BATON ROUGE, La. — Florida fell back to earth on Saturday. Fortunately for the Gators, Atlanta is of this world.
No. 10 LSU ended the Tyler Murphy honeymoon with a 17-6 victory against No. 17 UF on Saturday in Tiger Stadium.
Despite another loss during which the offense did too little and the defense was asked to do too much, the Gators’ season is far from over. In fact, it begins next Saturday.
The road to the Southeastern Conference Championship Game now goes through Faurot Field, home of undefeated SEC East leader Missouri.
“We still have everything on the table as far as Atlanta is concerned,” coach Will Muschamp said. “We need to take care of the SEC East. It is wide open, and it is all in our hands.”
Florida’s season may hinge on a tangle with another group of Tigers, but Saturday hurt.
In a statement game at the season’s midway point, the Gators crumbled in the same kind of three-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust contest that was its bread and butter in 2012. The style brought UF within one game of Atlanta last season.
But the Gators (4-2, 3-1 SEC) failed to impose their will on Saturday, and it proved costly.
LSU (6-1, 3-1 SEC) outmanned, outgunned and outmuscled Florida in the trenches. In a battle of stingy defensive units, the Tigers held stronger. In short, LSU stole Florida’s identity.
Les Miles won “The Muschamp Way.”
“We didn’t win enough on the line of scrimmage,” Muschamp said.
Senior defensive tackle Damien Jacobs added: “They kind of beat us at our own game.”
The Gators burst onto the national scene with their run-and-stun philosophy in a 14-6 win against LSU last season in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium. Florida ran the ball on 58 of 70 offensive snaps, burning the clock and moving the chains three yards at a time.
Meanwhile, the Tigers managed only 42 rushing yards on 25 carries against a stout Gators defense that surrendered more than 11 yards during only four of LSU’s 12 drives.
With that victory, UF grounded and pounded its way into national title contention.
“We’re not soft. No one can call us soft now,” quarterback Jeff Driskel said following that win.
“If we didn’t have people’s respect, we gained it today. We’re a physical team.”
But the Tigers turned the tables on Saturday, racking up 175 yards on 39 carries against a Gators defense that entered the game ranked second nationally in rushing defense.
LSU running back Jeremy Hill spearheaded the outburst by gouging the UF defense for 121 yards on 19 carries, including 64 yards on seven carries in the fourth quarter alone.
Hill became the first opposing player to rush for more than 100 yards against Florida since Georgia running back Todd Gurley tallied 118 yards on 27 carries last October.
Backed by Gurley, the Bulldogs ended the Gators’ hopes of reaching Atlanta.
“We got beat in the front seven,” junior linebacker Michael Taylor said. “They beat us at the line of scrimmage, at the point of attack, and that’s how you run the ball. Getting leverage on the other team, beating them at the point of attack, that’s what they did on a lot of plays.”
On the other side of the ball, the Gators could not muster enough production in the ground game needed for a balanced attack. Losing sophomore running back Matt Jones to a left knee injury during the first quarter did not help.
A career day from freshman Kelvin Taylor was a breath of fresh air, but Florida’s season-worst average of 2.8 yards per carry on 40 attempts could not get the job done.
“It was a line-of-scrimmage game,” redshirt senior offensive guard Jon Halapio said. “We knew that coming into the game. It really — it was all on the offensive line and the defensive line. We just got outworked, outplayed.”
Inconsistency in the running game forced the responsibility of production into Murphy’s hands, but the struggles on the line of scrimmage bled into the passing game. Dealing with constant pressure, Murphy struggled in his third career start.
LSU sacked Murphy four times, hurried him four times and batted down three passes at the line of scrimmage. Murphy, who was sacked only three times in his first two starts, was sacked on back-to-back plays to end Florida’s final drive.
“We’ve got to protect better,” Muschamp said. “We had too many free runners at the quarterback. They did a nice job of pressuring us. We had too many times that [Murphy] had too many guys in his face.”
Halapio blamed poor protection of Murphy on bad communication, poor technique and a failure to pick up blitzes. Crowd noise, he said, was not a factor.
“It was all on us,” Halapio said. “I’m not going to sit here and make an excuse. We’ve played in loud stadiums before, and we’ve never folded like that. It’s all on us. We’ve just got to do a better job.”
When he was not taken down in the backfield, Murphy threw — a lot.
He attempted a career-high 27 passes, but his 115 yards through the air marked his lowest output in four games. Junior punter Kyle Christy, who completed a 14-yard pass on a fake punt play in the fourth quarter, dwarfed Murphy’s 4.3 yards per attempt.
Two of Murphy’s passes were dropped interceptions.
“It’s my fault,” Murphy said of struggles in the passing game. “I really have to work on getting rid of the ball.”
The Gators just cannot drop the ball. Their struggles burned brightest in key moments.
UF lost a yard on eight red-zone snaps, none of which came before the fourth quarter. Florida converted only 6 of 17 third downs, including a 2-of-9 clip in the second half.
An overthrown pass to an open Quinton Dunbar in the end zone here, two false starts by D.J. Humphries on the Gators’ final drive there. Each one a roadblock to Atlanta.
“We just got to learn from our mistakes,” Halapio said. “Just embrace coaching this week. Get better.”
Next Saturday provides Florida another opportunity. The Gators have a chance to not only move on but also keep their Atlanta dream alive. Missouri, which upset Georgia 41-26 on Saturday, gives UF a chance to earn the statement win it failed to make at LSU.
But the margin for error is gone. Each mistake is more costly than the last. The season is on the line, and upcoming games against the Tigers and the Bulldogs are critical.
But even though the Gators are backed up against the wall, they are not deterred. The road gets bumpier now, but for Florida, it beats making a U-turn and heading back home.
“This is an SEC team, a rivalry team, a team that we damn sure wanted to beat,” Taylor said.
“But they’re not in the East, luckily. We’ve got all our East opponents ahead of us. I know we’re capable to beat all of them, so that’s what we’ll have to do.”
Follow Joe Morgan on Twitter @joe_morgan.
Will Muschamp reacts to a call during Florida’s 17-6 loss to LSU on Saturday at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, La. Despite the loss, the Gators can still win the Southeastern Conference Eastern Division.
Two LSU defenders sack Florida redshirt junior quarterback Tyler Murphy during the Gators’ 17-6 loss to LSU on Oct. 10 at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, La. Florida's offensive line has allowed 10 sacks in its past two games.
