The Gators ended the season on a sour note for the first time in Urban Meyer's tenure as a head coach, losing to Michigan 41-35 in the Capital One Bowl in Orlando. My hat is off to Michigan for playing their hearts out for the retiring Lloyd Carr. In the process, Michigan played unquestionably their best game of the season and delivered by far their most significant win of the season.
Michigan did it by dominating both lines of scrimmage the way the Big 10 Conference teams have always done it, but also by showing some surprising speed, especially in their wide receivers. We all knew that WR Mario Manningham was the real deal, but where did Adrian Arrington come from?
I put this loss squarely on the shoulders of our inconsistent defense, inconsistency that can be attributed to their youth. In fact, our youthful defense made the entire Michigan offense look like the NFL's Patriots with Chad Henne playing the role of former Wolverine Tom Brady. We can take solace in the fact that we are young and we will improve. Charlie Strong and Greg Mattison won us a national title last year on our defense, so I have every confidence they'll have these young men playing at a much higher level next year with a little more confidence and experience under their belts.
And speaking of confidence, how great will our offense be next year? We lose Caldwell and likely Ingram, but we are loaded otherwise with Tebow, Harvin, and most of the line coming back. In addition, we may actually have a legitimate running back next year when Moody, the transfer from USC, becomes eligible.
A side note about the Capital One Bowl: worst facility I have been in since the Orange Bowl against Miami a few years ago, a facility that will be torn down soon. Hopefully, someone also will soon put the Citrus Bowl out of its misery. It is hard to say which was worse, the bathrooms, the parking, the concessions, or the relative difficulty of getting to one's seats, but I think I'd have to say the worst of it was the concessions. How this bowl is considered more prestigious than the Outback Bowl in Tampa is a mystery to me. Hopefully, next year we'll be back in a BCS Bowl.
Anyone else notice the SEC's record in the bowls this year? Even though UF did not do their part this year, Tennessee, Georgia (congrats, Trey!), Mississippi State, Alabama, Kentucky, and Auburn all did. Arkansas, rudderless with no head coach, joined us in the loss column making the SEC 6-2 going into the national title game between LSU and Ohio State. Not too shabby.
Well, another year has passed and it looks like the unbelievable year of the Gator may be over. Our football team was good, not great, and our basketball team appears to be mediocre at best while we reload with only one junior and no seniors on the team at this time. We still have the best two coaches in the country in the two "revenue sports," so I hope the next year of the Gator is just around the corner.
As always, I'd like to thank my wife, Marie, for her understanding in allowing me to attend so many games and to W.D. and Trey for another fun year of smack-talking. Hopefully, FSU will emerge (slightly) from the mess they are in and become respectable again very soon. UGA and UF should both be Top 10 in 2008 preseason rankings with UGA possibly No. 1. I can't wait!