Florida Football to employ a simple solution for one of their glaring problems
![Florida Gators punter Jeremy Crawshaw (26) punts the ball during the first half against the Missouri Tigers at Steve Spurrier Field at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium in Gainesville, FL on Saturday, October 8, 2022. [Matt Pendleton/Gainesville Sun]
Ncaa Football Florida Gators Vs Missouri Tigers](https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/c_crop,w_4227,h_2377,x_0,y_0/c_fill,w_1080,ar_16:9,f_auto,q_auto,g_auto/images%2FImagnImages%2Fmmsport%2F213%2F01j429sqkjpgfce715w1.jpg "Florida Gators punter Jeremy Crawshaw (26) punts the ball during the first half against the Missouri Tigers at Steve Spurrier Field at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium in Gainesville, FL on Saturday, October 8, 2022. [Matt Pendleton/Gainesville Sun]
Ncaa Football Florida Gators Vs Missouri Tigers")
One of the glaring problems for Florida Football last season was their inability to count to 11 on special teams. The Gators only had ten guys on the field with enough consistency that counting to 11 became a mandatory activity for fans.
Billy Napier added Joe Houston to the staff in the offseason to work with special teams, and he is bringing with him one of the easiest solutions in the book.
Florida Gators: Houston Says We Have A Problem
With fall camp opening today, a number of Florida's coaches met with members of the media. During his segment, Houston mentioned that Florida would be using a "launching pad" for players on special teams to stand on when it is time for them to be ready to take the field.
Joe Houston says the Gators will use a special teams mat on the sideline this season. https://t.co/YhU9ldXmVq pic.twitter.com/P48Xtbnm5j
— Nick de la Torre (@delatorre) July 30, 2024
Online trolls will gravitate to this and make jokes, but the special teams mat is a standard thing that even teams in the NFL use to ensure their count is correct.
In fact, when Houston sais that the Gators would be using the mat in 2024, my initial reaction was, "Hold up! We weren't using the mat before? Everyone in America uses the mat."
What's done is done and all we want as Gator fans is for the sloppiness on special teams to be fixed. Napier acknowledged the issues Florida has had in the past.
"We’ve had organizational issues that obviously is well-documented. So we needed to get better in those areas, and I think Joe has provided a good sounding board."
- Billy Napier
But this also ties back to our commentary on special teams for the past two years. Chris Couch has been in charge of the unit for the past two years, and the unit's disorganization came to a head when Florida didn't know when they were supposed to send out the field goal unit against Arkansas.
Couch is still on the staff working in conjunction with Houston in 2024. Throughout the last two years, we have questioned whether part of Florida's problems were due to Couch or if they were due to the fact that Couch was limited in his role as an analyst.
Given that Houston has come on staff and a mat is among the first things implemented, which is something everyone else in the country was already doing, it feels more and more like Couch has been the problem over the last two years.
Florida opens their season on August 31 against Miami with full intentions of counting to 11.
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