We have made it to the start of another of Gators' football, and it is one that might have the most variance in a long time. If things go well for Florida, the Gators could make a deep run into the playoffs. If things go south, Billy Napier could be fired before the Georgia game.
Now that we have previewed all 12 games in our "Confidence Meter" series, it is time to lay out what we here at Hail Florida Hail think is going to be Florida's final record by the end of 2025.
Florida Gators enter a make-or-break season
There are two major backdrops that will define the season for the Gators:
- Its ability to "spot the ball" and navigate the difficulty of its schedule
- The health of DJ Lagway
It's not unreasonable to think that with a schedule like the one Missouri has, Florida could survive Lagway missing a game or two and still make it to ten wins.
However, even if Lagway stays healthy, our primary concern is that, in all three years Billy Napier has been in charge, he has underachieved each year.
We're not saying he should have won an SEC title by now, but to pretend that 19-19 is the absolute best he could have done, considering he has had a top-15 roster in all three of his previous seasons, is naive.
Procedural errors, lack of organization, predictable play calling, and a lack of week-to-week consistency have all contributed to Florida falling short by at least two wins in each of the past three seasons.
If you think we are just being pessimistic for the sake of being pessimistic, consider that we predicted a 7-5 regular season last year and were dead on with the final record.
Additionally, we predicted a 7-5 season in 2023, and were two plays away from being spot on.
It's with that in mind that if you go strictly by what our "Confidence Meter" series said, and consider anything above a 50% a win and below 50% a loss, we predicted:
Wins
- LIU
- USF
- Miami
- Mississippi State
- Georgia
- Kentucky
- Tennessee
- FSU
Losses
- LSU
- Texas
- Ole Miss
50% on the dot
- Texas A&M
We have Florida beating Georgia but losing to Ole Miss due to the previously mentioned lack of consistency. If you think we are crazy and want to swap those two results, that's fair.
But either way, it sets up the A&M game as the defining game of the season.
If Florida goes 9-3, the Gators should make the playoffs, given its schedule and given that it would have wins over Miami and Georgia under our model.
And if Lagway stays healthy and Napier fixes some of the errors that have plagued the Gators, this is 100% a possibility for Florida in 2025.
If Florida goes 8-4, it will miss the playoffs. Napier would be safe in this scenario, but it wouldn't be unfair to raise serious questions on whether he is ever going to get Florida over the hump.
Napier's road record isn't the greatest, and if forced to choose one way to the other, we would put A&M in the loss category (especially since they are ahead of Florida in the 247 Talent Composite.
Add it all together, and our official prediction for Florida in 2025 is 8-4.