Florida Gators

TAMPA, Fla. — The explosive play was an elusive one for the Florida offense during the 2016 football season. Oh sure, that really big one at LSU jumps to mind. The 98-yard touchdown strike that basically turned the game and helped turn the Gators toward a Southeastern Conference Eastern title. It was huge. Beyond that, though? Not much. 

But add Monday's catch-and-run by seldom-seen running back Mark Thompson to the very short list. Thompson, the junior college transfer with few touches the second half of the season, took a screen pass from Austin Appleby and sped through the Iowa defense for an 85-yard touchdown late in the second quarter to provide the spark the No. 20 Gators needed and set in motion a decisive 30-3 trampling of No. 21 Hawkeyes before 51,119 in the Outback Bowl Monday at Raymond James Stadium.

"I'm going to tell everyone it was an 85-yard bomb," Appleby said. 

Go ahead, young man. In the books, it might as well be, as far as how it jacked the UF sidelines and what it meant for the big picture of the Florida program. The win helped UF (9-4) avoid a similar end-of-year, three-game spiral that haunted the Gators all last offseason. Instead, Florida allowed Iowa (8-5) one measly first-quarter field goal on its way to setting a team record for fewest points allowed in a bowl game, while the 27-point final margin of victory tied for the fourth largest in the program's 44-game bowl history. 

Nice way to head into the offseason. 

"That was a heckuva game for us. That's a really good team we played, a very physical team and a team that knows how to prepare," UF coach Jim McElwain said. "I think it speaks volumes of our guys to get ready and go play in a bowl game in January. I'm so proud of them. It's well-documented how beat up we were and never once all year did we use that as an excuse in any way, shape or form. It was, 'Next man up!' " 
 

Appleby completed 14 of 25 passes for 222 yards, two touchdowns and a couple of interceptions, and tailback Jordan Scarlett rushed for 94 yards, but it was true freshman safety Chauncey Gardner Jr., who came away with the game's Most Valuable Player honors. Gardner, the replacement for NFL-bound Marcus Maye (broken arm), intercepted a pair of fourth-quarter passes, returning the first 58 yards for a touchdown to push the Gators in front by 21. 

"It just felt like we got our swagger and our confidence back," Gardner said. "We were going to go out there and compete at the highest level and everything was going to just fall in, if we did our job." 

They did.

The Florida defense, despite a slew of season-ending injuries to some star players and with interim defensive coordinator Randy Shannon running the show following Geoff Collins' leaving for Temple, allowed just 225 yards for the game and 55 through the air, both Outback defensive records. The Gators frustrated Iowa quarterback C.J. Beathard into a horrific afternoon (7-for-23, 55 yards, three interceptions). The unit also had a huge fourth-down goal-line stand in second quarter to keep the game tied. 


LARGEST VICTORY MARGIN IN FLORIDA BOWL GAME HISTORY 

Margin	Opponent	Score	Bowl	Date
34	West Virginia	41-7	Sugar Bowl	Jan. 1, 1994
33	Maryland	56-23	Orange Bowl	Jan. 2, 2002
32	Florida State	52-20	Sugar Bowl	Jan. 2, 1997
27	Ohio State	41-14	BCS Championship	Jan. 8, 2007
	Cincinnati	51-24	Sugar Bowl	Jan. 1, 2010
	Iowa	30-3	Outback Bowl	Jan. 2, 2017

The Thompson TD, which accounted for a quarter of his team's 331 yards of offense, gave UF a 10-3 advantage. The Gators opened up a three-touchdown cushion when Appleby found wide-open tight end DeAndre Goolsby for a 6-yard scoring strike and 17-3 lead with 48 seconds left in the third period, followed by Gardner intercepting a tipped pass and going untouched for his touchdown on the second play of the fourth quarter to make it 24-3. 

Sophomore place kicker Eddy Pineiro added his second field goal, a 25-yarder after the second interception by Gardner, to push it to 27-3 with 9:46 remaining; and a third field goal after linebacker Daniel McMillian got his first career interception on the next series.  

One of the bigger plays of the game, though, came when Marcel Harris stopped Iowa 1,000-yard tailback LeShun Daniels for a 2-yard loss on fourth-and-goal from the 1 in the second period. 

"Huge play," defensive tackle Joey Ivie said. 

After the two teams swapped punts, the Gators got the ball on their own 15 and called the swing pass to Thompson on first down. 

And away they went.  

"We didn't play well enough to come up with a victory against a good Florida team," said Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz, whose team picked off Appleby twice in the first quarter, only to come away with the three points. "We certainly give them credit, salute their effort out there and congratulate them." 

Just a guess, but the Hawkeyes likely didn't focus too much of their scouting report on Thompson. Heading into the game, he had just three receptions for 18 yards the entire season. He'd only rushed six times over the previous six games, after losing the starting spot he held going into the 2016 season to Scarlett. 

But with the game knotted at 3-3 and the Gators backed up at their own 15, Thompson caught the pass in the left flat, ran through a couple Iowa arm tackles, then used a stiff arm to break into the clear and outrun the Hawkeyes the remaining 50 yards for the longest touchdown reception in the Outback's 31-year history. 

"It was a long time coming for him," Scarlett said of Thompson's play. 

He might as well have been talking about the UF offense. 

"We got our skill position players out in the open a little bit," McElwain said. "But I don't think we did enough." 

The Hawkeyes had a chance to cut into the UF lead on their first possession of the second half. Beathard marched his unit 13 plays and 63 yards to the Florida 12, but kicker Keith Duncan, who hit a 36-yarder earlier, pushed a chip-shot, 30-yard field-goal try wide to the right.  

The Gators countered by going 80 yards in 12 plays, but needed to overcome some obstacles along the way. Back-to-back completions of 24 yards to Freddie Swain and then 21 to Goolsby moved UF to the Iowa 9. On the next play, Appleby fired an apparent touchdown pass to freshman wideout Tyrie Cleveland, but the play was called back on an illegal-motion penalty. On the very next snap, the Gators were hit with an illegal formation call, dropping them back to a first-and-goal from the 19. 

But on third down, Appleby stayed calm in the pocket, stepped up and zipped a throw to Goolsby, who went uncovered across the end zone for the 17-3 lead. 

On Iowa's second play of its next possession, Beathard, under duress from pressure by defensive tackle Taven Bryan, fired a ball down the middle of the field for wideout Riley McCarron. He was covered and took a hit by walk-on linebacker Cristian Garcia. The ball popped up and into the hands of Gardner, who sped to the outside and outraced the Hawkeyes to the end zone just 14 seconds into the final quarter. 

"The D-line got the pressure," Gardner said, humbly spreading the credit around. "That pick-6 is theirs, not mine."
 
Gardner's second interception of the game (and 30-yard return to the Iowa 7) was followed by three plays and minus-1 yard of offense. Enter Pinerio for his 25-yarder. Exit a bunch of Hawkeyes fans from the building. They weren't there to see the Gators intercept Beathard a third time in the fourth quarter when another ball was batted in the air and McMillian came down with it to set up Pineiro's 48-yarder with just 5:57 to go. 

Pineiro banged a 45-yard field goal at the 5:42 mark of the first quarter that tied the game at 3-all after Duncan had given the Hawkeyes a 3-0 lead with a 36-yard field goal three minutes earlier. Those Iowa points were set up by the second of two interceptions thrown by Appleby, both of them coming on tipped balls that bounced off his receivers. 

"I was as unlucky early in the game as I was at the Hard Rock casino earlier this week," Appleby said. 

He made up for it. 

Everybody did.  

'"It feels great," Harris said. "Last year we didn't win our bowl game (a 41-7 loss to Michigan in Orlando) and we won this one. So, that's all I have to say." 

And that's plenty.