Florida football: Five ways the Gators can beat the Volunteers
Florida football: Let the corners play man
The real threat of Tennessee’s offense is playing up-tempo, getting a snap off within 20 seconds of the last play ending, forcing opposing defenses into a basic coverage, then burning teams deep.
There is no denying that the Volunteers can put up points. Last year they finished with the 7th highest scoring offense in college football and had the 13th best “Points per play,” scoring 7 points every 13 offensive plays that they ran.
They put up 45 points on a Kentucky defense that only gave up more than 30 on two other occasions last season.
So while these may be orange and blue colored glasses we are putting, Florida’s defense should feel decent about this matchup Tennessee’s strengths on offense play right into the hands of what Florida is also strong at.
If you were to take a poll of Florida football fans and ask them what the defense struggles at they would say:
- Linebackers filling the correct gaps on runs
- Defending tight ends
We already chronicled that if Miller plays that Tennessee, on paper, should have an average run game at best. And the good news for the Florida defense is that their tight ends only have six catches through three games.
Florida’s strengths are in the secondary and it isn’t an accident that Florida held Tennessee to 14 points in last year’s matchup, the fewest the Volunteers scored all year.
“But Ben, Tennessee was still figuring out their QB situation and are much better this year.”
The concepts they are running are still the same and if you don’t think Florida’s approach to pressing Tennessee’s receivers last year is applicable to this year, Pitt employed a similar strategy during its week two matchup against the Volunteers.
Pitt forced Tennessee to punt seven times by simply getting in the face of Volunteer receivers. Were they burned a couple of times on deep throws? Yes. But these are two and three-star corners we are talking about that kept coverage long enough to force Hendon Hooker into multiple sacks.
Hooker is not the type of QB to go through his progressions. He will make one read, maybe two. If he likes what he sees he will throw it. If he second-guesses himself, he will hang onto it and try and run.
Avery Helm, Jalen Kimber, Jason Marshall, and Devin Moore will have their hands full, but if they are allowed to challenge the Volunteer receivers and win that battle, Florida’s odds of winning swing massively in its favor.
Now some of these matchups may work, and some may not. But when one of them is working…