Just a week ago, this was Dan Mullen’s breakout season as the coach of the Florida Gators.
But now his team needs to make sure it doesn’t turn into a breakdown season.
The Gators, as expected, were beaten 52-46 by Saban’s Cyborgs — aka the No. 1-ranked Alabama Crimson Tide — in a closer-than-expected SEC Championship Game shootout on Saturday night in Atlanta. It was a game that sent conflicting messages to Gator Nation: It showed just how far Mullen’s program has come and it also showed how far it has to go.
The fact that the Gators got themselves back within a touchdown in the fourth quarter against an undefeated Alabama team that had beaten everybody on its schedule by at least 15 points could be considered a moral victory, but moral victories are for the Vanderbilts and South Carolinas of the world, not the Florida Gators.
Gator Nation should not be feeling good just because UF covered the spread in in the SEC Championship Game. You should never feel good when your team makes a bunch of mental mistakes and clock-management blunders that might have kept you from winning a conference title. You should never feel good when your team scores 46 points — and loses. And you should never feel good when your defense gives up 52 points, 33 first downs and 605 yards of total offense.
The last time the Gators were in the SEC Championship Game, it was Jim McElwain’s second season and Alabama crushed Florida 54-16. It was obvious then the Gators were SEC pretenders and McElwain was fired a year later when the bottom fell out of the UF program.
Obviously, Mullen has vastly improved UF’s program since the days of McElwain but, still, you don’t want to end the season with one of those McElwain Specials in which the team qualifies for the SEC Championship Game and then limps to the finish line with multiple losses. Which is why it’s imperative for the Gators to get ready and primed to play Big 12 champion Oklahoma in the Cotton Bowl. It would be a shame if Mullen’s team ended the season with three consecutive losses.
As close as the Gators played Alabama, it certainly didn’t make up for last week’s embarrassing loss to LSU, which qualifies as one of the worst defeats in school history. The Gators were 24-point favorites, were at home on Senior Day and had everything to play for. All they needed to do was beat depleted and downtrodden LSU and it would have sent them into the SEC Championship Game with momentum and confidence and a chance to advance into the College Football Playoff semifinals with a victory over the Crimson Tide. In fact, a case could be made that if Gators had beaten LSU last week, they might have advanced to the College Football Playoff semifinals (in place of Notre Dame) even with Saturday night’s close loss to Alabama.
There’s no question, the embarrassing loss to LSU sucked much of the momentum out of Florida’s season. When Mullen was asked earlier in the week if his two-loss team could still advance to the playoff with a victory over Bama, he tried to reinvigorate his players with some confidence when he answered, “We’ll think about that on Saturday night after we win.”
There was likely some false bravado involved in Mullen’s comment, but his team took his positivity to heart. Even though Alabama never trailed in the game on Saturday and led by 18 going into halftime, the Gators kept coming back.
They came back despite Alabama quarterback Mac Jones throwing for 418 yards and five TDs. They came back despite Alabama running back Najee Harris running for 178 yards and two touchdowns and catching another three TD passes. They came back despite Alabama wide receiver DeVonta Smith catching 15 passes for 184 yards and two TDs. They came back despite some critical mistakes in the first half, including a pair of penalties on apparent third-down stops, extending two drives that turned into touchdowns.
Even though the loss may have cost UF quarterback Kyle Trask the Heisman Trophy, he matched Jones nearly yard for yard. Trask threw for 408 yards and three TDs and ran for another score. Meanwhile, Kadarius Toney had eight catches for 153 yards and a touchdown and Kyle Pitts caught seven balls for 129 yards and a score.
“Maybe it’ll be good for us to be in a dogfight because we were certainly in one tonight,” said Alabama coach Nick Saban, whose team will now advance into the College Football Playoff semifinals.
Said Mullen: “We never stopped competing until the clock struck zeroes. I thought we showed a lot of character as a team. We’ve got some young guys now who are going to be hungry to get back to this game. Our focus will be to get here again next year and compete to win it.”
But first comes No. 7 Florida’s Cotton Bowl matchup with No. 6 Oklahoma.
A bowl victory over the high-powered Sooners would quickly give UF its mojo back heading into next year, but a loss would end this year with three consecutive defeats and an 8-4 record.
Even with the so-called moral victory over Alabama, Mullen’s breakout season would then suddenly seem more like a breakdown season.
