TALLAHASSEE — The atmosphere on Saturday night in the bowels of Doak Campbell Stadium was bittersweet. Florida’s fate was in another team’s hands, but coach Will Muschamp — soaked and dripping with Gatorade — still found plenty to be happy about.
Only one year removed from questioning the Gators’ toughness, Muschamp watched his team play the 13th-ranked Seminoles off their own field.
“It was a really sexy win,” Muschamp said. “I was going to come in here with my shirt off, but my wife and the players did not want me to do that.”
Florida’s 37-26 win against Florida State (10-2, 7-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) was more than simply revenge.
The victory was the Gators’ 11th despite facing one of the nation’s toughest schedules. Florida’s 12 opponents have a combined 92-50 record this season, and five have spent time ranked among the top 10 in the BCS standings. UF is 4-1 against those teams.
The Gators (11-1, 7-1 Southeastern Conference) ended the final weekend of the regular season with a body of work befitting a national championship contender.
“Our resume speaks for itself,” Muschamp said. “Come on, you’ve seen where we’ve played, who we’ve played, and the quality of football teams we’ve beaten. We’ll play anyone anywhere.”
Florida’s BCS National Championship Game aspirations were dashed when No. 1 Notre Dame held off USC 22-13 late Saturday night in Los Angeles.
After finishing last season a dismal 7-6, the Gators made their final claim in the national title race. They won the same way they have all season — by doing what they couldn’t do last year.
Florida opened up an early 13-0 lead with three scoring drives on its first five possessions. Three of the Gators’ first four drives lasted 10 or more plays.
In its previous five games, Florida had only four drives with a double-digit play count, two of which came during a 23-0 win against FCS foe Jacksonville State on Nov. 17. The nation’s 104th-ranked offense was efficient and clicking early on.
Unfortunately for the Gators, a combination of botched trick plays and a mid-game slump typical of offensive coordinator Brent Pease’s much-maligned unit resulted in a 13-0 lead morphing into a 20-13 deficit late in the third quarter.
Instead of panicking, Florida simply did what it has done all season: finish strong.
“We kept saying the second half is our half,” nose tackle Omar Hunter said. “No matter what, (the) second half is our half. We got to finish the game in the fourth quarter. That is the most important quarter, because you got to finish, and we came out and did that.”
“We knew adversity was going to come, and we stayed positive,” cornerback Marcus Roberson said. “We know things like that are going to happen in the game. We just have to fight through every time. It just shows we are a tough team, and in the second half, we come out strong.”
Spurred by freshman linebacker Antonio Morrison’s forced fumble on a sack of EJ Manuel — the Gators’ fifth takeaway of the game — Florida scored 24 straight points in the fourth quarter.
“The defense was feeding us the ball, and we’re so grateful for that,” center Jonotthan Harrison said. “Although we couldn’t score every offensive possession, the defense just kept giving us the ball.”
After failing to put the game out of hand despite multiple opportunities, Florida’s offense finally broke through in the ground game, wearing down a unit that entered as the nation’s top-ranked rushing defense.
Mike Gillislee spurred the Gators’ offensive outburst, racking up 63 of his 140 yards and a touchdown on his final five carries. Matt Jones carried six times for 74 yards and a touchdown in the fourth quarter alone.
Like LSU on Oct. 6, Florida State’s vaunted defense folded.
“We had a lot of confidence coming in here to be able to run the football,” Muschamp said. “We’ve run it well versus everybody. We’ve run it well versus better defenses.”
The Gators became the fifth team in school history to win 11 games during the regular season and emboldened the SEC brand by exposing the likely ACC champions, but Saturday was incomplete.
Even with one of the nation’s toughest schedules, Florida’s margin of error was razor-thin in 2012. After Saturday’s game, Muschamp’s thoughts drifted 167 miles eastward.
“We shot ourselves in the foot too many times in Jacksonville, or we’d be sitting here undefeated,” Muschamp said. “We have no one to blame but ourselves for not getting it done in Jacksonville. That rests on my shoulders.”
The Gators have come a long way since coach Urban Meyer called the program “broken” at the end of the 2010 campaign.
Eleven wins and a likely berth in the Sugar Bowl cannot quell Muschamp’s thirst. Instead of playing in Atlanta and Miami to end the season, the Gators will watch both games at home.
In Muschamp’s eyes, even an 11-win season is a failure without a championship.
“Until you start accomplishing some goals — everybody wants to talk about how we’ve arrived and we’re back — hell, we haven’t won a championship,” Muschamp said. “Until you win a championship, I have a hard time saying we’ve arrived and we’re back at all. That’s my opinion. Everything at the University of Florida is about championships.”
Contact Joe Morgan at joemorgan@alligator.org.
Safety Matt Elam celebrates after making a tackle in Florida’s 37-26 win against Florida State on Saturday at Doak Campbell Stadium in Tallahassee.
