London Johnson clapped his hands together. The overlapping roar of the crowd at the Swamp nearly drowned out the signal for the Charleston Southern center to snap the ball. Then, an orange and blue blur came rushing toward him.
It was Gators defensive back Chauncey Gardner-Johnson flying across the line to greet Johnson with a quick slam into the turf for his first sack on the first defensive play of the season.
The remainder of the game for the CSU offense unfolded much like that play, reminding everyone why this Florida defense has been the strength of the team for so long.
Florida danced to a 53-6 clobbering of Charleston Southern in a game in which the defense held the Buccaneers to just three passing yards. Three. It was only the second time since 1996 UF held an opponent below 10 passing yards in a game.
"That just sets the standard for our defense is how I see it you know, that's just how we are, that's how our defensive is,” defensive tackle T.J. Slaton said of the Gardner-Johnson play. “We're gonna be aggressive, we're gonna play fast and we're gonna be physical."
However, what went right last Saturday wasn’t the focus when defensive coordinator Todd Grantham and other members of the defense spoke to reporters this week.
Instead, they collectively harped on a couple things this defense needs to do better.
Younger guys need to improve
A lot of young players saw playing time on Saturday during the second half of a game that had been decided since the first quarter.
“(Cornerback) Trey Dean, first time playing, was able to go in and give us some quality snaps. So, from that standpoint I was pleased with that,” Grantham said, “but when you go back and look at it as a whole with our young guys we gotta continue to still work and develop and get to where we need to be because we’ve got some tough games coming up.”
Dean, along with cornerbacks C.J. Henderson and Marco Wilson, opted to stay after practice Monday night to work on their techniques. Wilson said defensive backs always do.
The inexperience of the younger guys showed, and Grantham noted the specifics that they need to focus on.
“It’s a matter of just continuing to understand your technique, your leverage, making sure you get the right fits, leverage your gaps, doing those kind of things, being able to execute the call when it comes,” he said. “It’s really nothing more than being able to get some experience, get it on tape and continuing to work out it out in practice this week and be better next week.”
Tackle better, please
Mullen told reporters that despite the great defensive efforts he saw on Saturday, his players must get better at tackling.
Missed tackles were somewhat of an issue in Saturday’s game, especially when the reserves checked in. A missed tackle in the fourth quarter led to the biggest run of the game for the Buccaneers, and it led to their only score of the night.
Corners Marco Wilson and CJ Henderson both agreed with Mullen that the focus this week will be on improving tackles.
The Gators registered 68 tackles on Saturday despite missing quite a few.
Wilson said that the subpar tackling could have had something to do with it being the first game of the season.
“That’s probably a little bit of it, just getting used to thudding in practice and not really going out there and hit for real,” Wilson said. “It will definitely get fixed.”
You can follow Alanis Thames on Twitter @alanisthames or contact her at athames@alligator.org.
UF coach Dan Mullen emphasized that his defense's tackling needs to improve as the Gators (1-0) head into a home matchup with Kentucky.
