ESPN analyst Greg McElroy names Florida among his 3 most disappointing teams this season

The Florida Gators entered the 2025 regular season ranked No. 15 in the preseason AP Top 25 poll. Excitement was high around Gainesville coming off an 8-5 season in 2024. UF ended that season on a four-game winning streak, with two of those against Top 25 opponents. The Gators started this season with a blowout over LIU in week one. However, the team stumbled in the following weeks with losses to USF, LSU, and Miami in that order.

McElroy talks about Florida’s season up to this point

Like many college football analysts, ESPN’s Greg McElroy was high on Florida heading into the regular season. The Gators’ struggles have made the noise surrounding the future of head coach Billy Napier loud, and UF’s schedule won’t get any easier in future weeks. McElroy understands that two of Florida’s three losses came against Top 5 opponents. It’s the struggles on offense that have them on his list as one of the most disappointing teams so far.

“I had them at No. 16 in the preseason,” McElroy said on the Always College Football Podcast. “To start the way they’ve started is really disappointing. And I don’t think I had them winning against LSU on the road, wouldn’t have had them winning on the road at Miami. Those two teams I loved, both had them in the top 10 there in the preseason. But losing to USF, and the big issue at Florida is how out of sorts they look offensively.”

The struggles of Gators quarterback DJ Lagway also highlight McElroy’s factors of why Florida has not played well on offense.

“Their identity has been running the football,” he said. “They haven’t been elite running the football. I thought their quarterback, DJ Lagway, was a top 10 quarterback coming into the season. He hasn’t played that way, not even close to being able to reaching his potential. Here’s hoping they can get things back on track.”

Penn State and Clemson were the other programs included on McElroy’s most disappointing teams so far this season.

Florida has a chance to bounce back this weekend against Texas

The Florida Gators had a BYE this past week. That allowed the team to look under the hood and see what can be done to improve the team’s future. Florida will be back in The Swamp for their first home game in almost a month and host the No. 9-ranked Texas Longhorns. The Gators need several players to step up to get a much-needed win, but getting DJ Lagway looking the way he did last season as a freshman is one of the top adjustments needed.

“I think that he improves with each full-speed rep that he gets,” Florida head coach Billy Napier said this week. “We obviously had an open date last week, so that presented an opportunity for him to get more work. Obviously, he’s had a very challenging offseason in terms of time missed, and I think that we’re trying to get him caught up, right? It’s all about feedback for me at quarterback, right?

Every time I take a snap, or play a play, or process, or the ball comes off my hand, I’m self-correcting, right? I’m improving my process in terms of how I communicate, how I process, my decision making, and just what I can get away with, my anticipation, my accuracy, and I think that’s been ultimately the challenge for us is trying to get him ramped up. I think this is the sixth week of real practice, so he’s working his tail off, and I think that with each rep that he takes, I think he’s getting more and more comfortable.”

Florida and Texas will kick off from Ben Hill Griffin Stadium this Saturday at 3:30 and will be broadcast on ESPN. It’s the first meeting between these two teams in Gainesville since 1940, and only their fifth meeting all-time.