Tag: Gainesville Sun

Who ruled Florida in football recruiting for June? The answer might surprise you.

You’ll be surprised which school won the recruiting war in the Sunshine State last month.

The college football recruiting trail was blazing hot in June matching the rising mercury, and while there were some ups and downs over the past 30 days, overall the Gators hung tough as the dog days of summer continue to roll in.

One of new head coach [autotag]Billy Napier[/autotag]’s biggest goals in turning around a struggling Florida football program is to dominate the recruiting scene within his school’s home state. Despite the recent decommitment from one three-star Sunshine State prospect, seven of the Gators’ current eight commits hail from the Sunshine State. However, the Orange and Blue were not the overall winners on their home turf last month.

According to Jon Santucci and Chris Boyle over at the Gainesville Sun, it was the Ohio State Buckeyes who lured the most top prospects from the Gators’ own backyard in their recent ranking of the 10 schools that fared the best on the recruiting trail in the nation’s southern-most state. Here is how they justified their No. 1 pick.

If it feels like Florida boundaries should be redrawn to add Columbus, there’s a good reason. Ohio State has dominated the state this cycle with six commitments. The Buckeyes put an exclamation point on an already loaded class with the top two receivers in the state (and maybe the nation) in Tate and Inniss. Anything the Buckeyes do in Florida between now and December will just be showing off.

While a northern school coming in and carpetbagging talent from the south is enough to get any Gator fan’s blood boiling, Florida did rank second on the list (keeping in mind that this was published before the recent decommitment news).

Billy Napier and his staff had a great close to the month, picking up commitments from defensive lineman [autotag]Gavin Hill[/autotag], cornerback [autotag]Sharif Denson[/autotag], edge rusher [autotag]Isaiah Nixon[/autotag] and offensive lineman [autotag]Tommy Kinsler[/autotag] in an eight-day period. The Gators now have eight players committed from Florida and, from what we’re hearing, are doing a great job building relationships around the state.

Florida is followed by the Miami Hurricanes at No. 3, with the South Carolina Gamecocks, Clemson Tigers, Pitt Panthers, Michigan State Spartans, Cincinnati Bearcats, Rutgers Scarlet Knights and Maryland Terrapins trailing behind, respectively. The Alabama Crimson Tide, Oklahoma Sooners, Tennesee Volunteers, Texas A&M Aggies and UCF Knights all earned honorable mentions on the list.

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LSU tight end Arik Gilbert stays in SEC, announces he’ll transfer to Florida

Florida has added another former five-star recruit from the transfer portal, landing LSU tight end Arik Gilbert.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published by The Gainesville Sun and has been republished in its entirety below. 

Florida has added another former five-star recruit from the transfer portal, landing LSU tight end Arik Gilbert.

Gilbert announced his decision Sunday on Twitter to join the Gators.

“After careful consideration I have decided to commit to the University of Florida. This is the best situation for me and I’m excited to join the family,” Gilbert wrote.

As a freshman, the 6-5, 249-pound Gilbert caught 35 passes for 368 yards and two touchdowns with the Tigers. He was rated a consensus five-star recruit and the nation’s No. 1 tight end in the Class of 2020 out of Marietta, Georgia.

Gilbert will help fill the void left by Mackey Award winner Kyle Pitts, a projected first-round NFL draft pick. His record-setting production last season undoubtedly attracted Gilbert to the Gators.

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He is the latest five-star transfer for Florida coach Dan Mullen and his staff. The Gators have landed Brenton Cox Jr., Justin Shorter, Lorenzo Lingard Jr. and Demarkcus Bowman from the portal in recent years, along with Trevon Grimes before the 2018 season.

And this month, the Gators have already added grad transfers Daquan Newkirk (defensive tackle Auburn), Antonio Shelton (defensive tackle Penn State) and Jace Christmann (kicker Mississippi State).

Despite the early departure of Pitts, Florida assistant Tim Brewster has a ton of talent to coach in his tight end room: Veteran Kemore Gamble, rising junior Keon Zipperer and redshirt freshman Jonathan Odom, as well as Gilbert and incoming freshmen Nick Elksnis and Gage Wilcox.

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Gators News: October 14, 2020

19 players were reported to have contracted the coronavirus,

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Well, the good news this Wednesday is that we made it to the middle of another week; the bad news is that the University of Florida’s football team currently has an outbreak of COVID-19. While the game is still scheduled to proceed at 4 p.m. EDT Saturday, there are plenty of questions surrounding whether or not the match will be played.

On that topic, the Gainesville Sun’s football beat writer Robbie Andreu talks a bit about the outbreak in this article. Additionally, Texas A&M Director of Athletics Ross Bjork said the Aggies have not been impacted as of Tuesday.

In other Gators football news, Kyle Trask dropped to third place in USA TODAY Sports’ latest Heisman Trophy Watch, behind first-place Clemson Tigers quarterback Trevor Lawrence and Alabama Crimson Tide quarterback Mac Jones, who leapfrogged over Trask this week. Florida’s gunslinger received five second-place and four third-place votes this time around.

Around the Swamp

It’s great to be a Florida Gator!

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Best and worst case scenarios for Florida Gators football in 2020

But while it’s easy to look at UF’s schedule in 2020 and imagine the best-case scenarios, it’s also worth considering where the floor is.

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It’s no secret that expectations surrounding coach Dan Mullen and the Florida Gators heading into the 2020 season are high.

Mullen is 21-5 in two years at Florida with two New Year’s Six Bowl wins, and many believe this will be the year the Gators go from conference title contention to national title contention.

But while it’s easy to look at UF’s schedule in 2020 (which appears to line up favorably) and imagine the best-case scenarios, it’s also worth considering where the floor is this fall.

The USA TODAY Network released predicted best-case and worst-case scenarios for each SEC team, and the projections, written by the Gainesville Sun’s Robbie Andreu, demonstrates a wide range of possible outcomes for UF.

Florida

Best case: 10-0

If the Gators can successfully navigate their way through the pandemic and keep everyone on the field, they’ll have a chance to win every game. The offense should be potent with the quarterback combination of Kyle Trask and dual-threat Emory Jones operating behind a more experienced offensive line. The defense is fast and athletic and could be one of the best coordinator Todd Grantham has put on the field.

Worst case: 6-4

The Gators enter the season with all kinds of momentum coming off a second consecutive top-10 season under coach Dan Mullen. But that momentum could come to an abrupt end if they falter in that opening trap game at Ole Miss against coach Lane Kiffin. If UF takes a loss there, the Gators then have at least three more possible losses (at Texas A&M, LSU and Georgia). Kentucky and Tennessee also are far from guaranteed wins.

— Robbie Andreu

While it seems highly unlikely Florida will be able to navigate 10 conference games and remain unblemished, a four-loss season also seems unlikely. Losses to Texas A&M, LSU and Georgia would render the season an abject failure, and a fourth loss would add insult to injury.

But at the same time, losing all three of those games and also dropping a game to Ole Miss, Kentucky or Tennessee doesn’t seem like a probable outcome given the talent UF returns.

Ultimately, the actual outcome will almost certainly fall somewhere in between, but now that the Big Ten is back, the Gators have a much thinner margin for error if they want to make the College Football Playoff.

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Gators and Bulldogs are locked up in the SEC East per USA TODAY Network poll

Alabama is the clear-cut favorite to win the SEC this year, but — as usual — there is a division between Georgia and Florida.

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Editor’s note: Gators Wire took part in the USA TODAY Sports poll among all SEC team publications represented in the network. The overall results were published by Pat Dooley of the Gainesville Sun on Friday and have been republished in full below. 

Alabama is the clear-cut favorite to win the SEC this year, but — as usual — there is a division between Georgia and Florida.

With no SEC Media Days this summer, the USA Today Network held its own among the SEC coverage team members virtually, and Alabama was the unanimous pick not only to win the West but the overall SEC crown.

In the East, it was a dead heat, with Florida and Georgia finishing in a tie when the votes were tabulated (at 97 points). Georgia did have one more first-place vote than Florida.

Tennessee (72) was a distant third in the East voting, followed by Kentucky (64), South Carolina (45), Missouri (33) and Vanderbilt (15).

Points were compiled on a 7-6-5, etc., basis, with seven points going to the predicted winner of the division.

In the West, the race for second behind Alabama was close, with defending national champion LSU getting the nod with 78 points to Auburn‘s 76 and Texas A&M’s 71.

Ole Miss was fifth (40 points), followed by Mississippi State with 34 and Arkansas with 15.

The beat writers also selected preseason honors and an All-SEC team heading into the season, which begins Saturday, Sept. 26.

Florida coach Dan Mullen was named the preseason coach of the year, with Mark Stoops of Kentucky finishing second.

In preseason player of the year balloting, Alabama running back Najee Harris was the pick, with four players tying for second.

The preseason newcomer of the year was quarterback K.J. Costello of Mississippi State, the transfer from Stanford expected to take the reins in the Mike Leach offense. LSU freshman tight end Arik Gilbert finished second in the voting.

Not surprisingly, Alabama led the way with eight players being selected on the preseason All-SEC team. No other school had more than three, and fourth-ranked Georgia had only two. No second or third team was selected by the voters.

As for the Crimson Tide, Harris, receiver DeVonta Smith and linebacker Dylan Moses were unanimous choices.

The other unanimous picks were Florida tight end Kyle Pitts, LSU defensive back Derek Stingley Jr. and Tennessee offensive lineman Trey Smith.

Gators Wire will be releasing its votes as well as explanations for our decision shortly.

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