‘The Journey’ with Napier, Hocke no longer foreign to UF's players

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Heading into his second spring at Florida, the to-do list for coach Billy Napier is not as long as it was in Year 1. Napier keeps detailed notes, and his logbook from the first few months of 2022 was extra thick.

“I’m going back looking at my notes from the previous year, I mean, needed multiple pages to get all those things fixed. I think we’re starting in a different place,” Napier said Saturday following his team’s opening day of camp.

Last year the Gators first embarked on “The Journey”, Napier’s eight-phase football calendar that is modeled after Nick Saban’s year-round plan at Alabama. It starts with the Foundation phase, followed by the Identity program and then phase three: Spring Ball.

UF director of strength and conditioning Mark Hocke and his staff lead players through the first two phases with workouts in the indoor practice facility and weight room. Hocke aims to instill a “pirate mentality” within the Gators program, although he admits the first voyage wasn’t smooth sailing.

“It’s almost like the unknown. It’s like navigating in the dark a little bit,” Hocke said Saturday of the first offseason. “Now the lights are on. Okay, now we know each other. We know each other’s strengths and weaknesses and there’s just a better relationship and just a smoother ride.

“Now, you’re a little more of a skilled sailor, if you will. And you know when to push, you know when to pull back. So, there’s just a lot more awareness from the player level to the coaching level and I think that just helps organization wide, and that’s why year two’s been such a blessing.”

The Gators have three more practice sessions before spring break and then resume camp March 21. After two scrimmages and a dozen practices, UF will conclude phase three of this year’s “Journey” with the Orange & Blue Game on Thursday, April 13.

When asked Saturday where he expects to see the biggest jump with his team in the second offseason, Napier likened the growth to finding familiarity in a foreign land after settling in for a year.

“It’s like you moved to a new country and learned a new language last year. Now you’ve been living in the country for a while so you’re a little more fluid. And all of a sudden you start to process a little quick little bit quicker. You anticipate better, you play faster, you get more production,” Napier said. “So, we still have 27 brand new scholarship players out there. But overall, we have veterans and then a group of rookies that I think bring some things to the table.”

And despite the change at defensive coordinator, Florida’s players on that side of the ball aren’t learning a different language this spring. Newly hired defensive play-caller Austin Armstrong coached alongside and under former DC Patrick Toney when was in the same role at Louisiana in 2020.

Toney coordinated the defense and worked with the outside linebackers, while Armstrong coached inside linebackers. Armstrong also served as a defensive graduate assistant with Napier and Toney in 2018, so he knows their verbiage and understands the system, making a smooth transition for UF.

“That’s actually very important,” Gators cornerback Jason Marshall Jr. said of Armstrong’s history with Toney. “You know, we don’t have to go through a whole ’nother DC or play-calling. Everybody’s still very fluent.”