Joel Klatt breaks down Florida's chances of making first College Football Playoff in 2025

Florida and the College Football Playoff could be a reality in 2025, but the Gators have to go through a ridiculous schedule as Joel Klatt points out. The Fox Sports’ college football analyst likes what Florida has built ahead of the season, but the slate of games is still insane on paper.

Billy Napier, DJ Lagway and more are the ones to watch out for. New guys will step up as well as Gainesville would love to celebrate a highly successful season.

But that schedule is brutal. Florida will have its challenges, but if the team is as talented as Klatt suggests, maybe they’ll come out clean on the other side.

“There’s a lot to like about this Florida team,” Klatt said on his podcast. “They could be a top 15 team to start the year. DJ Lagway, he looks like a potential star. Has some weapons on the outside, five star true freshman Dallas Wilson, I think he could be a real factor early in the year. They’ve got quality running backs. So I like their backfield. They’ve been good, and I think will be good on the line of scrimmage, four starters back on the offensive line, including Jake Slaughter. Jake Slaughter was an all American at center. Their defense, they still have guys like Tyreak Sapp, really good player, Caleb Banks on the defensive line. 

“The defense, I thought, improved under Ron Roberts. That’s a good team. Look what they did late last year. I think Billy Napier has done an excellent job. You look at how hot his seat was at the beginning of the season, and then what they were able to do and now with some momentum moving forward.” 

But as Klatt pointed out, similar to last year, Florida’s schedule is brutal. With an extremely difficult slate, 9-3 actually might get the Gators to the College Football Playoff.

That’s only if they can win the right games and actually win nine games in the first place. Can they be the first three-loss team in the CFP? Maybe. Can they make the CFP? It’s a possibility, but they’ll need a monumental effort this fall.

“Their schedule is brutal,” Klatt said. “I mean, just look at September alone at LSU, at Miami. That’s brutal. Then in October, they’ve got Texas coming to town. They’ve got to go to Texas A&M, then in November, they’ve got Georgia. They’ve got to go to Ole Miss like, hello, hello, what are we doing Florida? That’s going to be brutal. If Florida can somehow go 9-3, that means that they’ve got wins over really quality opponents, and they can go to the playoff. They also have Tennessee. They also have Florida State … I know last year 9-3 was the barrier, and teams did not get in at 9-3. 

“With this schedule, if Florida were to go 9-3. … Let’s just say Georgia beats them and Texas beats them, and let’s just say at LSU, that’s a loss. Okay, so those will be the three losses, which means they would have wins at Miami, at Texas A&M, at Ole Miss, against Tennessee and against Florida State. So at 9-3, Florida would be in but that’s still a Herculean task for them.”