After a wild offseason, the Florida Gators are jumping back into action with this college football season just ahead.
There were a lot of changes in the program with the new head coach Billy Napier being hired early into 2022 and now his monster of a program is coming to life.
Napier was the former coach of the University of Louisiana-Layfette Ragin Cajuns where he had amazing success going 40-12 in his four seasons. His dynamic recruiting and play-style was a big need for the Gator program after a disaster with former head coach Dan Mullen and Defensive Cord. Todd Grantham.
To fix everything, the Athletic Director Scott Stricklin gave Napier the reigns and let him go get whatever assistants he needed to get this historic program back on top.
A few big names Napier brought over from UL-Layfette was Mark Hocke (Assistant head coach/ director of strength and conditioning) and running back’s coach Jabbar Juluke. Their chemistry helps tremendously as they already are used to each other’s schemes.
One huge hire was cornerback’s coach Corey Raymond. Raymond is coming from LSU and has a very successful resume of cornerbacks he has coached and became NFL talent.
With this new staff, they went right to work on recruiting high school players to help build the program for the future. They brought in big names such as Kamari Wilson (5-star safety), Trevor Etienne (4-star RB) and Chris McClellan (4-star DT).
Gators Boosters immediately bought into Napier’s scheme and finished with the newly upgraded football and athletic facility that compliments athletes with dining, lounges and rehab facilities to get them back on track. He also wanted to emphasize the athletes living places so they upgraded athlete housing, and in the eyes of recruiting, will help win over many athletes.
Florida’s season is no easy task as they play in the Southeastern Conference (SEC) but their non-conference is also very tough. They start out with pre-season ranked #7 Utah Utes who is a very veteran team as they return 20 of 22 starters from 2021.
Next, they play #20 Kentucky which is always a close nail-biting matchup. To end the month of September they go against one of their biggest rivals #24 Tennessee in Knoxville.
The month of October gives them two easy games against Eastern WA and Missouri; however they will go into a three game stretch against LSU, #2 Georgia and #6 Texas A&M. And to finish off this rigorous season, they play in Tallahassee against another hated rival, the Florida State Seminoles.
With all this news around the Gators’ program, this college football season is going to be one to watch.
Photo by Jean-Daniel Francoeur on Pexels
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