Four wins in twelve, and a coach gone by October
Florida open on Saturday night in Gainesville against Florida Atlantic, and the number hanging over the building is 4-8. That was last season, the one that cost Billy Napier his job seven games in.
Look further back and the pattern is worse. The Gators have finished with a losing record in four of their past five seasons. For a program of Florida’s standing, that is not a slump, it is a decade drifting.
Jon Sumrall arrives to stop it. He took Tulane to the College Football Playoff last season, and that is the credential Florida paid for.
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A new quarterback, and a passing game that ranked 93rd
Aaron Philo starts. The Georgia Tech transfer beat out Tramell Jones Jr. through the offseason, arriving with one career start and three appearances behind Haynes King in Atlanta.
The bar he inherits sits low. Florida finished 93rd nationally in passing yards per game in 2025, which explains why Sumrall sounded relaxed rather than committed when he named his man.
“We’re moving forward with Aaron Philo as our starter, but the other part that’s nice about it is both of those guys’ skillsets are similar enough that we don’t have to drastically change a game plan if we have to go with one or the other,” Sumrall said.
FAU throw it better than anyone and defend it worse than almost anyone
The Owls led the nation last season at 340.2 passing yards per game. Caden Veltkamp, who threw for 3,641 of them, returns to run it again.
The other half of the ledger is why they finished nowhere. Florida Atlantic conceded 36.3 points per game, tied for fifth-worst among 136 FBS programs, and gave up the seventh-most yards in the country at 436.5. Linebacker Leon Hart Jr. leads a unit rebuilt largely through the transfer portal.
“I want to make more game-changing plays,” Hart said. “Turnovers, sacks, things of that nature.”
History says Gainesville is not the place to start
Zach Kittley’s Owls have played Florida four times and lost four times, every meeting on this field. Sumrall and Kittley have faced each other once, on November 15 last year, when Sumrall’s Tulane side won 35-24.
Both coaches know that tape. Only one of them has been hired to end a five-year slide with it.
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