Florida Gators Preview

In his second year as the head coach of the Florida Gators, Urban Meyer has quite a bit of proving to do. After having extremely successful stints in his past coaching jobs, especially with his work at Utah, Urban established himself as one of the premier head coaches in the nation. When he packed up and signed a big contract in the talent rich state of Florida, Gator fans immediately went into a frenzy thinking that the glory days had finally returned to the team that had seen a drought in big wins the past few years.

However, the lofty expectations of Florida fans to reach champion status in just two years probably aren’t going to be met. That being said, Urban Meyer has definitely been doing the field work and cleaning up in the recruiting arena to try and get as many of the talented players from Florida away from Florida State and Miami and to instead have them come and contribute to his own team. Meyer has been largely successful and the fruits of this work will become evident in the next couple years, if not as soon as the 2006 season.

Freshman wide receiver and return man Percy Harvin hopes to make some highlight reels while QB Tim Tebow continues to work to try and dethrone star QB Chris Leak, an extremely talented QB who hasn’t been effectively used in Meyer’s scheme. Although these two looks to be the main immediate contributors, big pickups along the offensive line and defensive fronts look to secure the Gators with solid teams for the next few years under Urban Meyer.

But with only 5 starters returning on offense and 5 on defense, experience will be an issue that will plague the Florida Gators early and often. Despite having talent up and down its roster, the Gators will still struggle as they try to get some consistency amongst their offensive and defensive squads.

Talent alone is not enough to win in the SEC, and Urban Meyer will have his hands full in 2006 as he tries to bring that talent together to form a truly competitive Florida Gators squad to take on the tough SEC schedule.