Billy Napier: 'We're living in third and long and that's not where we want to live'

It was tough sledding for the Florida offense in their Week 1 matchup against Utah, only posting 11 points in their loss to the Utes last Thursday.

The Gators specifically struggled at converting third downs, which head coach Billy Napier was asked about in a press conference Monday.

“I think that we’re living in third and long and that’s not where you want to live,” Napier said. “I think national average in all these situations that we had are not good for any team much less our team.”

Florida converted a disappointing one of their 13 third down attempts versus Utah, struggling to generate offensive momentum and sustain drives. But Napier detailed which areas of their game they need to excel at in order to improve.

“So we want to live in third and manageable, and that comes down to eliminating the negative plays. Ultimately if you take care of the ball and you limit negative plays you’re probably going to have a pretty good day on offense,” Napier explained. “Those are the two significant stats in this game. We took care of the ball outside of the turnover, which was a little bit unique in itself, and then the issue was the negative plays.”

The Gators’ one turnover was a result of a Graham Mertz pass attempt being bobbled by wideout Ricky Pearsall into the hands of Utah defender Sione Vaki. But even despite the one miscue, the Gators could not stop negative plays, as the Utes lived in the backfield all night with five sacks and seven tackles for loss.

“Penalties being in that category. We’ll take those third and ones and convert those and not have a delay of game, which I can help there. So I think the negative plays on third and manageable contributed to third and longs, and all of a sudden we’re not near as successful as we’d like to be,” Napier said.

The Gators had their fair share of self-inflicted wounds with nine penalties in Thursday’s game. Plus their inability to run the football with just 43 yards on the ground made it extremely difficult for Florida to be successful on third down and beyond in their first game of the season.

Florida should have more offensive success in their next game, as they host McNeese State on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. ET in a matchup airing on ESPNU.