Three stats that paint a picture of how Florida Football can beat

Even though the betting public doesn’t trust Florida, here are three stats that explain why Vegas liked Florida originally

By Benjamin Henderson |

Sep 7, 2024; Gainesville, Florida, USA; Florida Gators head coach Billy Napier looks on against the Samford Bulldogs during the second half at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Matt Pendleton-Imagn Images

If you have read our content here at Hail Florida Hail over the past few weeks, you know we haven’t exactly been optimistic about the Gators. If we had our way, Billy Napier would have already received his marching orders, and Florida would be searching for a new coach.

But even with Napier still employed, we also realize there is still a realistic pathway for Florida to win some games that the public doesn’t believe they will win.

With that in mind, these are three key stats that work in Florida’s favor against UCF.

UCF’s Defensive Line Isn’t Good

In the Mississippi State game the Gators actually held up very well along the offensive line. Not only did Florida not give up a single sack during the game, they also didn’t give up a single pressure according to Pro Football Focus.

There is a bit of fool’s gold behind that because Mississippi State has the 15th-worst sack percentage in the country, sacking the opposing QB on just 2.7% of dropbacks, but when given time Graham Mertz and DJ Lagway were able to carve up the Bulldog secondary.

Guess who is coming to town with an even worse defensive line based on metrics?

UCF has the 14th-worst sack percentage in the country and the lowest amount of sack overall in the country. Against Nebraska, Colorado gave up five sacks and 16 hurries. Against UCF, Colorado gave up just two sacks and eight hurries. Hell, Colorado State generated more pressure on Shedeur Sanders than UCF did.

So if Mertz and Lagway can stay upright, Florida will have a pathway to move the ball against the Knights.

KJ Jefferson Accuracy

We profiled UCF QB KJ Jefferson earlier this week and highlighted that he is a wildcard coming into this game. Astute Gator fans will still have memories of Jefferson running for over 100 yards against Florida when Arkansas won in OT.

Jefferson isn’t having a bad season, but we wouldn’t classify it as good so far. When Jefferson does complete a pass, it usually goes for a big chunk. The problem is that his overall accuracy is a problem and as a result UCF is quite poor in the redzone.

Of QBs who have taken at least 100 dropbacks, Jefferson is 68th in completion percentage. Last year at Arkansas, he only had three games in which he had a below 60% completion rate. This year at UCF, he has already dipped under that number three times.

So, while UCF is 16th in the country in red zone scoring attempts in games against FBS competition, they are 53rd in overall red zone scores and 118th in red zone percentage, sporting a rate of 64% against FBS competition.

Translation to all of this is that while Jefferson can get UCF into the red zone, he may be forced to complete a pass or two he hasn’t completed all year in order for UCF to win.

This somewhat ties into the defensive line woes for UCF, but one of the other reasons why Colorado had a field day on offense was a dominant running game.

Colorado’s average yards after contact on rushing attempts in their four previous games was 1.95, 2.75, 3.65, and 3.15.

Against UCF, Colorado averaged a whopping 4.30 yards after contact en route to a healthy 5.2 yards per carry average on 27 carries.

Likewise, Florida averaged 4.11 yards after contact against Mississippi State after averaging 2.09 against Texas A&M and 2.80 against Miami. Even against Samford, the Gators only managed an average of 3.32 yards after contact.

So even if Napier sticks to his vanilla offense, there might not be much UCF can do if Florida can establish a physical running game the Knights have no way of stopping.