Tonight is a key litmus test for the Gators to see whether some of the early losses have been bad luck or if something far worse is brewing. Florida takes on Georgia at 7 PM at home, and as is the case these days with Florida and Georgia, Mike White will be roaming the Georgia bench, forced to look up at the rafters and see the national title banner he was never going to win in Gainesville.
But only one of the two teams is ranked, and it’s not the Gators, as White has the Bulldogs playing a style unrecognizable to anyone who had to watch White over the past decade.
Florida takes on Georgia at home
This will be the first time since 2003 that Florida takes on Georgia while the Bulldogs are ranked. Georgia is ranked 18th in the latest AP poll, while Florida fell out of the rankings. Despite that disparity, Florida is still favored by a whopping 9.5 points.
But the reason Georgia is 13-1 on the season is that White has completely transformed the way the Bulldogs are playing stylistically.
During White’s final season in Gainesville, the Gators were 228th in possessions per game. That pretty much tracked with the entire Mike White Era, which was plagued with slow, plodding play that invited a low margin of error.
White’s first three seasons in Athens had been mostly the same, though he did show an uptick in tempo during his 2023-24 season before retreating back to a slower pace last year. But this year, the Georgia Bulldogs are second in the country in possessions per game, averaging 81.1 per game. Florida is just 61st in this category.
The higher tempo has also made Georgia the number one scoring offense in the country, averaging 99.4 points per game. Florida is currently averaging 84.4 points per game.
Now, the caveat to all of this is that of Georgia’s 13 wins, eight have come against Quad 4 opponents, and they have yet to beat a Quad 1 opponent. In fact, of Georgia's 14 games so far, only four have come against Quad 1 or Quad 2, and it’s why Vegas still has the Gators favored.
But when watching tonight, if it looks like Georgia is trying to push the ball, your eyes are not deceiving you.
Mike White is actually trying to play up-tempo in 2026.