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Florida 24, Auburn 13: Defense leads Florida to signature win over Auburn

Florida 24, Auburn 13: Defense leads Florida to signature win over Auburn

Saturday’s showdown at The Swamp with the Auburn Tigers was the Florida Gators first major test in a trilogy against elite teams over the next month. The Gators passed, at least for now, and they did it behind a magnificent defensive performance and just enough timely offense.

In what was a scary moment for the Gator Nation—Kyle Trask was injured late in the first half and was escorted to the locker room, then returned a few moments later and appeared ready to get back on the field. It was a huge sigh of relief for what was a stunned and petrified crowd as we have all been down this road before. Even though it was a mediocre display from the UF offense, there’s no denying the gutsiness of Trask for sticking it out and leading his team.

There’s no debating that this UF offense has plenty of room to grow, but luckily for Florida, if the defense plays like it did against the Tigers, it will always give it a chance. Florida held the Tigers to just 269-yards of total offense and forced four turnovers, along with allowing just six points on the day. If not for a botched coaching move by Dan Mullen to call an ill-advised fake punt deep in their own territory, the Gators kept the orange endzones immaculately clean against the Tigers. Florida’s defense shut-out Auburn in the second half, took control and never relinquished it.

There’s no way to describe the energy inside of The Swamp. The Swamp roar activated these Gators and we saw them rise to the occasion and clearly catch the memo—you got a Top-10 team in your terrain, now work em’ silly. Florida was locked in defensively from the onset, tackled well, and dominated the line of scrimmage. Between the insanity and Swamp noise, along with a ferocious, attacking Gators’ defense, Auburn’s Bo Nix was glaringly overwhelmed by the experience. Nix finished 11-of-26 for 145 yards, and though he did have one TD, he also threw 3 interceptions. Nix’s passes were erratic and thrown into disastrous situations at times, and the Gators made him pay at crucial junctures of the game.

I’m not going to give the UF defense that much credit in slowing down Nix and this Auburn offense now. After all—he’s just a freshman in just his sixth game in college football with so much riding on his shoulders and running the show on the road in the nation’s most intimidating environment. There were countless opportunities that Nix could have slashed the Gators on the day but couldn’t take advantage. Auburn’s only touchdown came on a pass from Nix to receiver Seth Williams in which they caught Florida flat-footed after the Tigers regained possession at the UF-32, but other than that—Nix and the Tigers sabotaged its other opportunities. Florida’s defense largely strangled the Tigers run game throughout, and Gus Malzahn could never really utilize his gameplan to its full potential because of that reason. After Florida had eliminated everything Malzahn and Auburn would throw its way, the Tigers finally started to show some life in the run game towards the latter part of the third quarter with UF leading narrowly 17-13. Nix had Williams streaking wide-open on a busted UF coverage and overshot him, which would have been a touchdown. Then Nix misfired on an open slant route and then followed that up with an interception thrown right to Donovan Stiner in the endzone, ending that threat. On the very next possession, he threw behind receiver Sal Cannella and then scrambled for his life and lost 22-yards on a 3rdand 8 play taking Auburn out of field goal range. But it cannot be stressed enough how well this UF defense and especially this defensive line performed on the big stage.

Florida’s offense did enough to conserve the win with the way its defense played, but there were many faults on the day that have get cleaned up. Firstly, I gotta start with Trask’s inability to secure the football—this is a real problem and could have costed Florida already. That has to be the primary concern that has to be addressed before next week against LSU and beyond. Now to be fair, Trask was under pressure on almost every play, as the Gators had no answers for the Tigers’ front either. It’s more indicative on the poor play of the offensive line, and I’m sure all that he sees is helicopters closing in, but Trask can’t cough up the football just about every time he’s touched. This will be something interesting to eye as the season moves forward—defenses will continue to bring pressure in an effort to shake up Trask and get the football out. Vomiting only one fumble is too many against a good team, let alone three. But that said, this UF offensive line has a long way to go in its pass protection and run blocking. Secondly, the countless, inexcusable dropped passes from a great group of receivers. Trask finished 19-of-31 on the afternoon, passing for 234-yards and 2 TD’s compared to no interceptions. So, when he was given a chance in the pocket, Trask consistently delivered accurate passes to open receivers. But there were at least a few of those "incompletions" that should have padded those stats just a shimmy. Freddie Swain had a career-high 146-yards on 6 catches and a TD, but he also dropped a catchable ball right in his hands. Even the ever-reliable Josh Hammond, who also had a TD grab, dropped a couple of passes that he always catches. Hammond came into Saturday without any drops in his UF career. Trevon Grimes and Kyle Pitts each also dropped passes that they could have helped their quarterback out also. I point this out because going forward—Florida needs its best players to step up when there’s plays to be made, especially when UF’s offense is basically one-dimensional and looks like it will be that way all season. And thirdly, the obvious woes in the run game which points fingers right back over to that offensive line.

But the weird part of this game had to be the actual the Play of the Game, which was the back-breaker for Auburn—an 88-yard fourth quarter scamper from Lamical Perine to bring the UF lead to 24-13 and give the Gators breathing room. Florida’s run game had been non-existent all afternoon as it has for much of this season, and then all of a sudden, before The Swamp and the Gator Nation had even knew what happened—there went Perine bolting down the sidelines, outrunning the Auburn defense and getting his first prime highlight reel this season. UF had four receivers lined up to Perine’s left, and he went off tackle to the opposite side of the field, running through a tackle from Auburn’s best linebacker K.J. Britt, and then broke loose down the sidelines breaking another tackle from the AU safety Daniel Thomas for the score.

Down 24-13 with nine minutes to play, now Malzahn was in a position where he had to rely on his freshman QB to make plays as time wasn’t on his side and in favor of the home team. The added cushion with under 10 minutes to play was all this UF defense needed to put the Tigers to bed.

Florida answered the question of the national audience about if it’s a justified top-ten team. With an important and convincing win in their own personal sinkhole, the Gators now have to get away from the Swamp but will be headed to Baton Rouge with confidence. But next time around Louisiana State will have the home-field advantage as it’s their turn to get that significant edge. These potentially disastrous situations can’t continue to linger as Florida now has to go prove that it can get it done away from The Swamp. But let’s not get too caught up in the upcoming assignments that Florida has to deal with, not just yet—not until we enjoy this one just a little.



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