Florida football three keys: Tennessee

Three-keys-Florida

Florida football visits Tennessee on Saturday. Here are your three keys to a Gator victory.

By Matt Zemek

This particular Florida-Tennessee game has a strong callback to 2001. The Florida Gators hope to avoid the fate of their 2001 team on Saturday in Neyland Stadium.

In 2001, the September 11 attacks had the effect of (among many other things) postponing Florida’s game against Tennessee. The Vols were a mystery team entering that 2001 season. No one knew how good they would be. Florida, on the other hand, had just won the 2000 SEC championship and had Rex Grossman coming back to lead an offense everyone knew would be great.

Had Florida played Tennessee in the usual September slot, the Gators likely would have crushed the Vols. Instead, the postponement into the month of December gave Tennessee time to develop as a team. Casey Clausen, Travis Stephens, and the rest of the Tennessee offense controlled the ball and the clock against an outmatched Alex Brown and the rest of Florida’s defense. UT stunned UF, 34-32, knocking the Gators out of the national title race.

A full 19 years later, we have another Tennessee-Florida game originally scheduled for an earlier part of the year, but moved into December due to unforeseen – and tragic – reasons. Florida is once again in the national championship hunt. Tennessee is trying to spoil Florida’s season. It all feels very familiar. Let’s see if the Gators can avoid being ambushed with everything to play for.

1 – Withstand the early storm

Tennessee is a good first-half team. The Vols led Arkansas 13-0 on the road at halftime. They led Georgia at halftime in Athens. They were tied at Auburn at halftime. They start games authoritatively, with focus and clarity. Florida – which started slowly against Kentucky in its most recent game – can’t stumble and bumble out of the gate. The thing which can get the Gators beaten in Knoxville is a terrible start which puts them down 10, 14 or 17 points in the first half, which causes a sense of panic and enables Tennessee’s pass rush to pin its ears back and get after Kyle Trask.

In mentioning that Tennessee is a good first-half team, the other side of the coin is that the Vols have been horrendous in second halves. They have been outscored 81-14 in the second halves of their last four games. If Florida gets through the first half tied or with a small lead, the Gators should feel good about their chances in the second half, barring an unexpected plot twist.

2 – The other man

Kyle Pitts is back, which means he will get Tennessee’s full attention in film study. This is a great time for Dan Mullen – one of the best play-callers and play-designers in college football – to find another target who can benefit from all the focus Jeremy Pruitt will devote to Pitts. Whether it’s a wheel route to the running backs or Kadarius Toney being used in any number of ways, Mullen has a chance to use Kyle Pitts as the bright shiny object which leads the Tennessee defense to overextend itself, creating openings for another Gator to have a very big day as a pass catcher.

3 – Routine defensive plays

Florida’s oft-maligned defense did against Kentucky what it needs to do in every game: make routine plays. That’s it. This defense is never going to be great, but it doesn’t have to be with Heisman Trophy contender Kyle Trask slinging the rock and rolling up big numbers on offense. The Gators just have to make the routine plays on a regular basis. If Tennessee scores 24 points, that’s not a great showing by any means… but Florida should win comfortably if that’s the case, because the Mullen-Trask offense exists in another league. If the Vols score in the mid-30s, that would be a problem… and if UT does score in the mid-30s, you can trust that Florida will have failed to make routine defensive plays often enough to change the equation.

Saturday‘s game kicks off at 2:30 PM CT (3:30 PM ET). You can watch this Florida football game on the CBS Network.

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