What they said: Gators finish with another losing record in SEC play

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Vanderbilt not only won its first game against the Gators in Nashville in 24 years, but Florida’s upset loss Saturday marked back-to-back losing records in SEC play for the first time since 1958-59.

UF dropped to 3-5 in SEC play (2-6 last season) and 6-5 overall, while the Commodores improved to 5-6 (2-5 SEC) and are one win away from bowl eligibility.

Here’s what both teams had to say after the Gators’ 31-24 loss at Vandy.

Billy Napier on the Gators’ loss to Vandy:

“You have to give Vanderbilt some credit, they did some things today well. There was a lot of Florida beating Florida out there today. That’s my job is to have the players ready to play — we did not do that today. I think our group understands what happened out there today and ultimately not enough to win. It’s that simple. A lot of the things we’ve been doing we were not able to do today.”

Napier on Jason Marshall’s muffed punt:

“It’s a product of losing two players. Then you’ve got your third out there and nobody wants to do their job more for the team than Jason Marshall. He made an in-game decision there, he made a mistake in the game, much like a lot of our players in the game made mistakes. The great thing is he responded as a competitor and made a great play later in the game.”

Napier on a season-low 45 rushing yards:

“They did a good job of fitting the run. They played inside out. They forced us to throw it to the perimeter at times. They made Anthony hand the ball off at times. There’s a lot of different things that contributed to that.” 

Clark Lea on Vandy’s second straight win:

“I told them last week that we’re going to do more of these celebrations. They responded, the week of prep was great. We’re going to be happy with that one. There’s going to be stuff to clean up. We want to fight for postseason, that’s what we’ll do.”

Lea on scoring two TDs off UF turnovers:

“We capitalized on mistakes today. I’m going to be honest, it wasn’t a perfect league game, but we capitalized on mistakes, we played Vanderbilt football and made the plays when we needed to make them, including the one there at the end.”

Lea on limiting the Gators’ rushing attack:

“We knew we had to stop the run, they did that. We knew if we forced them to throw to beat us, that they were going to have trouble. Proud of them, obviously. There’s going to be some things that we want to get back and get better at, but on the whole, we got a win, we’re going to celebrate a win.”

Anthony Richardson on his performance:

“We lost, so. You know, I could have done some things better. Made some better reads, better checks for us or even been a better leader. So, just got to work. That’s all. … I definitely missed opportunities. You know, red zone scoring opportunities, that’s where we want to take advantage of. We didn’t do that today, so that’s why we lost.”

Richardson on his INT in the third quarter:

“I was kind of frustrated because I was trying to throw it away but I noticed my guy Thai trying to make a play for me so I can’t fault him. I’ve just got to eat it, take the sack. Turnovers you don’t want. That’s the only thing that’s messing with me, putting turnovers on the board. But other than that I’m not really worried about it.”

Amari Burney on dealing with the loss:

“I mean, it’s very difficult whenever you lose a game. When you play football, nobody likes to lose. You like to win. It’s very difficult knowing we didn’t play our best ball today. … Shoot, we’ll regroup. It’s football. You win some, you lose some, you fight to live to fight another day.”

Burney on Ventrell Miller being ejected:

“We put [Derek] Wingo in the game and Wingo didn’t miss a beat out there. Ventrell was still on the sideline coaching. Still telling Wingo what to do, what he sees. Just not having him on the field, but he was still in the mix. It’s very tough to see a leader like that go out of the game because of a mistake. I didn’t see the targeting, but it was really just a mistake that he did. And shoot, it’s just something we have to live with now.”