As Florida gets ready to take on its annual FCS opponent on Saturday, our neighbors down south in Coral Gables had the only FBS game on TV last night. Miami turned on the lights in their Rent-A-Center stadium and invited FAMU to join them. The end result was a 77-7 beatdown that looked like a nine-year-old playing on Freshman on CFB27. Miami was desperate to run up the score they were still going for it on 4th down after it was 77-7.
The question for Florida heading into its own FCS matchup against Campbell is whether the Gators need to up the ante and aim for 70 points of their own? History would say it’s a complicated answer.
Florida gearing up to try and blow out Campbell
After Florida put 66 points on FAU, there is reason to believe that the Gators could top 70 points if they wanted to against Campbell.
Over the last five seasons, there were 29 games where a Power Four program scored at least 70 points. For the most part, putting up 70 points is a solid indicator that a successful season is incoming. Indiana is the shining example: last year, they beat Indiana State 73-0 and went on to win the national title.
Of those 29 teams that scored at least 70 points in a game, 18 of them would go on to win at least 10 games that year. 25 of those 29 would go on to at least make a bowl game.
However, Indiana also became the first team since Clemson in 2018 to score 70 points in a game and go on to win a national title. And in the last two years since the expanded playoffs, only five of the 15 teams to score at least 70 points in a game would go on to make the playoffs that season. Over the last five years, four teams have scored 70 points in a game and still finished with a losing season. That list includes last year’s FSU squad (77-3 over East Texas A&M) and Miami’s 2022 team (70-13 over Bethune-Cookman).
Translation:
Scoring 70 usually signals a solid incoming season, but it is not a magic marker that guarantees glory.
What can Florida accomplish against Campbell?
Last year Florida beat LIU 55-0. We all know how last year ended.
So what can Florida actually accomplish on Saturday beyond scoring points for the sake of scoring points?
As we chronicled earlier in the week, we would like to see Florida clean up some of the snap issues from FAU, not play as soft in the secondary, get a bit better burst from the defensive line, and prove they can go long off play action. Because in reality, the Gators could just hand the ball off to Jadan Baugh 25 times and get to 70 points, but that won’t prove some of the little things from last week have been fixed.
That would be more valuable moving forward than an artificial marker.
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