University of Florida Football

“We didn’t take care of the football. And when those things happen, emotionally it’s a killer. It’s a killer for your entire organization,” he said. “So when you spot them the ball on the 4-yard line, right now we’re not strong enough mentally to handle that. A year ago, maybe early in the year, we were. Right now, we’re not. It’s a ‘woe is me’ mentality right now. We’ve got to overcome that. Our leadership needs to step forward.” –Will Muschamp

Dear Florida Gators,
This is what your coach said…after Vanderbilt. How can you be anywhere but rock bottom. I don’t think I’ll ever see a FCS team beat a FBS team like this. This is like, once in a decade, and for you, once in a lifetime. You paid Georgia Southern a little over half a million dollars to clobber them, and they won on your field…without completing a pass. No doubt, they played their guts out, literally ( I saw their running back puke on the sidelines), but you still should have won that game. Knowing you’re playing for “nothing”–yes, that mentality is difficult to overcome. Now, you have a moment, an opportunity…..will you take it? Regroup, refocus, set new goals because Florida State looms. Play with the abandon and joy you used to when you first learned this game, on the playground, in a backyard–where flexible creativity was allowed to flourish alongside your game plan. Now is the time to move beyond your current perceived limited potential, and there is so much more to you. Believe.

What are you going to do, Florida, when you tune into ESPN and see “an expert” talk about how atrocious you played, how your coach is leading you in the wrong direction, and how FSU is going to wipe their feet with you? What will you do when you’re walking across campus to class and people are looking the other way, some even looking at you with sheer disgust? How about at practice, when you see a teammate dogging it because after all, “the season is over”? What will you do? And Friday night, when you’re lying in bed and all these thoughts of self-doubt come flooding in? What’s going to happen next? For this is the stuff that makes men. Not some glory on the field. And when game time is here, and the Seminoles score first?….well, Florida, here are your opportunities. Show us.