Tempo wasn't a problem for Florida Football's defense in 2023, but it is in 2024

One of the few highlights of the 2023 season for Florida Football was their defensive masterclass against Tennessee. Florida seldom looked phased by the uptempo nature of the Volunteer offense en route to a 29-16 victory that made believers out of a lot of people in The Swamp that night.

Fast-forward one year, and that night feels like a distant memory, given the direction the defense has since taken. But with UCF's uptempo offense coming to town, Florida could learn a thing or two from how they beat Tennessee last year.

Florida Football: The Need For Speed

We played this game last week, and we are once again going to play a fun game here at Hail Florida Hail called "When Was That Said?"

The following are two quotes from two different players from the past year. One was said following the Tennessee game last year, and one was said yesterday regarding the Mississippi State game.

See if you can guess which quote is connected to which game.

Quote One:

"They did run some tempo a little bit. It was at times where we were just standing around looking for the signal. Like I said, that was one of the small details that we had to fix knowing that it's going to be a few other teams that run tempo later on in the season."

Quote Two:

"His tempo that we were doing in practice was way faster, it was like an unrealistic tempo. So, he was just doing that to get us ready. And you know I think there was only one play, where we weren't lined up. And you know, we were ready because we went through it in practice."

Quote one is from Jason Marshall in regards to the Mississippi State game, and quote two is from Princely Umanmielen talking about Austin Armstrong's practice plan after the Tennessee game last year.

To Marshall's point, Florida looked lost when the Bulldogs opted for uptempo. The frustrating part is that it's not like Florida didn't know Mississippi State would go uptempo; the Bulldogs have the seventh-fastest time between plays on offense in the country.

So when Billy Napier talks about still trying to clean up the between-the-play process for the defense, why was it fixed against Tennessee last year, only to go backward in 2024?

UCF is coming to town this week and they too run an uptempo offense. The Knights are 27th in the country in time between plays, averaging a play every 24 seconds.

Armstrong is still on staff. Does he have the autonomy to speak up to Ron Roberts and say, "Hey, just as a suggestion, here is what we did last year and had our best game of the season," or is he forced to quiet down and do as Ron Roberts says?

That's probably rhetorical, but the beauty of this Saturday is Florida has a blueprint to slow down UCF.

Whether or not they follow the blueprint is the grand mystery.