Gator bite:
It’s early in the college football season, but Florida is flashing an offense last seen in the SEC during LSU’s romp to a national title. Meanwhile, something is awfully wrong with Oklahoma.
We are very early in an admittedly strange and unpredictable college football season, but it’s worth asking: Does Florida have the potential to be this year’s LSU?
Two games is a small sample size, but we’ve seen enough of the Gators’ offense to know that they’re going to score and score and score and score. Though their defense is still a question mark, that was the formula LSU used last year to rampage through the Southeastern Conference, setting all kinds of offensive records while allowing a ton of points until their defense caught up later on in the season.
Gators quarterback Kyle Trask is probably not on the level of Joe Burrow, but he’s played well through two weeks and there are some pretty interesting comparisons between the Florida receivers group and the deep roster of playmakers LSU had last season.
Kyle Pitts, the best passcatching tight end in the country, had four receptions and two touchdowns in an Oct. 3 38-24 win over South Carolina while Kadarius Toney had six receptions for 86 yards. Four other players caught at least one pass of more than 10 yards. Trask has a ton of options, and coach Dan Mullen is one of the best at building an offense that makes opponents cover the whole field. How good? Florida has had 21 offensive possessions this year against South Carolina and Mississippi. Of those, 11 have resulted in touchdowns, four in field goals, three in punts and three in turnovers.
We’ll learn everything we need to know about whether Florida’s offense is sustainable at this level over the next month or so, which includes games against LSU on Oct. 17 and Georgia on Nov. 7.
But so far, they look unstoppable enough to be the favorite
coming out of the SEC East – for now.
Here are other Week 5 takeaways:
h Anyone can be the victim of an upset in college football, as Oklahoma last week against Kansas State. But to back it up the following week with a 37-30 loss to Iowa State in which it looked thoroughly mediocre in pretty much every aspect of the game?
That’s a big warning sign, and given that Oklahoma’s College Football Playoff hopes are done, it’s something Lincoln Riley and athletics director Joe Castiglione are going to have to face realistically and figure out what needs to be done.
The Sooners have a roster of mostly four- and five-star recruits and yet that talent level just doesn’t come through visually. We’ve known Oklahoma has deficiencies, especially on defense. And we knew the Sooners were going to play a young quarterback this year in Spencer Rattler. But where’s the next great group of wide receivers? Why is the offensive line not really getting the job done?
And about that defense ... well, it’s still not good enough. Leading 30-23, Oklahoma gave up an 85-yard kickoff return that set up a tying touchdown. Then the Sooners failed to tackle Breece Hall, who finished
with 139 yards on 28 carries including a 36-yarder that set up the winning touchdown.
Put it all together, and we’re in five-alarm fire territory. This isn’t an isolated incident. Here’s a stat worth pondering: In Oklahoma’s last 10 games, the Sooners are 6-4.
h Georgia’s response to a mediocre effort in its season opener against Arkansas was to flex all over Auburn in a game that has felt like it was decided on national signing day the past couple of years. The Bulldogs just have better players, particularly on the line of scrimmage, and their 27-6 victory was a reminder of why so many people buy into Georgia despite red flags about their offense over the years.
The speed on defense, the brutally effective pass rush, the running game that you can rely on? It’s all there. They always look like a traditional powerhouse SEC team. And when it works as well as it did last weekend, it’s incredibly impressive to watch.
The Bulldogs throttled Auburn in every way, allowing just 216 yards and making Tigers quarterback Bo Nix (21 of 40 completions, 177 yards, 1 interception) look like he hasn’t progressed at all from last season.
Stetson Bennett didn’t make any big mistakes and completed 17 of 28 passes for 240 yards.
It was good enough against Auburn, but will it be good enough against Alabama? We still have our doubts. h Though it was always going to be a long shot for an American Athletic Conference team to make the playoff, the league’s chances were hurt pretty badly by UCF’s surprising 34-26 loss to Tulsa.
Had Central Florida and Cincinnati remained unbeaten until their meeting on Nov. 21, both teams would have likely been in the top 10, creating the kind of game that the entire country would have been invested in watching.