Sunday’s announcement of Billy Napier as the University of Florida’s new head football coach turns the page on a disappointing season and begins the process of rebuilding a consistent winning culture for the Florida Gators. Napier will be Florida’s 5th head coach since the 2008 National Championship season. The pattern for the last three hires has been two or three good years, one bad season, and gone. Expectations in Gator Nation are ruthlessly high. Here’s to hoping Napier is up to the task.
The box score from Saturday’s game against Florida State provides an excellent snapshot for where the program stands today. Just enough talent to overcome typical errors and win a home game against an underdog. The Gator’s weren’t poised enough this season to win road games or to upset favorites in the swamp. There weren’t any games, excepting the home loss to Alabama, where Florida exceeded expectations. On Saturday, the Gators added to their SEC leading penalties total with 13 more. They also added to their SEC leading interceptions thrown total with three more, two of them on FIRST down plays.
Beginning with day one, Billy Napier will have work to do reassuring and confirming Florida’s 12 currently committed 2022 recruits. He will have until the December 15th early signing date to add up to about 12 more commitments. By reputation, Napier is a strong recruiter, but recruiting is about building relationships and three weeks isn’t much time. Best case, he might close this recruiting cycle successfully by adding a few highly regarded Gator leans and then looking to the transfer portal. Realistically, the 2022 class is about damage control.
The second item that should be at the top of Billy Napier’s priorities is rebuilding a winning culture within the Gator football program. This task comes with a great deal of complexity and is unavoidably incremental. It isn’t about swagger. Beginning with swagger places the cart before the horse. It is about creating a mindset, individually and collectively, that reinforces an internal locus of control and accountability. It’s also about having a culture where TEAM results are the end game.
Questioning the Gators 2021 team effort level is the easy button for fans who might equate outward emotionality with effort, but Dan Mullen and team leaders have been clear in stating the problem hasn’t been about effort and desire. They have regularly attributed this season’s losses and failures to inconsistent focus and reoccurring mistakes.
We live in a world where the values that have historically supported team play are no longer universally held. Individualism and personal goals are greater priorities now for many. Increasing numbers of people aren’t willing or, perhaps, capable of delaying immediate gratification in favor of longer-term, bigger picture goals. This has been a big part of the problem for the 2021 Gators. Napier must build a culture for the 2022 team and beyond where mental focus and individual accountability for team goals is the measuring stick.
Mental focus aligns directly with both having an internal locus of control and with reducing external distractions. Individual accountability results from having clear standards and expectations that are reinforced when met and punished when they aren’t met.
The most successful athletes have a strong internal locus of control. They focus on the things they can control and work tirelessly to improve their ownselves. Their primarily source of motivation is on becoming the best version of themselves possible. They don’t need to be motivated by proving others wrong. They simply ignore the negativity of others because they are too busy working on the things that improve their own game. Responding to criticism on social media is the very least of their priorities. Their number of Twitter followers and their NIL agreements are clearly secondary to their football responsibilities.
The mindset during games for top performers is on making sure they are ready for the next play. The goal is to string together a series of consecutive good plays by maintaining game focus and not digressing into mini-celebrations and posturing after any decent effort. Trash talking energizes fans and social media, but most good players don’t need the distraction. They let their on field playmaking serve as their resume. This year’s Florida defense featured a handful of guys whose swagger was bigger and more consistent than their actual play. The frequent outcome was a good play followed immediately by a bad play. Staying focused and getting lined up and ready has to be a higher priority next year. On-field dancing to the music during dead-ball timeouts is time that could have been spent reviewing assignments and staying focused on the task at hand.
In terms of individual accountability for meeting team goals, consistently successful athletes play fundamentally sound assignment-based football. They fill assigned gaps and maintain contain on the edges. They line up correctly and know the snap count on each play. They understand down and distance and make in-game decisions that reflect an understanding of these concepts. They play as a part of a unit and subrogate individual attention in favor of team success. These are areas of needed improvement at Florida.
These are 18 to 22 year olds playing an intensely physical game in a high profile environment. Emotion and intensity are important components, but the ability to harness that energy constructively, deflect pressure, and perform at consistently high levels is a large part of what separates the top teams from the also rans. Without any doubt, Billy Napier’s ability to transform a program that lacked poise, focus, and accountability in 2021 into a consistent championship contender will determine if Florida is hiring a new head coach again in 2025.