Tag: Pat Dooley

OPINION: The bottom line that led to the dismissal of Dan Mullen?

Pat Dooley explains why Dan Mullen had to go.

It was just too toxic.

It was kind of where it was when they finally let go of Will Muschamp despite him trying to cling to life.

The problem is that if you had retained Mullen, you would have had an offseason of negativity and then open the season with Utah and Kentucky.

So, losses in either or both games get you right back where you were Sunday morning.

To me, that is the overwhelming reason to go ahead and do the difficult thing. I know, Florida is getting into that cycle where it is becoming a serial dater, liking a coach until he loses and then dumping him because there might be someone better out there. Someone who doesn’t eat their peas one at a time.

The fall from grace was the most dramatic I have seen at Florida, to go from a coach that was considered one of the best in the country to fired in less than a year.

It’s sad for the seniors who deserved better than playing their final game at home with a skeleton staff.

But it had to be done.

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10 important ahead of Florida’s meeting with Missouri on Saturday

Pat Dooley gives his breakdown of 10 things to know ahead of the Mizzou game.

Florida football fans never dreamed they would be here in the fourth season under Dan Mullen, needing a win in one of UF’s last two games just to become bowl eligible and the team likely playing for the head coach’s job.

And yet, here they are knowing that going to Missouri is never easy.

Still, for some reason, Florida opened as a 10-point favorite on the road against a team with the same record. It was set down quickly to 7.5 and is now back up to 8.5. What do the wise guys know that we don’t see? Because when we look at Mizzou, we see a team that has been disappointing but also fits the mold of how to beat Florida.

We’ll get to that as we take a look at one of three sets of Tigers in the SEC:

10 fascinating facts ahead of Florida football’s meeting with the Samford Bulldogs

Pat Dooley gives his breakdown of 10 things to know ahead of the Samford game.

Tickets are not hard to come by for Florida’s first game in the Swamp in over a month.

That’s what happens when you’re 4-5 and have already clinched a losing SEC record.

Florida will face Samford at noon on Saturday in front of what likely will be a restless crowd if anything goes wrong. With Florida’s performances over the last three games, Gator fans are looking at a game that was expected to be a sure win and are wondering if this team has any gas left in the tank.

Two coaches fired. Head coach answering tough questions. Recruiting slipping.

Florida could use a feel-good day. But with this team, nothing is guaranteed.

Let’s talk some Samford football (and quit calling it Stanford or Sanford):

Did you know Florida football has played Samford twice? Well, kinda.

Some interesting history ahead of the Samford game that Pat Dooley dug up.

Florida has never played Samford before Saturday’s game in the Swamp. Well, they did play against the school when it was named Howard College. So, we do have a little history to explore this week as we take a look back:

Sunday Hash: Diving deep into the Gamecocks’ butchering of the Gators

The Gamecocks grilled the Gators on Saturday night. Come get a serving of Sunday’s reflections from Pat Dooley.

Pat Dooley takes a deep dive into Florida’s embarrassing 40-17 loss to South Carolina Saturday night in with his weekly Sunday Hash feature. The loss sinks Dan Mullen‘s program into depths unforeseen and raises a lot of questions about the future of the program. Here’s a prime cut from Saturday night’s BBQ in Columbia, South Carolina. 

10 things you should know about the Florida-Georgia game

Pat Dooley preps us up with his 10 important facts heading into this weekend’s rivalry game.

Any time you get to a big game week – and despite Florida’s record it is a big game – you will hear plenty of theories on how one team or the other can win the game.

Then, the game starts. And everything is blown out the window.

Take Florida’s loss to Kentucky. We all supposed that if the Gators could defend well and limit the running game, Florida would win. Of course, none of us had the game-changing drastically on a blocked field goal that went for a game-changing touchdown or that Florida’s advantage in the running game would be offset by 15 penalties.

Often in games like Florida-Georgia, the things we don’t think of jump up and change the game. Like Florida using a fake field goal that turned former walk-on Michael McNeely into a folk hero would spark a Florida win in 2014.

Or that Judd Davis would kick four field goals in the worst conditions ever for the game and Anthone Lott would call the most timely time-out in the history of the series to allow the Gators to escape in the 1993 game.

They may be hidden stats, but all we can go by going into the game is what each team has done so far this season.

So, let’s take a look:

Looking back at the last four winning streaks in the Florida-Georgia series

Pat Dooley reviews the last four winning streaks between the Florida Gators and Georgia Bulldogs.

It’s never easy finding a path to victory against a team that is ranked No. 1 in the country and has allowed only four touchdowns all season — one of them was a meaningless score as the clock hit 0:00.

Not easy at all.

Especially for a Florida team that leads the nation in passes picked off. And gave up 49 points in its last game.

But there is a reason why we play the games and you have to remember that every game is its own game. They write books about Florida-Georgia and if there is one reason for Florida to hope the next chapter is a good one, we have to hope the mathematical progression continues.

After the infamous Georgia Stomp game in 2007, each team has been on three-game winning streaks. First the Gators, then the Bulldogs, then the Gators, then the Bulldogs.

Florida broke the latest streak in 2020 so wouldn’t it make sense to keep it going?

Here’s a look at those four mild winning streaks and what happened in each of them:

A run-down of the men’s basketball team for the upcoming season

You know the type who comes to you after a bad football loss and asks when basketball season starts? Gator fans have been through this before.

Gator fans have been through this before. You know the type who comes to you after a bad football loss and asks when basketball season starts?

This is a more common question asked in Lexington most years, but with some of the lean times during the eras of Will Muschamp and Jim McElwain, it’s come up in the Gator Nation as well.

This year, despite three football losses, you don’t hear it much. And after the SEC released the vote on the projected order of finish for this season and the Gators were picked seventh. That is partly because the league is ridiculously good and partly because nobody is sure what to expect from Florida.

Which is why there is not a lot of noise about the start of the season even as football fans get closer to the edge of the ledge.

They don’t completely trust Mike White even though he gets them to the tournament every year. They know that Florida had two players drafted and others who left. They know that it is very unlikely we’ll see Keyontae Johnson play this year.

So, basketball? Meh.

But this could be a really interesting team because Colin Castleton, the 6-foot-10-inch center, came back and was a first-team selection of the preseason All-SEC team. And if Anthony Duruji can take another step in his improvement, he could be a major factor. Then there is 6-foot-6-inch true freshman Kowacie Reeves.

But this team will likely only go as far as its transfers can take them. There are four new ones and White went searching hard for guys who could defend and guys who could score.

“We called it portal diving,” White said.

Of course, this is not uncommon. At last count, there were 85 transfer players added to SEC rosters this year. The basketball slogan should be “Go Old or Go Home.”

“I feel old,” said Brandon McKissic, a 6-foot-3-inch guard from Missouri-Kansas City who is in his fifth and final year of college.

Then there’s Philandrous Fleming Jr., a two-time Big South Defensive Player of the Year from Charleston Southern. And C.J. Felder from Boston College and Myreon Jones from Penn State.

Everybody’s got transfers. It’s what you do with them that matters.

And what they want to do with their final chances in college.

“Being in Gainesville these six months has just been amazing,” said Fleming. “I’ve learned so much, grown so much. I’m becoming the player I’m supposed to be. I’m growing into the player I’m supposed to be.”

Well, that’s good to hear.

Because for a lot of these guys, this is Last Chance U. But that’s not why they were brought in. They were brought in to fill gaps on the team and instill a different level of maturity unlike a year ago when Florida was one of the youngest teams in the country.

“My biggest thing is being a leader, you know, being a voice of this team,” said McKissic, who was also the Defensive Player of the Year in his conference. “Being one of the older guys that, as well seasoned and had a lot of games played regardless of level,  it’s just, I gotta be that guy you know that can be a voice that can not only through adversity, you know, work through, work on the issues.”

Of course, nobody ever knows for sure how a team will blend together, especially when it has so many new faces that are also old faces. Basketball cultures are always fragile things.

And with this new Mike White team, he seems to have filled in the pieces well with the deep dives into the portal.

Not only does he feel like he has improved defensively, but it’s not like the four transfers never put the ball in the basket. They combined to score 3,882 points at their previous schools, the second-highest total of any transfer class.

“We’re still working on finding the identity and culture of his team,” White said. “We’re doing different things offensively, different from anything I have ever coached at Florida.

“This is the most skilled team I’ve had and it’s definitely the best passing team we’ve had at Florida. It’s the oldest team I’ve had. The basketball IQ, the older you get the better passer you become. And the four transfers, they all have some muscle on them. They can deliver a pounding; they can take a pounding.”

Now, you may be getting a little fired up and over your LSU hangover. But know that this league may be the best it has been in a long time when you go one-through-14. And you never know how players who were stars elsewhere will handle reduced minutes at UF.

We’re not that far away from finding out.

“When the big lights come on, all the fans, and there’s all the cameras and stuff, that can really change the team,” Jones said. “So I think the biggest part of that is just, you know, staying connected, keeping the egos at the door once the lights come on, too.”

Amen to that.

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Pat Dooley gives his first-half grades for Florida football

Let’s look at why they are sitting at 4-3 overall and 2-3 in the SEC by grading the rooms through seven games:

This was not what Florida football fans expected in 2021, even if the media did. All you heard in the summer was that Florida would take a step back this season, paving the way for an easy path for Georgia.

And now that it’s happened, everyone seems shocked.

Too much was put into the near-miss against Alabama as the measuring stick for how good this team is. In front of an amazing crowd, the Gators were this close to beating No. 1.

But they did not.

And what has happened since has a good chunk of the Gator Nation calling for mass firings and accountability. Dan Mullen’s reply to all of this has been, “We’ll evaluate everything. It’s a long season.”

Yeah, but it’s getting shorter every day. There are four games remaining after Georgia, Florida’s second game against a No. 1 team this season, and they are all games where the Gators are going to be huge favorites.

South Carolina and Missouri are a combined 1-6 in the SEC. FCS team Samford is 3-3 with a loss to Mercer already on its record. FSU is 2-4.

Which likely means an 8-4 record, a decent bowl game but certainly ending the streak of New Year’s Six bowl games under Mullen. Then again, Georgia’s bus could take a right on I-10 and the Gators might get a forfeit.

That’s a joke, of course. Like a lot of this season has been a joke. Seriously, Florida’s biggest win this year was a two-point loss.

So, let’s look at why they are here at 4-3 and 2-3 in the SEC by grading the rooms through seven games:

10 interesting tidbits about Florida’s matchup with the LSU Tigers

Take a look at Pat Dooley’s list of 10 fun facts for the Florida at LSU game this weekend.

When the season was still hot summer days away from starting, it was easy to point to Oct. 16 as a big day on the schedule.

Now, not so much.

Florida and LSU have combined for five losses this season and are clinging desperately to a chance to salvage a good season while knowing Atlanta is pretty much out.

This isn’t what we signed up for in August. An 11 a.m. local time game? (Good for Florida, but tells you about the status of this year’s contest). For the second straight year, one team isn’t ranked. And we’re looking at you LSU.

It doesn’t take away from the fact that these two teams don’t like each other and the fan bases get growling when they get together. Most of the animosity started with the postponement of the 2016 game because of Hurricane Matthew to the end of the season and the chirpiness that came out of Baton Rouge when we actually had a nice day on what would have been game day.

From there it escalated, but none of that means anything now. This is about two teams trying to find themselves while their fans wonder if they truly want to.