Floor to ceiling: Best and worst case for the Florida Gators 2023 season
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — There was a lot of change inside the football building this offseason. Most notably the Florida Gators lost starting quarterback Anthony Richardson, who was drafted fourth overall by the Indianapolis Colts. The Gators haven’t named a starting quarterback, have a 29-year-old defensive coordinator, and are coming off of a 6-7 season in which they lost their last three games.
Vegas noted all that and set Florida’s win total at 5.5 games (Draft Kings betting futures). It seems low but the men and women who set lines in Las Vegas don’t build palaces in the desert for being wrong. ESPN’s FPI has Florida as favorites in eight games next year but two games (Tennessee and Florida State) are essentially coin flips.
Florida’s 2023 football schedule is rough. The Gators will head west to face Utah to start the season. There, of course, are games with Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, and LSU, all teams who beat the Gators last season. With many questions left unanswered during spring camp, Florida’s stock is low.
Are you buying the dip?
Let’s look at the best and worst-case scenarios for the Gators in 2023.
In order to go through this exercise we’ll go through the games that should be won. Nothing is guaranteed but the Gators shouldn’t have an issue dispatching the mighty McNeese Cowboys or Charolette 49ers. Throw in Vanderbilt and we’ll start Florida at 3-0 for the purpose of this article.
Examining the best and worst-case scenarios for the Florida Gators
Best case
15-0 and the fourth national championship in school history.
If only it were that easy.
Let’s dig in. The season starts like 2023 did, a win over Utah. Cam Rising tore his ACL in the Rose Bowl. Even if he is able to play on August 31 is he back to full speed and playing like he’s capable of? The Utes also appear to be a second-half-of-the-season team. Florida gets them in week one and they win.
We’ll zoom through the rest of the month with wins over the two non-conference cupcakes and a home win over Tennessee. A 4-0 start to the season will have fans buzzing.
The Gators go on the road at Kentucky and stumble for the first time. Mark Stoops has had more success over Florida than the six coaches that preceded him. He’ll scheme a win, his third-straight over Florida, dropping the Gators to 4-1.
Florida picks up a home win over Vanderbilt to improve to 5-1 and find a way to win at South Carolina to make it 6-1.
Georgia. Back to Earth.
6-2.
The Gators will be favored in a home matchup against Arkansas. So for this best-case scenario we’ll add that to the win column. 7-2.
At LSU. Reality check.
7-3.
We’ll throw Missouri in the win column, although this is a game I feel has trap written all over it (more on that below). 8-3.
Florida State will be favored. This game is more of a coin flip, in my mind. I’m not as high on the Noles as some national media members are but FSU returns Jordan Travis who carved up the Gators in 2022 with his legs. He looked like he was covered in grease the way he slipped through tackles. That wasn’t just Florida being poor tacklers, Travis does that to teams. Since we’re viewing this game as a coin flip, we’ll give it to the Gators who are playing at home.
9-3.
Doomsday scenario
A loss at Utah is quickly overcome with a win over McNeese. Unfortunately, Tennessee comes in and the Gators drop to 1-2. The 49ers offer a respite from the second-straight loss to the Volunteers and the Gators get back to .500.
Is Kentucky a win? The Wildcats are replacing Willl Levis with Devin Leary. Florida has to go back to Lexington to play Kentucky. This is the worst-case scenario, so Florida drops a road game and an inexplicable three-straight to Kentucky and a 2-3 record.
The Gators get back to above .500 with wins over Vanderbilt and South Carolina. The Gamecocks are getting a lot of love with Spencer Rattler returning but the Gators’ defense handled him and the Gamecocks at home last year.
4-3.
Georgia.
4-4.
ESPN FPI gives the Gators a 66.2% chance of beating the Arkansas Razorbacks. Florida will likely be favored in this game. The Gators will need to contain KJ Jefferson, who should be settled into Dan Enos’ offense this late in the season. We’ll give Florida a win but this could be a trap game coming just a week after Georgia. 5-4.
At LSU. The Tigers could be in the thick of the SEC West race here and playing for a chance to go to Atlanta. Florida will be trying to gain bowl eligibility. The Tigers have won four in a row and eight of the last 10.
5-5
Here’s the shocker. Two teams that are sitting around .500 smells like a noon kickoff on SEC Network. That’s 11 am local. It will be early, mostly empty, and cold. This feels like a game that Florida loses for so many reasons. Is Missouri a better football team? No. Do Florida and Missouri have weird games? Absolutely. This series has never made sense. Coming off of a loss to LSU the Gators fall short in Columbia in a weird game late. 5-6.
Flordia State. The Gators nearly pulled off a win last year in Tallahassee. The Noles brought back a lot of talent. This season, like the 2022 season, ends with three straight losses and the Gators miss a bowl game.
Review
9-3 would be an incredible second season for Billy Napier and the Gators. Florida is coming off of two losing seasons in a row. If the Gators can win eight games and continue recruiting the way that they are now, it shows the positive trajectory for Napier and his program.
The doomsday scenario where Florida doesn’t make it to a bowl game would be disastrous. The Gators are tracking to have a top-five recruiting class, something they need to accomplish. Can you do that if you finish the season with just five wins?
The reality is probably somewhere in the middle. The Gators, right now, are probably closer to 5-7 than they are to 9-3. Florida has to show improvement on the field this year. They can do that while still going 6-6 or 7-5.
The post Floor to ceiling: Best and worst case for the Florida Gators 2023 season appeared first on On3.
