Dooley Noted: Once again, a Florida coach struggles in his 3rd year

By
Pat Dooley
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32
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Pat takes a look back at the Gators’ disappointing loss to LSU and other NCAA football news from the weekend.

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32 COMMENTS

  2. Pat…Mac was extended in July. The UAA and administration locked us into mediocrity for the next 10 -15 years with that horrific decision. Stricklin is NOT gong to make any changes and even if they did, nobody in the country wants this train wreck of a program. Back in the day someone cared, but that day is gone.

    • 10-15 years??? And how do you know Stricklin won’t make changes? And there’s a lot of coaches who would jump at the chance to coach at Florida. If no other reason than the $4 million dollar a year paycheck.

      • Excellent analysis, LT. A lot of coaches would love a big paycheck from FL. Does your analysis cover which of those coaches could build a better program than there is now, recruit better than the year to year improvement from Mac, win as many close games as Mac and put up with clueless fans? Do any of these coaches have proven records with major teams? With minor teams? Do you have in mind a top assistant coach, say Will Muschamp? A former Gator assistant, say Ron Zook? Charlie Strong? Maybe Urban Meyer will come back?

        • I don’t understand the criticism of recruiting. He’s got a class lined up this year that should finish top 5 and he’s got the ’19 class hovering around 1-2 right now. The guy took over a completely broken program that no recruit wanted to play for and each year he rose in the rankings to a top 10 class this past cycle. Besides that he’s one of the best talent evaluators out there finding lower ranked players that wind up excelling. The only thing he hasn’t been able to do yet is find a decent QB. He missed on Franks who was the #5 Pro passer in the nation that anyone would’ve taken, who suffers from a mental block that has nothing to do with coaching. So he missed on his one and only player he hand picked since he’s been here. Big deal he’s hit on way more players than that. I mean jesus, the guy has had some of the worst luck any coach has ever had to start his tenure and has still won 22 games in a little over 2 seasons. I have no doubt they would’ve beaten LSU if Cleveland wasn’t injured. Firing Nuss is the only thing that needs to happen cause Mac has everything else going in the right direction. Until Nuss is gone nothing will change with the offense. I mean look no further than FSU to see how important a QB is to a team loaded with talent. They’re freaking 1-3 with a QB that’s producing way more than Franks. Gator fans need to just shut up with the Mac’s got to go BS.

          • Joe, you are right about Coach Mac and Nus. We have good QBs but we need plays that will work for them. Look at all the QBs that transfer from us and now they are throwing 200+ yards. If Coach Mac doesn’t remove Nus, we will continue to struggle on Offense. We need to find someone that can coach the QBs.

  3. Pat, L.S.U. was ”better than U.F.” on Saturday, they won! And I think the reason the Gator ‘D’ struggled with the ”jet-sweep” is because they probably don’t see it in practice much. In fact, I’d bet the scout team doesn’t run it (very often), and neither does the 1st team Gator ‘O’. And with a dynamic player like Toney (before injury), the ”jet-sweep” should be run at least once a game.

  4. The problem is that McElwain is trying to change the culture of Florida Football that we as a fan base have grown up with and are accustomed to. The Spurrier era is what put Florida on the map. Florida Football culture involves scoring points and lots of points. Winning the East is not that big of a deal anymore especially when you do it by scraping by against mediocre opposition then go on to get obliterated in the championship game. Proof of my statement about Mac trying to change the culture of the program is when he pissed and moaned about Malik Davis scoring a touchdown against Vandy rather than falling down and letting the clock run out. The boosters need to explain to Mac that points and excitement is what Florida offense is known for and that he needs to find a way to make it happen or kick bricks.

  5. The problem is that McElwain is trying to change the culture of Florida Football that we as a fan base have grown up with and are accustomed to. The Spurrier era is what put Florida on the map. Florida Football culture involves scoring points and lots of points. Winning the East is not that big of a deal anymore especially when you do it by scraping by against mediocre opposition then go on to get obliterated in the championship game. Proof of my statement about Mac trying to change the culture of the program is when he was visibly upset about Malik Davis scoring a touchdown against Vandy rather than falling down and letting the clock run out. The boosters need to explain to Mac that points and excitement is what Florida offense is known for and that he needs to find a way to make it happen or kick bricks.

  6. Am I the only one who thinks the UF offense has looked horrible for so long we didn’t even know what a good one looks like, I will give the running backs thumbs up for effort, I’m sorry for you guys that my wife knows, if the opponents bring in the goal line defense, it’s pretty tough to run up the middle, do you remember when Spurrier use to go 5 wide and then run it up the middle on the goal line, Mmmm let’s to the math, 5 defenders most go out with them. But no let’s run it up the middle 2 plays and pass on third down, FG time. Coach needs to be Thankful that the SEC East is way down. I do think Ga is on the rise.

  7. Our Offense is like watching paint dry. It’s boring, it’s ineffective and nothing has changed. We are no longer the fun n gun but the 3 n done. Meyer was an offensive guy and our offense did very well with the exception of his health issues. WM came in knowing defense, he made our defense good but knew little about offense. Mac was brought in to fix the offense. He gets a big fat F. He gets praise cause we won back to back sec east titles. Great whoop, the east is way down and when Mac faces good teams we get clobbered for the most part. Yes he has a great home record and win loss, but then again it was thanks to the defense. We won in spite of a crap offense. Now that most of WM defensive players are gone, the defense can no longer cover for the sorry offense an L’s will pile up. I suspect this season will be 6-5 or 5-6. He just doesn’t get it and I don’t think he will. Our offense is dive right, dive left, run on second down and dink and dunk. Thankfully basketball season is around the corner.

  9. And one thing I and many others I know have noticed is that the Sun sports reporters are not willing to challenge McElwain at his pressers concerning the poor performance of Doug Nussmeier as OC. No tough questions concerning his weekly poor performance in leading this poor offense. Why is that?

  10. The truth is Mac gets all soft ball questions. No one questions his time management like why not try to get into field goal range right before half when he lets half a minute tick off while we had time outs. We lost by 1, a fg could have been the difference. Frankly, I wonder why any top flight recruits would want to play under Nuss and Mac with the kind of puke offense we run. We are easy to recruit against, all other teams have to do is point to our offense ranking which is in the hundred something for 3 straight years. Hey Dooley, why not ask the tough questions?? This is year 3 and what we’re like 124th ranked offense. How about asking why dive plays and no jet sweeps? Why run on second down 90% of the time. UF has better athletes then most programs and yet we suck on offense plain and simple. Have you looked at UCF program lately? Look what’s being done with Strong and USF. We are in year 3 of pure crap. Don’t give me yeah but we won back to back, or this record in the swamp for the past 3 years, without noting how weak the east was and how the defense bailed Mac out. You think the administration would have learned from the WM mistake of giving an extension, uf just got dumb and dumber.

    • John, I agree with a lot of what you have said. However, so much has been written about the Will Muschamp years. This present coaching staff reminds me in some ways of the Ron Zook years. Each week after a loss, Coach Zook would always say, “that’s on me.” He would always follow that by saying, “Our guys are doing everything we’ve asked them to do.” To this my husband and I would practically screem at the TV, “Ask them to do something else! “

  11. Ok, am I the only one that doesn’t really care if we win the East, if that only means we’re the least crappy of a crappy division and we get destroyed by Alabama? And Florida State? We were GREAT once. Great is the goal. Not mediocrity. WE ARE NOT MARYLAND!!!

  12. Struggle is an understatement. It implies that Coach Mac knows what he is doing and it is just a matter of time for him to get it right. He will never get it right. He does not know what right is. We are doomed to mediocrity with Coach Mac. We will never achieve greatness with Coach Mac. Time to cut our losses an fire Coach Mac.

    • This. Coach Mac is an imposter, always was since Day 1, he never possessed the skill set he was hired for as “Offense Guru” and “QB Whisperer”. The dude is lazy, doesn’t coach on the sidelines just walks up and down and chomps his gum. When he does make a decision it’s a passive give-away like running the clock out at the half when down, and he has the best FG kicker in the country. He cannot be fixed, he has to be fired.

  13. The problem is McElwain is soft, timid, and passive in his offensive strategy. Instead of aurrounding himself with innovative, aggressive assistants and coordinators, he’s hired “pals” and “buddies” who coach just like him.

    He might keep his job here one more year, but EVERYTHING I predicted about Nussmeier has panned out. He was a bad hire who shouldn’t be close to a division I CFB offense.

    This staff needs a serious enema after this season or Mac needs to go too.

  14. Basically, it’s a good idea to reduce capacity, but who loses their seats? I think it was in the ’70s that UAA expanded capacity by making seats narrower. I think they added two seats to every row. The problem is that if they remove those two extra seats, someone in every rich boster row gets bumped to a lesser section, someone in every medium booster row and every low level booster row, too. Certainly, bumping students from the best east stands seats will help, but the rich guys won’t like facing the sun.

  15. Mac is a good coach if he has talent and depth across the team, but who isn’t? Saban probably was the OC and DC at Bama with coaches who followed his system and Mac and Nuss benefited from that. Now, without the same talent and depth, it really is telling and the third year will be very disappointing. Suspensions have crippled what the coaches wanted and the QB situation is still very questionable. Guess the season is going to be far less than expected, but very stupid and selfish players on suspension really started the avalanche. Poor coaching obviously helped also.

    • Mac hasn’t had one season yet where a QB hasn’t been injured or suspended. Not sure how Gator fans can expect so much considering that. I’ll say it again, look what losing a Qb can do to a team with more talent than the Gators by watching FSU lose every week. Jimbo hasn’t even won his division the last 2 seasons and has underachieved big time considering the talent he’s had. You think Nole fans are calling for his head cause he’s 1-3? The offense only goes as far as the QB and OC take it. Look what happened to Meyer’s offense when Mullen left or when Herman left him at OSU. The Gators unfortunately missed on the only QB Mac has hand picked so far and all the sudden he needs to be fired after he’s clearly shown major improvement in talent at every other position? Makes absolutely no sense. Mac won 10 games and had a top 5 offense in the nation at a second tier school like CSU. It’s obvious he has the ability to field a potent offense when he has the right players and hopefully the right player’s name is Matt Corral. Firing Mac now sets the program back another 5 years cause there isn’t a coach out there like a Meyer who can turn it around quickly. Everyone wants to harp back to the Spurrier days and scoring a bunch of points, but the fact of the matter is that was a different time when a new offense could shock opposing defenses. There isn’t anything new that can shock anyone now and talent and coaching is far better than it was back then. Spurrier’s offense clearly didn’t work as well in modern times while he was at USC. It’s also funny making that comparison considering it took Spurrier 7 years to win his first title and yet Gator fans expect Mac to be winning them now. It’s just absolutely ridiculous!

  16. As the head ball coach used to say ” We just didn’t coach them good enough!” “We have to do a better job of coaching the players if we want to win!” Nuss needs to go , his mighty proven track record proves he was a bad hire and could be the problem with the entire offense. Shannon needs to get it through his thick skull , THIS ISN’T THE ACC!! SEC defenses are fast and aggressive and this unit we have , isn’t very aggressive at all. “We can get pressure with 4 linemen” Shannon says , while other defenses are rushing 5 and 6 in some cases 7. Coach Mac needs to realize , this isn’t buddy football!! fire the dead beat OC and DC and get someone aggressive that wants to win championships. it’s obvious the 2 we have , don’t care about the Florida Gators!! And i’m starting to wonder about the HC

  17. Very vanilla offense on Saturday,esp 1st half. LSU had time of possession as our O could do nothing & had no sense of urgency the whole game. We did throw our first screen pass to the tailback which was shocking. The long square outs work very well & should be used more often. I do like the off tackle plunges on 1st down, we do that about 95% of the time. Go Gators!

  18. Look it’s easy to see that Mac stinks. Ucf goes from 0-12 to #8 offense in 2 years, so it can be done with right coach. Mac is peewee football. This program is a joke. Get a young innovative hungry coach in here that actually shows some fire and desire to win, not this rube mcelwain.

  20. By the third year, any new program should be headed up. Pat, is Mac providing off-field leadership? Can’t image Saban’s program allowing 9 guys to get arrested for the same violation/crime? Personnel issues do matter. With the surrounding Gainesville demographic, 70-80K attendance is all you can expect without a winning team. Cost of going to games is also a factor…a lot of people just can’t afford to go.