If you would've told me before the game that Graham Mertz would go 31-44 for 333 yards, I would say that Florida would win comfortably. The problem was the fact that the offensive line allowed 5 sacks, there were so many penalties and they went 1 for 13 on 3rd down conversions. Nothing seemed to go right for Florida all night long as they fell to the #14 Utah Utes 24-11. There were some positives to take away from the game, but the negative plays grossly outweighed any of the positives.
The Gators committed 9 penalties, and a good amount of them happened at the most in opportune times. They contributed to the issues they had in the red zone. In the first half alone, the Gators had false starts on 3rd & 1 and 4th & 1 that killed drives, missed a missed 31-yard field goal and a special teams penalty for having two No. 3s on the field that led directly to a Utah TD. They also had an atrocious 21-yard punt, allowed a walk-in TD for Utah and accounted for only 19 rushing yards while allowing 3 sacks.
Gators head coach Billy Napier talked about some of the miscues after the game, including finishing with only 13 yards on the ground. "Some of it was how Utah played them but “no doubt we need to run it better.” Although Graham Mertz threw for a career high 333 yards, Montrell Johnson and Trevor Etienne are the keys to getting the offense in rhythm. Napier also mentioned that he was surprised about the amount of penalties they committed. He also believes that he could've done a better job coaching them. "Florida's leadership was strong and that he believes he saw "a lot of the things that I thought I would see from our team from an intangible standpoint, but there's no question that we can coach better and do better."
The Gators have a chance to bounce back at home next week against McNeese St. before Tennessee comes to town. It's a chance for them to work on some things and clean up the mistakes that were made against Utah. Coach Napier is confident that his team will be ready to play. "You find out who you are during difficult times. This group will respond.”
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