Tennessee vs. Florida Complete Game Preview
One week after beating Kentucky for the 29th consecutive time, Florida looks to extend a shorter but even more impressive streak with its 11th straight win over Tennessee.
It also looks to start 4-0 overall and 2-0 in conference play under new head coach Jim McElwain. The offense struggled in a 14-9 win in Lexington, and even though the product resembled that of the Will Muschamp era, the result (winning a close game) did not.
Tennessee began the year in the Associated Press Top 25 but dropped out after blowing a 14-point lead on its home field to Oklahoma. The Vols missed a golden opportunity to put themselves back on the map, but beating Florida in their SEC opener and advancing to 3-1 would likely get them back into the rankings.
We could say the same about the Gators, who sit at No. 40 with seven votes received in the poll. A win over the No. 28 team should be enough to push them over the hump. The question is whether they have the offensive firepower to get there.
Here is everything you need to prep for game week.
Date: Saturday, September 26
Time: 3:30 p.m. ET
Location: Ben Hill Griffin Stadium; Gainesville, Florida
TV: CBS
Line: Florida -1, according to Odds Shark
Florida Keys to Victory
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Ride the Crowd Early
The Swamp is still The Swamp when it wants to be.
And on Saturday, it will want to be.
The Gators return home with a 3-0 record after their biggest road win since 2012. The only other comparable performance came in 2014, when they beat Tennessee 10-9 in Knoxville and then hosted LSU the following week.
In that LSU game, Florida rode the crowd and took an early lead. It forced a 4th-and-32 on its first defensive possession and then scored on an Andre Debose punt return. It led 17-7 in the second quarter, and although Florida found a way to lose with late miscues, The Swamp proved it can still can make an impact and stake its team to a lead.
Florida needs to take advantage of that, the same way Tennessee did against Oklahoma. It needs those early points to serve as a buffer, so when it does make those inevitable mistakes (and it will) late in the game, that doesn't mean it has to lose.
Get Something—Anything!—From the Passing Game
The passing game looked awful against Kentucky. Will Grier earned the start and made plays with his legs, but with his arm he finished 13-of-22 with 125 yards, no touchdowns and one interception.
That won't do the trick against Tennessee, which held Bowling Green and Oklahoma—two teams with better offenses than Florida's—to 285 rushing yards on 82 carries. Vols defensive tackle Danny O'Brien also returns from a two-game suspension, which further solidifies the middle against the run.
Florida can't rely on Kelvin Taylor to carry the offense. It will need to take some chances in the passing game, and it will need to take them on standard downs. Grier needs to be crisper, Demarcus Robinson needs to be more explosive and Jake McGee needs to be more available—everyone needs to step his game up a notch.
The Gators can exploit Tennessee through the air.
Tennessee Keys to Victory
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Save Some Dang Adrenaline
The biggest reason Tennessee lost to Oklahoma? It ran out of gas.
The Vols are a young, zealous but naive team susceptible to bright lights and big stages. They came out on fire against the Sooners, but it turns out they were holding down the sprint trigger and couldn't re-access that energy reserve late in the game.
Here are each team's efficiency splits by quarter, per Bill Connelly of SB Nation:
| Quarter | Oklahoma | Tennessee |
| Q1 S&P | 0.386 | 0.586 |
| Q2 S&P | 0.534 | 0.445 |
| Q3 S&P | 0.210 | 0.375 |
| Q4 S&P | 0.582 | 0.000 |
For more on what those numbers mean, here's a glossary. In layman's terms, Tennessee got progressively worse each quarter and then ran zero successful plays in the fourth. It only had the ball for 3:41, and in that span it managed to gain just two yards on six plays, punted three times and blew a 14-point lead.
Now the Vols hit the road for a game Barrett Sallee of Bleacher Report called "the most important of [head coach] Butch Jones' career." Their young guys will be amped to play the 3:30 p.m. ET SEC on CBS game in front of 90,000 screaming, antagonistic fans.
But they need to rein it in and weather the storm instead of throwing haymakers. They need to save some gas for the second half.
Finish Drives
The second biggest reason Tennessee lost to Oklahoma? Finishing drives.
The Vols turned eight scoring opportunities—defined as having a first-down inside the opponent's 40-yard line—into 17 points, a gruesome average of 2.12 points per trip. In Week 2, only two other teams turned as many opportunities into fewer than three points per trip: Prairie View A&M against Texas State and Vanderbilt against Georgia.
Florida has been stingy near the goal line this season, most recently holding Kentucky without a touchdown in Lexington. It did the same thing to Tennessee last year in Knoxville, and this year it's allowed only two touchdowns on seven trips to the red zone.
When Tennessee gets close, it needs seven points instead of three. It can't leave points on the board against a defense much better than the Sooners'.
Florida Players to Watch
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DE Bryan Cox Jr.
Jonathan Bullard, Joey Ivie and Alex McCalister have led the defensive line this season, but Tennessee will make special note of Bryan Cox Jr., who last year recorded three sacks in Knoxville. Cox played that game with a heavy heart after losing his grandfather earlier in the week, and he surely remembers what it felt like to destroy the Vols. This defensive line is one of the best in America, and it aligns with Tennessee's weakness in the trenches. Cox and the boys should feast against the Vols.
QB Will Grier
Grier won fans against Kentucky with his running and plucky attitude. He dove inside the pylon for an early fourth-down touchdown, and then he led two long drives before halftime. However, things got ugly in the second half, when Florida went scoreless and only twice gained more than 14 yards on a drive. First-half Grier needs to show up for all four quarters on Saturday. The Gators will not hold Tennessee to nine points.
DB Vernon Hargreaves III
Vernon Hargreaves missed the East Carolina game with an injury but returned last week and recorded a key interception. For the first time since his first two games as a freshman, he's recorded a pick in consecutive games. He recorded only three picks in the interim, one of which came in the end zone for a touchback against Tennessee last season. He'll be tasked with stopping either Josh Malone or Preston Williams—two young but insanely talented receivers—on Saturday.
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Tennessee Players to Watch
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DE Derek Barnett
Derek Barnett notched his first career sack against Florida last season. That sack broke the seal of what has since become one of the SEC's scariest players. He is a gamer who plays his best in big games, most recently logging 15 tackles and one sack against Oklahoma. He was the No. 16 overall player on Bleacher Report's Preseason CFB 250, and he'll be tasked with making Grier's life miserable. Who on this Gators offensive line can block him?
QB Joshua Dobbs
The biggest difference between Tennessee and Florida—presumably the reason one is ranked No. 28 despite a loss while the other is No. 40 at 3-0—is that Tennessee has a quarterback and Florida doesn't. But Dobbs didn't play like a franchise QB after halftime against Oklahoma, and one more bad game on a big stage might sound alarms about his future. Dobbs needs to outplay Grier for Tennessee to win in the Swamp. He needs to make this supposed giant edge at quarterback mean something.
RB Jalen Hurd
Last year Florida held Jalen Hurd to 39 yards on 10 carries. But that was around the norm for Hurd in the middle of his true freshman season; he didn't turn the corner until the South Carolina game in early November. This year Tennessee needs a bigger, stronger, more confident Hurd to average more than four yards per carry. He doesn't need to light the game on fire; he just needs to gain consistent yardage and keep the Vols out of constant passing downs.
What They're Saying
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Florida
McElwain on Grier's performance at Kentucky, per quotes released by the Wildcats:
"I think he did some decent things, obviously he has a lot of growing to do. I thought he did some good things with his feet, got us some plays, but that might have gotten him into some trouble as well by not staying in the pocket and letting the play develop. He left some awful big plays on the field. With that being said, for the most part he did a decent job of taking care of the football except for that throw in the end zone. But we’ll learn from it, that’s why we play the game, I’m excited to get back at it on Monday.
"
Taylor on what the win over Kentucky meant after a week in which he and McElwain made news for the tirade McElwain unleashed on him during the East Carolina game, per the same source:
"I feel like we did really well for our team tonight. It just shows us that we don’t let adversity hit us and we keep fighting until the clock says zero, and we are going to live with the results. We are going to go back on Monday and have a great walk-through practice and we are going to watch film tomorrow. (We have too) keep getting better from it and see what we did wrong so we are prepared for next week.
"
Tennessee
Jones on whether he spoke with his team about the 10-game losing streak to Florida, per quotes released by the school:
"No. Well, first of all, only 12 individuals on our roster went to Florida. That is for you guys to talk about all week long. What matters is our preparation and becoming a better football team. The challenge that lies ahead of us is playing a really talented football team that is 3-0. All we can control is our work ethic, our mindset, our improvement, our preparation and the go execute on Saturday. That is all you can do. Every game is critical. We don't put more emphasis on one compared to another because you still have so many games left.
"
Defensive back Todd Kelly Jr. on making his first trip to Gainesville, per the same source:
"It's pretty special, it's my first time going to The Swamp, I've never been down there before. Coach is getting us ready showing us videos of what it's like playing down there. We play in Neyland Stadium which is one of the loudest stadiums in the country. I'm pretty sure it can't get any louder than it does in our own stadium. We are going in with the mindset that this is our next game, the most important game, so we are excited to go play them.
"
Prediction
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Right now Tennessee is just better.
I know that's not what Florida fans want to hear, but it's true.
Does that mean the Gators can't win this game? Of course not. This is more of a coin flip than an emphatic prediction. Dobbs and Grier are both so up-and-down that neither can really be trusted.
But Dobbs has proved more over the past year-and-a-half than Grier has these first three weeks. When the game gets close late, that should prove decisive. I like the way Tennessee's defense matches up with Florida's offense, especially if cornerback Cameron Sutton locks up Robinson on the perimeter and forces Grier to look elsewhere.
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