Florida Gators

GAINESVILLE Fla. — The Florida defense was historically good against North Texas on Saturday night and, unfortunately, the performance on that side of the ball was the second-most significant storyline of the game. 

The potential loss of the quarterback took top billing. 

UF's defense set a school record by allowing just 53 total yards in a 32-0 victory in front of 86,848 at the "Swamp." The Gators got rushing touchdowns from four different backs, a field goal from Eddy Pineiro and an early safety from its defensive front to ring up the program's first shutout since blanking Eastern Michigan 65-0 to start the 2014 season. Collectively, it was plenty to push past the outmanned Mean Green, but the sight of quarterback Luke Del Rio laid out in the middle field, then exiting straight to the locker room, certainly left reason for concern.

"Luke is getting his leg looked at right now," UF coach Jim McElwain said in the postgame news conference, his team a week out from its annual Southeastern Conference East Division showdown with rival Tennessee at Knoxville. "It doesn't look great."
 
 Del Rio left the game when defensive end Joshua Wheeler dove at the quarterback's left knee while in the pocket and throwing downfield. Officials flagged Wheeler for a personal foul on the play. Del Rio went down and stayed down. Moments later, after checking on his QB, McElwain walked to midfield and appeared to shout something in the direction of the UNT bench. A commotion followed, but was quickly diffused, although offensive guard Martez Ivy was ejected on the next play for a personal-foul penalty.

McElwain admitted he took the low blow personally. It showed. 

"I care about these guys in more ways than as football players," he said. 

The injury to Del Rio forced backup quarterback Austin Appleby, the graduate transfer from Purdue, into action. The Gators (3-0) led 19-0 at the time and Appleby executed all running plays in finishing a 74-yard drive that was capped when running back Mark Thompson, the junior college transfer, zipped for a 20-yard scoring run, vaulting over a UNT defender at the goal line to complete the march early in the fourth period and put UF up 25-0. 

On the next series, sophomore tailback Jordan Scarlett slammed in from the 1-yard line to wrap a 48-yard march at the 7:15 mark, with Appleby mixing in a couple passes along the way. He hit two of his four attempts for 30 yards. 

"My heart goes out to Luke, breaks for him. The hit was very dirty in my mind and I don't think there's any place for that," Appleby said. "You don't want to get an opportunity like that." 

But that's what happened and now the Gators will move on -- likely -- with Appleby under center.  

"When you lose your starting quarterback it's going to raise eyebrows and questions," junior cornerback Jalen Tabor said. "But the quarterback is only as good as the people around him and vice versa, and we've got good players all around."



Some really, really good ones on the defensive side of the ball.

The Florida defense put the finishing touches on its record-setting performance by turning the Mean Green (1-2) away on downs with just 53 total yards -- including minus-13 on the ground -- which was six fewer than Western Carolina managed in a 62-0 win for the Gators here in their 2006 national-championship season. UNT had just eight first downs in the game, was sacked seven times and punted nine times. 

"We have one of the best defenses, if not the best defense, in the country," Tabor said. 

Yeah, but 53 yards? 

"That's what we do." 

Meanwhile, on offense, the Gators cranked out 471 yards, with 255 for a ground attack that was spread quite nicely across the board. Thompson finished with 85 yards, Scarlett with 62, freshman Lamical Perine with 57 and sophomore Jordan Cronkrite with 46. They all had touchdowns. 

"Four-headed monster," Thompson said, repeating a phrase put to him to describe the UF backfield. "I think that's spot on."

As for the passing game, it was somewhat hamstrung with sophomore wide receiver Antonio Callaway sidelined with a quad injury. Minus the unit's No. 1 weapon, Del Rio was far from sharp, finishing 14 of 25 for 186 yards, no touchdowns and an interception. He got a lot of help from that defense that allowed just 19 first-half yards, with UF building a 19-0 lead, but the ability to churn out yards on the ground was sustaining enough. 

"Everything that we want to do as an offense comes off of our run game," said Appleby, who made good on that statement during his late-game work in emergency duty. "I think we've been leaning on it for the last three weeks. That's our bread and butter, what we want to do. We want to pound the rock and be a physical offense up front and set up things over the top. We're going to continue to do that."

Perine, the freshman from Alabama, drove into the end zone from four yards out with three minutes remaining in half. Earlier in the period, Cronkrite scooted in for a 6-yard touchdown run less than three minutes into the period. The sophomore tailback accounted for three key plays on the four-play, 46-yard drive, including a 10-yard run to start the march, a 15-yard reception after a holding penalty backed his team up, then the final six yards for the score. 

UF started the scoring after a Johnny Townsend punt pinned the Mean Green at their own 7 on their opening possession. That's when redshirt defensive tackle Caleb Brantley bull-rushed the UNT pass protection on second down and -- with some pressure help from fellow lineman Joey Ivie -- sacked quarterback Mason Fine in the end zone for a 2-0 lead just 1 minute, 56 seconds into the game.

After the ensuing free kick, the Gators went nine plays for 67 yards before settling on the field goal from Pineiro, his fifth of the season, at the 8:49 mark of the first. It was 5-0. 

The Gators had a chance to stretch out the lead late in the first quarter after a 53-yard strike from Del Rio to wideout Josh Hammond helped get the home team inside the Mean Green 10. After coming up short on a third-down pass, Pineiro trotted onto the field and lined up for the kick, only to be halted when McElwain called a timeout. Out of the break, Florida opted to go for it on fourth-and-2 from the 7, but Thompson was stuffed for no gain.

They had another chance to take the margin out in the second period, but another trip inside the opposing 10-yard line -- a fourth-and-2 at the North Texas 8 -- ended with nothing. Del Rio play-faked into the line, but the Mean Green defense wasn't buying. The Florida QB was in heavy pressure and just chucked the ball into a crowd in the end zone, where it fell incomplete.

Eventually, the Gators found their way into the end zone and the score stood at 19-0 when Del Rio took his hit with 1:10 left in the third quarter. 

Whether that's the moment Florida's season changed is not up for debate. It changed.

How much remains to be seen. 

"It's a good win," McElwain said, "not a great win." 

A painful one, for certain.