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Rapid Reaction to Florida's 29-16 victory over Tennessee

On3 imageby:Zach Abolverdi•09/17/23•

ZachAbolverdi

Florida 29 Tennessee 16 Instant Reaction

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Florida responded to an early 7-0 deficit against Tennessee with 26 consecutive points en route to a 29-16 win, Billy Napier’s first over a rival.

The Gators outgained UT’s highly-ranked rushing offense behind sophomore Trevor Etienne, who rushed for a career-high 172 yards and a 62-yard touchdown.

Defensively, UF forced its first turnover of the season and held the No. 11 Vols to their second lowest scoring total under coach Josh Heupel.

In the video above, I’m joined by On3’s Andy Staples in The Swamp as we share our rapid reaction to Florida’s victory over the Volunteers.

RELATED: Everything Billy Napier said after the Florida Gators’ win over Tennessee

Billy Napier opening statement

“I think in this league, home field advantage is a big deal. And they were a factor tonight. There’s no question. How many procedure penalties did the crowd create? I think Austin had a really good plan. We stemmed the front on occasion. They were a factor. All the third downs, the fourth downs, really significant. Really thankful for that. 90,000 strong. Man, I’m just really — this game will teach you a lot about life. I was telling the players just now, if you’ll let it, this game can teach you a lot about life. And it’s hard. It challenges everything in you. And anything that’s significant that you accomplish in life is going to be a challenge. It’s going to be hard. And I think for that to be rewarding, there’s got to be some difficulty. There’s got to be adversity. There’s got to be days that you wake up and you question yourself to some degree, right? And that’s important that you surround yourself with really good people. And we certainly have good people here.

“But I’m proud of the players. You know, you go back a couple weeks ago. We went to Utah. We did not play our best football. There was no finger pointing. I didn’t hear one guy in that locker room complain or make an excuse. They took ownership and ultimately responded the right way. And we’ve been working ever since. So, you know, this group can get better. That’s the exciting thing to me. There’s areas of our team out there where we still struggled a little bit, areas where we can get better. We have young players that are playing. And I think as they get more experience, they’ll continue to improve. But, overall, I know there’s tons of keys to that game, and I know you’ll ask questions about that, but I want to compliment our players, the response and, ultimately, the leadership from the staff. We’ve got good people. They stuck together. We found a way to win a game. And, ultimately, if we can keep our humility and try to sustain this and get ready for the next one, that will be the objective. We’re going to celebrate tonight, though. I can promise you that. So what questions we got here?”

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