If we hit the rewind button to the previous coaching staff that was in Gainesville, there was a moment in time when it felt like they were on top of the world. Florida beat Utah to open the 2022 season, only to turn around and look flat against Kentucky.
This wasn’t unique to that staff, as Dan Mullen’s 2018 squad dropped an inexplicable game to Missouri and Jim McElwain’s 2015 squad almost lost to Vanderbilt one week after beating Georgia.
So as Jon Sumrall is starting to get some flowers of his own, this week against Missouri is going to be a litmus test as to whether or not Florida can handle a trap game or whether this week’s celebration is going to turn into frustration this time next week.
Florida hopes to avoid a trap against Missouri
Now that praise is starting to come in towards the Gators, Sumrall is going to have to work a bit harder to keep Florida’s edge. He was asked at his press conference about whether he would use the fact that this week is Missouri’s homecoming week as motivation for the Gators. Sumrall has a bigger red flag in mind:
“I have zero concerns about anybody's homecoming, our homecoming. It's a football game. I do know this. The last four trips we've gone to Missouri, we've lost three of them. So if we think it's going to be a freaking cakewalk, I don't care if it's homecoming or whatever, we're in for a rude awakening.
And so we've got to get ready to play a really good football team on the road in a place that's not gone well for us a lot recently in the most recent history. And so I'm really worried about that. I don't care who their homecoming king or queen or any of that is.”
It is interesting that Florida has struggled against the Tigers. Since Missouri joined the SEC in 2012 and the two became annual opponents, Florida is just 6-6 against them. And to Sumrall’s point, Florida has indeed lost three of the last four in Columbia, with the last one being when Florida failed to stop a 4th-and-17.
Missouri isn’t exactly the most intimidating environment to play in, but something about their gloomy November weather has been a house of horrors for the Gators. In that regard, the Gators get a break this year, with this game being in early October and the weather expected to be quite lovely.
But regardless of weather, location, or quality of opponent, this is the type of game that will serve as a checkpoint as to whether or not Florida is a genuine machine under Sumrall, or if they have the same warts and flaws that all the teams before them had.
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