Florida Gators

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – In mid-April, after wrapping the spring sports calendar, there was a very real possibility the University of Florida would not finish in the Top 10 of the Learfield Director's Cup standings, which annually rank the overall collegiate athletic programs in the nation. If that were to happen, it would be for the first time. Ever.
 
How real was that scenario? 
 
The Gators were 25th. 
 
Things changed, of course. That Mike Holloway's track and field teams altered the landscape was not a huge surprise (though the Gators, by their standards, were coming off third-place finishes at the NCAA indoors championships three months earlier). There was also optimism Kevin O'Sullivan's abundantly talented baseball team would hit its stride in the postseason. What Coach J.C. Deacon and the men's golf team did in Arizona, though, made for one of the great UF title dashes in recent memory; an unexpected, emotional. sometimes dominant and richly satisfying display of performance under pressure.
 
And when the Director's Cup standings finally settled, there was Florida, back in the top 5  – at No. 5  – for the 14th consecutive year and extending another impressive streak. Florida is the only school in the country to finish in the top 10 of the last 39 national all-sports rankings. 
 
What an incredible last two months it was. Not to mention another eventful athletic year. 

Let's review.
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10) Rally in Tally
 

ALEX FUDGE ON A 7-FOOTER 🔨 @GatorsMBK | #SCtop10 pic.twitter.com/ruczgdY1Bv

— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) November 19, 2022

UF basketball fans had become awfully ornery with regard to rival Florida State in the series. As of two years ago, the Seminoles were on a seven-game winning streak that dated to 2014 and constituted the longest such run by either team in the series that dated way back to 1951. Florida snapped the streak with a 71-55 home win on No. 14, 2021, giving then-Coach Mike White his first victory over the Seminoles in seven tries in what was White's final season with the Gators. 
 
Todd Golden's introduction to UF-FSU was not only more successful, it was historic. 
 
The Gators' 16-17 record in Golden's first go-around was not what anybody in the program wanted. The highlight of the season was probably a 67-54 defeat of No. 2 Tennessee, which joined Auburn '22 as the highest-ranked opponent ever to be beaten on UF's home floor. 
 
But Florida's stunning comeback and 76-67 win at Tallahassee made for a joyous road ride home. The Gators trailed the Seminoles 43-26 at halftime after making just eight of 29 field-goal attempts (27.6 percent), including a woeful 1-for-12 from the 3-point line, while allowing the home team to hit nearly 48 percent. 
 
The tables turned after halftime, with the Gators blitzing the Seminoles with a 23-3 run out of the locker room to wipe out the lead almost instantly on the way to shooting 52 percent in the second period and outscoring FSU 50-24 over the final 20 minutes. All-SEC forward Colin Castleton finished with 25 points and nine rebounds. 


9) Epic Football Opening  When the UF football team moved into the sparkling and palatial Heavener Football Training Center in August '22 the program moved into an altogether new era. Finally, the Gators' antiquated football offices and operations in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium were replaced with an $85 million, 142,000-square foot, state-of-the-art facility with first-class amenities – dining hall, lounge and gaming area, resort swimming pool and recreation deck – benefiting student athletes from all 21 sports, and all situated on the former site of baseball's McKethan Stadium. 
 
Doors opened for the football team on Aug. 14. Players (mouths agape) meandered into the expansive atrium lobby (since named "Jeremy Foley Hall of Champions"), luxurious locker room and training area, plus monstrous weight room that buttressed the Condron Family Indoor Practice Facility. 
 
The term "game-changer" was tossed around a lot. For good reason.

Welcome to the 21st century, Florida football, which now has a headquarters that can stand alongside the best in the nation (NFL teams, included). 


8) Epic Football Opener A second straight losing season and no-show performance in the Las Vegas Bowl was not what Billy Napier had in mind for his debut football campaign. Over the course of the season's three-plus months, the reality of a roster so void in SEC talent – and how recruiting had been so sorely deemphasized under the previous coaching regime – was on display for all of Gator Nation to see. 
 
But it belied what we saw on that glorious 2022 opening night at the "Swamp." 
 
UF rose to the occasion in Napier's debut, upsetting reigning Pac-12 champion and No. 7 Utah 29-26 behind some stellar big plays from quarterback Anthony Richardson (3 rushing TDs) and a defense that bowed up in the final minute when linebacker Amari Burney intercepted Utes standout Cameron Rising with a diving pick in the end zone on a 2nd-and-goal from the Florida 6 with just 17 seconds to play. The Gators, en masse, fed off the energy of the largest season-opening crowd in Spurrier/Florida Field history.
 
A week later, UF lost at home against Kentucky and away the Gators went on their up-and-down ride, which ultimately finished with a major down slope; as in consecutive losses to end the season at Vanderbilt, Florida State and against Oregon State in Vegas. 
 
But Sept. 3, 2023 under the lights was really, really cool. 

 
7) Lax avenges end of regular-season streak UF opened the American Athletic Conference slate against James Madison, a program very much on the national rise. The seventh-ranked Dukes handed the No. 8 Gators a 14-9 loss at Harrisonburg, Va., on March 18, with both teams going unbeaten over the next seven weeks before facing off again in the AAC Tournament championship game in Philadelphia. 
 
Florida trailed 8-7 after three quarters, then scored the only goals of the fourth period. Emma LoPinto tallied an unassisted score with 12:26 to tie, then Madison Waters took a feed from Maggi Hall just 103 seconds later for the go-ahead goal and 9-8 lead that ultimately stood up for the final score, thanks to tournament MVP Sarah Reznik's work in the net. 
 
So, yes, the Gators' run of 11 consecutive regular-season (ALC, Big East and AAC) crowns ended, but they won their respective conference tournament for a ninth straight season and went on to advance to the round of 16 in the NCAA Tournament. 


6) Volleyball Back on Top  The circumstances were somewhat unusual, but the end result was Florida's first SEC championship in volleyball since 2019. 
 
The Gators officially laid claim to the program's 25th all-time conference crown (far and away the most of any league volleyball team) on Nov. 26 with a sweep of their two matches against Ole Miss, but it was what they did the weekend before that set the table for claiming a share of the league banner. 
 
UF's final regular-season home matches of the season brought rival Kentucky to town. The 12^th-ranked Gators handed the 18th-ranked Wildcats a lopsided 3-0 sweep on Nov. 19, a Friday, with some of their best volleyball of the season. The Cats, obviously, took the beating personally and returned the favor with a 3-0 road sweep of their own the very next day. 
 
The two teams parted ways, with both needing wins in their respective regular-season finales to clinch a piece of the crown. Florida took care of business at Mississippi, while Kentucky did the same at home against South Carolina. 
 
Note: Since volleyball was introduced at UF, Coach Mary Wise's program has the second-most conference championships among all Gators teams. Volleyball trails only women's tennis in all-time titles.
 

5) Florida Five-Peat The Gators' gymnastics squad captured its fifth consecutive regular-season SEC championship in the final league meet by defeating 12^th-ranked Kentucky 198.15 to 197.575 at the O'Dome. The two teams began the night tied atop the conference standings with one loss each, with a fired-up sold-out crowd of 9,298 cheering the Gators on to the title and helping set a season average attendance record of 9,351 per meet. 
 
It was also Senior Night for fifth-year Trinity Thomas, who won her 30^th career all-around title, so imagine the energy in the building. 
 
Three weeks later, Coach Jenny Rowland took her squad to the SEC Championships in Duluth, Ga., and won that meet for the second consecutive time with a record-setting score of 198.425 that bested the previous meet mark of 198.375 set by Georgia in 1997. A Gator won at least a share of each of the meet's five individual events, with Thomas (again) claiming the all-around, but also posting the only perfect 10s of the meet, doing so on uneven bars and floor. Sophomore Leanne Wong won her second straight balance beam crown, while Sloane Blakely shared the vault championship. 
 
With the win, Florida had a ton of momentum heading into the NCAAs until Thomas, one of the most dominant performers in the sports' history. suffered a leg injury at regionals in Pittsburgh. The Gators advanced without her, but the injury kept Thomas from two of her four events at the NCAA Championships in Fort Worth, Texas, on a day they fell just short of the national title, falling to top-ranked Oklahoma – for a second consecutive year – by the narrow margin of 198.3875 to 198.2375. 
 

4) Rare Swimming Sweep  Thirty years. 
 
That's how long it had been since both the Florida men's and women's swim teams had won the SEC championship in the same year. 
 
The UF men had dominated the league literally for a decade, winning 10 consecutive league crowns, a run that began in 2013. In February, though, the women joined the fray by capturing their first SEC crown since 2009, as the two Gator genders raised the trophy (and took the post-meet victorious plunge) together for the first time since 1993.
 
Anthony Nesty, in his fifth season, joined Hall-of-Famer Randy Reese as the only swimming coaches in Florida history to win men's and women's swimming titles in the same season (Reese did it in 1981, '83-85 and '90). 
 
The UF men, now with 11 straight conference championships, scored big in the relays and got gold-medal performances from Jake Mitchell (500 freestyle), Joshua Liendo (100 fly), Adam Chaney (100 back), Dillon Hillis (100 breast) and Aleksas Savickas (200 breast). The Gators, with 1,255 points, left runner-up Tennessee (950.5) in their wake. 
 
The UF women sent Emma Weyant (400 individual medley) to the winner's podium, as well as the 800 free relay team of Ekaterina Nikonova, Talia Bates, Weyant and Micayla Cronk on their way to 1,488.5 points, compared to second-place Auburn at 1,089.5.


3) More Hardware for the Mouse House


Their overall depth, with a few points here and some more there, allowed Holloway's guys to stick around in striking distance of front-running Arkansas at the NCAA Track & Field Championships. 
 
Memo to the track-running nation: Better have some distance between you and the Gators before those sprint finals roll around. 
 
Emmanuel Bamidele and Ryan Willie finished 1-2 in the 400 meters. Then the team of Willie, Jacory Patterson, Pjai Austin and Robert Gregory placed second in the 4x100 relay. 
 
The last event of the night was the 4x400. The Razorbacks, without a serious contender in the field, had to finish no worse than fourth and hope the Gators' quartet of Bamidele, Patterson, Jevaughn Powell and Willie did not match the NCAA record-setting performance they clocked in the qualifying heats. Better yet, the Hogs needed the Gators to drop the baton and erase all doubt.
 
Well, they didn't match that time (or blow a handoff). No. Instead, they bested that record time at 2:57.4.
 
And with that, "Mouse" Holloway gave the Gators a second straight national men's title and 11th in program history, all of them coming since 2010.

This stat says it all about Holloway's dominance. Florida has won 47 national championships (all sports) in its history. Holloway is responsible for 27.7 percent of them. 
 

2) Oh So Close in Omaha Baseball claiming a share of its first SEC title since 2018 would have been good enough to make the list. O'Sullivan and his squad kept the ride going, though, by winning their first regional at two-year-old Condron Family Ballpark then sweeping conference rival South Carolina in the Super Regional in front of state-record crowds to claim the first College World Series berth in five years. 
 
In Omaha, the second-seeded Gators played with fire, defeating Virginia, Oral Roberts and Texas Christian each in one-run games to reach the best-of-three championship series, where UF was matched against 7-seed and league power LSU. The Tigers, with their rich CWS tradition backed by a half dozen national championships and the most talented overall roster in the country, began the 2023 season ranked No. 1 in the country and reached the final by eliminating CWS top-seed Wake Forest.
 
The Tigers flipped the script on the Gators. Twice, as it turned out.

First, it was LSU that won a one-run nail-biter with a 4-3 victory in 11 innings in Game 1 of the finals. The next two nights, sold-out Charles Schwab Field got turned on its head. 
 
Twenty-four to four. That was the score of Florida's victory in Game 2, courtesy of a CWS-record 23 hits (highlighted by a 5-for-5 night from Wyatt Langford), including two homers each from Ty Evans (one a third-inning grand slam that snapped a 3-3 tie and gave UF the lead for good) and Jac Caglianone, which gave him a 2023 NCAA-best 33 on the season, also a Florida single season record. That score again: Florida 24, LSU 4. The win was UF's 54th, setting a single-season mark. All the momentum and swag was in the Gators' favor.

Or so it seemed. 
 
Eighteen to four. That was the score of LSU's victory in Game 3, courtesy of – get this – a CWS-record 24 hits (highlighted by four hits and three runs from Tigers superstar outfielder Dylan Crews). A handful of the records the Gators set the night before evaporated in barely 24 hours, as did all the exhilaration and anticipation of what would have been a third NCAA championship for the school in a month.

But Gator Nation, as well as the college baseball-watching nation, was treated to quite a thrill ride, with ESPN viewership shattered in the three-game series.


1) Gut-check, Greatness at Grayhawk
 

FLORIDA GATORS. NATIONAL CHAMPIONS. pic.twitter.com/5DKBoucHyQ

— Gators Golf (@GatorsGolf) June 1, 2023

It was an amazing hour of drama and mental toughness.
 
Fifth-seeded Georgia Tech was seemingly in command on the back nine against the No. 2-seed Gators in the match-play final of the NCAA Golf Championships at unforgiving Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. The Yellow Jackets led three of the four individual matches still in contention. 
 
UF stared down the moment in icy-cold fashion.

Tech blinked. 
 
The day before, the Gators, who qualified for the match-play competition for the first time since the NCAA adopted the format (for the quarterfinals, semis and final) in 2009, trailed in four of five matches before rallying to defeat Virginia 3-2 in the quarters and from two points behind to stun rival Florida State 3-2 in the semis. In those matches, the big Gator guns stepped up in a big way, as seniors Fred Biondi, who won the individual medalist title (the first UF player to do so since 2001) during the four qualifying rounds, along with Ricky Castillo and John DuBois were nails down the stretch. 
 
Against Tech, Yuxin Lin gave UF an early one-point lead with a wipeout win, then watched things get a little testy before DuBois, Biondi and Castillo put the screws to their individual opponents. When DuBois, who trailed through 14, tied his match at No. 15 and won it at 18, the tide had turned in the other matches as well. Florida needed only one win from its two veteran standouts, with both Biondi and Castillo in prime position. 
 
Fittingly, Biondi clinched the title with a tap-in at 18, while Castillo and Deacon watched – and shared a tearful embrace – in the fairway about 150 yards away. 
 
The national title was the first for the Gators in men's golf since 2001, as well as the first for Deacon, who replaced retired Hall-of-Famer Buddy Alexander in 2014 and a month earlier delivered the program's first SEC title since 2011. 
 
What a remarkable run. What a remarkable season.