Florida Barely Getting By Heading To Week Three

The turnover from the Florida team that won the national championship two years ago, to the team that celebrated another Bowl win a year ago in Heisman trophy-winning quarterback Tim Tebow’s final season before entering the NFL betting draft, to the team that took to the field two weeks ago for the 2010-11 season opener has been enormous. Not only can that turnover be judged based on the depth that was lost, but for the elite talents that played for the Gators over those two seasons, their efforts are not easily replaced. Florida’s play so far this season has reflected that, and although it hasn’t impacted them directly in the standings, it has in the national rankings. Florida head coach Urban Meyer would like to choose to stay the course and steer this group to gentler waters, but it appears as though the rapids are quickly approaching.

The Gators knew their offense would be very different this sports betting year than the one that Tebow ran during his tenure with the school, because a talent like Tebow isn’t replaceable. This was one of the best players to ever play the position at the college football betting level, so to think that their would not be a significant drop in production would be unreasonable. New starter John Brantley has shown improvement over his first two games, but has his limitations in this system. Florida’s offensive rank had already dropped last year from the previous year, and it was predictable even before the season got underway that trend would continue. Rather than bringing back 11 starters on defense the way they did one betting year ago, the Gators have only five defensive starters that were with the team last season. With a tough schedule, and a big transition on both sides of the ball Meyer knew the change would be difficult, but just how bad will it get?

Florida opened the college football betting year with consecutive wins over Miami of Ohio and South Florida, but trailed at points of both games and never really looked convincing in the victories. The Gators had their position in the national rankings adjusted after coming too close against the RedHawks, but a solid second half against the Bulls justified their ranking this week. Things will get much tougher for Florida as the season progresses however, competing in the ultra-tough SEC against some of the best teams in the country. Florida will go to Tennessee this weekend where they will play the recovering Volunteers, but after that will get number-one Alabama and number-15 LSU in consecutive weeks following a home date with Duke. That portion of their schedule is right at the open of October, so there is little time to prepare for two of the top teams in the country. The Crimson Tide are an almost guaranteed loss for the Gators, with the real question being how they fare against an LSU team that will not let them hang around.