Florida football: The Gators’ secondary can’t keep the lid on

Florida football had one of the best defenses in the country through four weeks, and it looked like Austin Armstrong had come in and quickly done a full 180 with that side of the ball.

But as SEC play has gone on, the defense has come back down to earth a little bit and has some glaring issues that have been hurting them.

One of those problems is explosive plays, which we have talked about a good bit over these past few weeks.

More specifically, however, the Gators’ secondary has given up 12 40-yard or longer passing plays, which is second to last in the country.

Florida football: Got to make them earn it

You hear about it all the time. Offenses want to pick up “chunk plays” that help them move down the field efficiently.

Generally, those are between 8-12 yards. Not over 40.

Giving up almost half the field in one play is never something you want your defense to do, and the Gators have done it more often than 131 other FBS teams.

That’s an issue when there are 133 of them.

Looking at some advanced metrics, it’s clear that this is a major problem for the defensive unit. As a whole, opposing offenses add 1.6 points per play whenever they run a successful play. As a reminder, a successful play is when:

• On first down, gaining 50% or more of the yards to go
• On second down, gaining 70% or more of the yards to go
• On third and fourth down, converting

Through the air, teams are adding 1.87 points per successful passing play, which is way higher than it needs to be for this unit to be effective.

These flaws were exposed when Florida went up against Georgia. Tennessee was able to capitalize on it in certain spots when they played the Gators as well.

With games coming up against Brady Cook (Missouri), Jayden Daniels (LSU), and Jordan Travis (FSU), the Gators need to tighten up in the secondary if they want to keep those games close.