‘There’s a lot of good drugs out there’ — Gators HC Jon Sumrall pulled no punches when talking about Florida’s game Saturday
The Gators have been dominant through 3 weeks, and head coach Jon Sumrall isn’t buying the hype just yet.
The Florida Gators are 3-0 on the season and 1-0 in conference play heading into their home SEC opener against the Ole Miss Rebels. One of the more interesting elements of the college football season has been their emergence as a legitimate contender. Florida opened as 1.5-point favorites per DraftKings Sportsbook and has since risen to 3.5-point favorites, a line that even head coach Jon Sumrall found hard to believe.
Sumrall was asked about the point spread during his press conference and delivered a characteristically honest response. When told the Gators were favored, Sumrall asked who had them favored against Ole Miss. Upon learning it was the point spread, he quipped, “There’s a lot of good drugs out there, huh?”
Jon Sumrall keeps it real
That’s Sumrall. He always keeps it calm, cool, and collected. He does not want to get out over his skis publicly. Sumrall is willing to praise his players, but he’s also willing to call them out. That kind of honesty has gone a long way in helping establish a new culture in Gainesville, something that was desperately needed after the Billy Napier era.
Even so, is it ludicrous to think the Gators should be favored in this game? They have been dominant on offense over the course of the first three weeks, putting up at least 44 points and 495 yards in all three games. Their worst performance came against the Auburn Tigers, and they put up the benchmarks I mentioned above.
The Gators came into the season with a lot of question marks, and they were completely fair. Nobody knew what this rendition of the roster was going to be. Sumrall brought in a lot of players through the transfer portal, and both sides of the football were installing new schemes. Even so, they have outperformed expectations thus far, and a lot of people are starting to believe it because the success feels repeatable.
Florida still needs to tidy things up, especially on defense. Ole Miss has been good this year, but this game is in the Swamp, and the Gators have been a fantastic team through three weeks. Along with that, the Rebels could potentially be without Kewan Lacy, which would be a massive factor on Saturday afternoon.
If the Gators can take care of business at home in their SEC opener, the narrative around this program shifts in a major way. Sumrall might not want to hear the hype, but his team is making it harder and harder to ignore.
