Grading the Gators: Some improvement, but overall, the Georgia Bulldogs test far too tough

Florida's 42-20 loss to Georgia Saturday in Jacksonville left the Gators 1-4 in the Southeastern Conference. Here are our grades:

Offense D plus

Florida’s hopes of running on Georgia resulted in 13 yards in 13 attempts in the first half. The passing attack was predictably scattershot. The highlight of the day was Xzavier Henderson’s 78-yard TD reception, but the most impressive part was the 13-play TD drive to start the second half. UF was outmanned otherwise, as evidenced by going four-for-16 on third-down attempts and zero-for-three on fourth down tries. Whatever clicked in the third quarter, the Gators need to bottle and take to College Station.

Defense D plus

The Gators forced three turnovers and had six third-down stops. Those have been nothing to take for granted this season. Neither has tracking opponents’ tight ends. Georgia's trio had nine catches for 204 yards. Overall, the defense wasn’t the disaster UF fans feared. It actually sparked that third-quarter rally. But when Georgia was really motivated in the first and fourth quarters, the Gators’ defense was pretty much at the Bulldogs’ mercy.

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Game takeaways:Florida football: 5 takeaways from the Florida Gators' 42-20 loss to No. 1 Georgia

Special Teams B minus

On the upside, Adam Mihalek made both field goal attempts, including a career-best 52-yarder. Jeremy Crawshaw averaged 46.8 yards on six punts. Trever Etienne averaged 31 yards on two kickoff returns. On the downside, there was a holding penalty on one kick return and a flag for blocking in the back on a punt return. Those miscues have been all too frequent this season.