Do you remember Tim Tebow?
Of course you do.
If you don’t, let us put it to you another way: If the football program was like drama club, Tebow was the guy who was always cast in the lead role. Only he actually deserved it, unlike all those other jerks in your high school theater programs.
When Tebow graduated, he accidentally left a dearth of football-related talent in our program. We didn’t think we could ever be happy again. It was as if he broke up with us.
Relationships end all the time. It just takes people different amounts of time to get over them and move on.
For UF football, it took us about four years.
There’s a strange feeling coming back to our campus. Can you feel it?
Without getting cocky, there’s a feeling of hope mixed with surprise.
Still, the campus has been healing itself for a while now, and we appear to be finally out of our breakup funk.
Here are seven tips for getting over a relationship. Let’s list them and see if they apply to the Gators.
1. Make plans. It certainly seems like our football players do things other than focus on the past; at least they do things other than hang out at local bars like Ryan Lochte. He doesn’t even go here.
2. Be aware of the rebound. Not only did they have to deal with losing Tebow, the Gators football team had to then get over the loss of Urban Meyer. It was so bad, even Hoodie Allen mentioned it in his “freestyle” rap about UF.
3. Participate in hobbies. Does going to class count? Maybe they can do those flashmob-esque group dances like other schools’ marching bands or prisoners in other countries do. “Gangnam Style” is practically already “Gator Style.”
4. Keep up daily self-care routines. We could probably all learn from these guys. They must be pretty regimented with their workout schedules. So, like, kudos to you, gentlemen.
5. Don’t overwork. This is key to relationship recovery, but remember that idle hands are the Devil’s plaything. Don’t overwork, but don’t underwork either. More cynical football fans might say that the Gators barely worked at all over the past few years, but we digress.
6. Set a daily time limit for grieving. This step is probably difficult, considering Tebow’s name is mentioned pretty often; he’s still so relevant to the Gainesville area somehow, plus the media loves to follow his post-college career. There’s basically no escape. But it’s also been four years since he left UF, so it seems like the time for grieving is over.
7. Seek professional help. Here’s where Coach Muschamp enters the picture. He can be moody at times, yell at his players or at the referees, but he’s the expert opinion that we turn to in times of trouble. And it’s starting to pay off.
Now, the shift in attitudes could affect the football quality or vice versa.
But really, all it did was take some time. Time heals all wounds.
