Laying out Florida’s blueprint for success, mimics Ole Miss

No one truly knows what to make of Florida heading into Billy Napier’s second season. The only expectation is that the Gators are only going to be so good within the SEC, especially considering their quarterback situation.

However, On3’s J.D. PicKell believes we’re all looking at Florida from the wrong angle. In a segment of ‘The Hard Count’ while at SEC Media Days, PicKell explained why the Gator’s backfield deserves more love. He said that they may have one of the best running back tandems in the country but that you wouldn’t know about it necessarily with how many are discussing the rest of the roster.

“I think we’re looking at Florida all wrong,” PicKell said. “You look at what Florida has in that backfield and that’s going to be their bread and butter now. That’s going to be the foundation of this offense.”

“You’re giving the ball to your backfield a whole heck of a lot of the time,” continued PicKell. “Florida, very quietly, has one of the best backfields in America. And the fact that Graham Mertz is their quarterback and the fact that their defense wasn’t phenomenal last year, I think, is getting a lot of the spotlight.”

With how the game is today, playing a rushing style over a passing attack isn’t always favorable to the fans at home. Even so, in order to win, PicKell believes that philosophy could take them much further next season, especially considering what Ole Miss did with very similar circumstances a year ago.

“What Florida has in front of them, I believe? The blueprint to be successful, to a degree, has already been laid out for them from what a certain team in the SEC did last year. That’s Ole Miss,” said PicKell. “Look at what Ole Miss did a season ago. They allowed 27 points a game? Still not great. They had a quarterback that threw 20 touchdowns and 11 interceptions? That’s not great. But what did they do effectively? They ran the football like nobody’s business. They committed to it, ran the ball 60% of the time. You had a running back in Quinshon Judkins that went over 1,500 yards on the season. They averaged 250+ yards a game running the football.”

“That’s the key difference there. For Florida, they ran the football at a rate of 193 yards a game. That’s really good. But to be able to be as successful as I think they want to be this coming season in Gainesville? They’ve probably got to be over that 200 number, probably over that 220 yards a game number,” PicKell said. “It’s a tall order but you look at this backfield? They’ve got the guys to do it. Trevor Etienne was only a freshman last year, Montrell Johnson’s first year on campus as a Florida Gator. They’re going to lean on them a lot more heavily than they did last season because you also had to make sure AR got his in the run game as well. But when I look at Florida? I think the formula is very much so there.”

Ole Miss went 8-5 in 2022 by putting much of the offensive load on Judkins and Zach Evans. With Jaxson Dart at quarterback and the No. 57 defense in the country, the rest of their production was pedestrian at times.

Still, that’s the formula which PicKell believes Florida could thrive best within this year. Considering how low the Gator’s expectations are from the outside, he says they just need to pick up the wins however they can to show where their program is headed under Napier. In the end, PicKell thinks this is how they do it considering how recently it has been proven in their league.

“You look at what Ole Miss did last year? A quarterback with, essentially, a 2-to-1 touchdown to interception ratio, ran the ball really well, and the defense was eh and left something to be desired. They won eight football games in the SEC!,” exclaimed PicKell. “Ole Miss, with that formula, with a quarterback that wasn’t lighting the world on fire and a defense that struggled relatively frequently, depending on which game you look at, still won eight football games.”

“Florida? I promise you. They would take eight wins. They would take eight wins to the bank,” PicKell said. “Heck, I think they’d take six or seven wins to the bank. Because 2023 is about trajectory. Nobody is projecting Florida to win the SEC. That’s not what 2023 is about. 2023 is about creating some momentum, showing a positive trend, and showing where this thing is headed.”