Keys To A Gator Victory

Each week AM 850 sports gives you our "Keys To Victory" for the Florida football team; this week, the Gators take on the South Carolina Gamecocks. Here are our keys to a Gator victory...

** Spread The Wealth. South Carolina is very good defensively, and it will present multiple fronts and looks to try to confuse the Gator blocking schemes. Florida must recognize these looks and take advantage of opportunities to break a big play if the Gamecocks come with the blitz. The Gators must stay out of negative plays and continue to spread the ball around to different playmakers.

** Run It To Throw It. One of the main reasons Florida has been successful of late in spreading the ball to different playmakers on offense is the resurgence of the running game with Jeffrey Demps and Chris Rainey at tailback. Teams now must respect the run and the quick scoring ability Florida's backs now possess, and that opens up a lot of things offensively. Vanderbilt was so concerned about those backs that the plan was to stop them and then take their chances with quarterback Tim Tebow, who had his best rushing game of the year with 88 yards. I like the formula; mix it up but establish that run to open up the passing game.

** Shut Down The Run. South Carolina does not run it well (last in the SEC at 103 yards a game) and Florida should be able to shut down the Carolina running game. But by doing so, you are making the Gamecocks do what they do best which is to throw it. However, quarterbacks Chris Smelley and Stephen Garcia are prone to throw picks (the QB's have thrown 17 in all) and without a running game, a one dimensional Carolina offense will face the wrath of a very good Gator pass rush and mistakes could follow.

** Don't Help The Gamecocks. South Carolina is prone to turnovers (minus 5 for the season) and Florida is one of the best teams in the country in this category at plus 13. Most believe South Carolina wants to follow the Ole Miss blueprint to beat the Gators, and that would include Florida giving the Gamecocks some help in the turnover area much as Ole Miss got those from the Gators. Florida must continue to take care of the football and not give Carolina any easy chance points.

** No Let Down. It would seem natural that Florida could relax a bit in this game with the SEC Championship game berth already locked up, but with the Gators playing so well and a real shot at the BCS title game out there, I don't think Florida will have that let down. Let's hope the Gators come to play, because you know former Florida coach Steve Spurrier would like nothing better than to come in to the stadium he named the Swamp and pull off the upset.

Those are our Keys To Victory; enjoy the game! And don't forget, AM 850's live coverage of Gator football on Saturday starts with the First And Ten pregame show at 12:30pm.

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