Florida's Jon Sumrall discusses Florida's upset road win over Texas

Jon Sumrall's opening statement

Game's not easy. Obviously happy to get the win. Proud of our guys. You know, we've had some setbacks as of late. The last couple weeks did not feel like we fought the way you have to fight when you're in the middle of the game — battle — it's going to be a competitive battle.

Today the game didn't start out very good for us. We played really sloppy early. You know, getting to several situations where we just kind of shot ourselves in the foot. They played good early, but the thing that I'm most grateful for — you didn't miss a whole lot, guys; I hadn't really said a whole lot, guys. I've really said a whole lot of nothing to this point.

But what I would tell you is – here's my opening statement: y'all made it just in time; our guys fought today. And we happened to win the game too, which is huge. But the most important thing that happened today is we fought, and winning the game matters. I want us to always win, but how you play the game matters as much to me.

And we today showed a lot of character, a lot of growth, and the fact that we fought when maybe things had not been going our way, and a lot of it was self-inflicted. But just grateful for our guys' response and the mental toughness and the resiliency to fight.

So with that, we'll open it up.

Tramell Jones Jr.'s performance and his play after Dallas Wilson catch

It's like a shooter in basketball. If something goes good, it makes maybe something else go good later. Like you build a little confidence. He would tell you, he'd be the first one to tell you, he by no means played perfect. Missed plenty of opportunities and throws, but for his first opportunity, even when he didn't make some throws he needed to make, he kept battling and kept fighting, and that's when good things happen.

And so I'm proud of him for staying resilient, through going back to training camp when he didn't win the job, and still being ready, and did a really nice job today of just, you know, the thing I'm probably most grateful for is maybe no crazy, dumb decisions.

I grabbed him yesterday morning and I said, "Hey, this is going to be your game." He already knew that. We knew it all week, pretty much. I'm not trying to tell you all we didn't, but we kind of knew. Yeah, everybody kind of knew. All you had to be able to do to figure that out was have a pulse.

But what I would say is, through maybe some things that didn't go well for him in the game, he stayed steady and responded and he'd miss a throw and came back and make a throw, and that's going to happen at the quarterback position. Like, that's gonna take place. You're not always gonna make every play, and so, yeah, I think he did a really nice job.

Thought that throw did give him a little confidence, you know. The other one on our sideline that we didn't give Dallas a chance — there's certain times it's just learning from the missed throws that you have to grow from. But man, so proud of his approach to going back to really post-spring, you know.

During the spring when we did our exit meetings, I told him, I'm like, "Man, you haven't been in there a whole lot of extra, and you haven't learned the offense the way you need to, but I've never seen you do more on your own." And in the summer, you know what he did? He did a little bit more on his own and started to do extra. And in this training camp, started to do more on his own and do extra and spend more time.

And so now you get your opportunity today, and you're prepared to help the team win a game. When — if he'd have handled all those situations poorly, he wouldn't have been as ready as he was for this opportunity. And so very proud of him, grateful for his approach and happy for his success today. 

Did things shift after Jones went 5-for-5 on third down in the second half?

It did. Going into the, I would say, going in the first half some of the things that we missed were on third down were, like, pretty clean, like some stuff that wasn't real complicated. I think you shake the cobwebs off, you go through the first half (and) don't maybe execute the way you want to, and then you recalibrate.

And then, we talked a lot this week about doing simple things better. I think he started to do some things simple, better in the second half and just take what's there. Don't have to do anything crazy, put the ball in play, give guys opportunities, and get the ball in the hands of our playmakers, and that helped out. And then two, I would say we were better on the O-line today.

Like, that's another thing, you know, it's a whole lot easier to play quarterback when the O-line plays good. No matter who's at quarterback for us, when the O-line plays better, it's a lot easier to play quarterback. And last couple weeks, no secret, we haven't played very good on the O-line. This week we played better on the O-line, so it made everything tick just a little bit cleaner on third down as well.

We also ended up in less what felt like third-and-crazy-extra-longs today, where at times — where in the past, I don't have all the stats in front of me, but last week I felt like every time we looked up was third-and-12. We were trying to block that number 6 (Dylan Stewart) and it was like we couldn't get a glove on him. So today, I really only felt a couple of those situations. Didn't feel as many of them.

What Sumrall saw from the OL in particular that led to improved play

I thought there was a better strain and a better finish and a better urgency. It wasn't perfect, never is, but I felt like we had a little bit different mentality, kind of more similar to what we had against maybe Ole Miss, at least in how we tried to play the game.

You know, that number 1's (Collin Simmons) a good player; their front was big, they're built a little different up front. Their interior guys are bigger and more stout and strong, and play with more knockback than maybe movement.

But I thought guys just played with a mentality that you have to play with up front to win, which is physicality and with an edge."

Can Jones compete for the starting role after this performance?

Yeah, that's a good question. I know that's going to be everybody's question probably. I would say this: I'm going to get, I'm going to watch the tape; the whole staff will. You know, I go back to — I'm happy for Tramell and his success. He missed plenty of things today. He did some good things today.

The success with our team today had more to do than just the quarterback. Our defense played a hell of a lot better. Our O-line played a hell of a lot better. So I'm not taking anything away from Tramell, but today was a team win, not a quarterback win. It was a team win, and so we evaluate each week how we do to get to 1-0 that week.

That's sort of our job, and I would tell you the God's honest truth, like, looking back, the last two games, Philo didn't cost us the last two games. I'm not going to point fingers at everybody, but just like individually, Tramell didn't win the game by himself. I'm glad we got two guys I believe in we can go win football games with.

We will get through the tape. I'll watch the tape on the plane today, and then I'll watch it again tomorrow and then we'll figure out how we move forward. Some of it too — you know, Philo's got an injury, so when he's ready from the injury, that matters. But so that's a word salad basically, to tell you like there's going to be no decision tonight of like here's what I'm doing moving forward. Philo's been our guy and has won us some big games, too. Just like Tramell helped us win a big game today as well.

So I like both guys. I love both guys. I believe in both guys. I've said that about Tramell for several months now, like, since I saw the shift in the summer. I really felt like we could win with both guys, and that proves it, that we did it today.

On winning the middle-eight

Yeah, you know, huge momentum shifts. The middle-eight, success in the middle-eight, is not actually like a huge indicator of winning the game, to be quite honest with you, statistically. Scoring more points is. But the flow of the middle-eight today, we needed that momentum, because we had not played very clean early.

And yeah, you want to win, I want to win every part of the game, but we did finish the half well, and then we started the half well. And with the way the game started, that was pretty vital, because if it did not finish well for us or start well for us, we weren't going to win today.

On linebacker Ty Jackson earning more playing time

You know it's great. He was our special teams player of the week last week, internally for our team. He was the one that forced the punt block last week, late in the game. I showed it to our team. It was the only play I showed from our game last week.

Everything else was all about how we need to take care of the locker room better and all this other stuff. The only real play I showed last week in the team meeting was Ty Jackson's punt block. I said, guys, here's the score. It's 38 to whatever. Not good last week.

And I said, here's Ty Jackson, who probably doesn't like — maybe the amount of snaps he's getting on defense. And he's playing his tail off, and he goes and makes a play because he's still playing hard. He's still fighting. And so this week as a defensive staff, we went in there, and I'm like, guys, we need a little juice, we need a little spark.

And Ty, sometimes your fear as a coach is like, is the guy ready? The only way to find out if he's ready is by putting him out there. And that they may not be ready for everything, but you have to figure out what are they ready for, and how can we make them useful and lean into their strengths and offset their weaknesses. Ty's a tremendous kid.

You know, last night when I met with the four captains today, because we do game captains, we do season captains at the end of the year. When I informed him, Harrison Moore, Bailey Stockton, and DK Kalu they were today's game captains, and I said, "All right, who is comfortable being the speaker at the coin toss, and who is not?"

I actually didn't have to ask Ty if he's not because he doesn't like to talk. Like he doesn't say two words, like a big deal. And they all kind of chuckled. Like, well, Ty ain't doing it. But man, I'm so proud of his growth. He's a tremendously talented player.

He reminds me of a couple guys I've had that were really high draft picks that maybe early were trying to figure out their, you know, how to see it, how to communicate it, how to execute it. But he's got the physical to go be a big-time player, and I think he showed strides at the end of last week's game, but as it fell into this week as well.

Sumrall on the defense's performance as a whole

A lot of it was a mentality. I met with the defense on Monday. We got a great defensive staff. Let me start there. Like I've worked with Brad White before. All right, and Brad and I were at Kentucky together and put together a couple of defenses, we were like top 25 in the country. And Brad works his ass off. You don't always feel the returns.

Sometimes we got to do a better job as coaches putting them in better positions. We didn't have a whole lot of brand new fancy calls today. You know what our guys did? They executed them with more detail, more urgency, more violence, more strain. They finally took it upon themselves to play with the mentality.

Honest to God, there was one time on a third down that we were at corner down pressed on number eight. It's like third and extra long, and I'm screaming my head off, like, "Hey, get off!" We're playing kind of a four-under, three-deep defense. I'm like, "Get the corner off!" Brad looks at me, goes, "Coach, I'm just glad they're challenging them. Leave them down there", and I'm like, yeah, but it's third and 14, so it's like let's not give up a bomb.

But the guys, I think, took it personal. It's no secret we haven't played the kind of defense we need to play the first part of the year. I've been absolutely disgusted with it. Our coaches are working their tail off. Our players are trying. We have to help them mature faster. I'd say certain guys have stepped up. I felt LJ McCray last week at the end of the game, and then this week I felt him a lot more.

You know, Stive-Bentley (Keumajou-Yondui) got a few opportunities today on D-line because he's been practicing on scout team at such a high level. I've been watching him on scout team, and I'm like, push this guy over there. But I think our corners also play with less fear today. They play with a little bit more confidence today, and so very grateful for the mindset those guys played with. We probably did pressure a little bit more today.

I told Brad in the middle part of the game, I just said, "To hell with playing coverage. Let's try to come after them a little bit and see if we can affect them." And sometimes maybe we need to call it with aggressiveness to help our guys go play with more aggressiveness.

On the first top-10 win on the road since 2012

Thanks for cheering me up.

You weren't here, though

I wasn't, but I'm a part of everything that's happened here.

What the win does for the program in the big picture?

It helps us get better. We got better today. It does nothing. You know, I think if we've learned anything about this, in this game or in life, you don't get to go, Hey, I was good last week, so I get to be good next week, right? I guess part of why we got our ass kicked in Missouri and last week at home is because we, everybody around Gainesville was patting our guys on the back, telling them how good they were, and I'm like, guys, we suck.

Like I've watched this practice; we're not very good. We still suck. We just suck less, all right. And so we have to figure out to suck less each week. But we're not like a complete team yet. Like this is, so it does nothing for us. What it does for us, it gets us another win.

But the thing it does more than a ranked win or a road win or whatever those stats are, what it does for me, it gives me belief and hope that our guys understand you have to fight your tail off every time you play the game. Doesn't matter who you play, where you play, when you play, you have to fight. And if you do not fight, you will get embarrassed.

This league, man, like there's nowhere to hide. Week in week out, it's the closest thing you got to the NFL, and you got to bring it every freaking Saturday. I'm just glad our guys brought it.

On quarterback Aaron Philo and wide receiver Vernell Brown III's injury statuses:

Philo, through this week, you know, it's a couple-week deal probably from when it happened. It's not season-long. A lot of it is based upon his ability to have some zip and do it on the move and function fully. But he's a tough dude.

The beautiful thing is, like I said earlier, I believe we can win football games with Aaron Philo. I believe we can win football games with Tramell Jones, and those guys support each other at an elite level. But so Philo, we'll see. Like we're going to bring him back more as time is right for his return to play.

And then VB has been trying like crazy to give it a go. He's working his tail off. He ran at a better top end speed this week than he did the previous week. I think he hit closer to his max speed. He didn't hit his max speed, but he's getting within striking distance of that, and just did not quite feel like watching him in pregame; I didn't feel like he was right.

You know, he looked right at times this week late in the week, but not consistent enough for us to be like, hey, let's go put him out there. So he's still not ready for maybe game action. I feel really good about where he is going into a bye week and then having a game out of that. I feel really positive about where he is, the prognosis of him playing that next week. So we'll see.

But the thing I want to make abundantly clear is he's trying like crazy to get back. And then the bye week, we'll still practice. Monday we'll do meetings, lifting, kind of get their bodies back a little bit. Tuesday we'll go for about an hour. Tuesday and Wednesday with pads, and we'll bang a little bit. Like we got to practice, we got to stay sharp, we got to get better. Thursday we'll do kind of a run through.

We have to, right now after seven games, kind of stop, catch our breath, still get some work, but get some bodies back to healthy and fresher, and then take a deep dive. I love the bye week because you get to take a deep dive into where are we playing well? Where are we not? Who deserves more opportunities? Who may deserve less?

Like we evaluate everything that's going right and wrong, and I expect everybody to take ownership of it so we can move forward through the rest of the year, and then we'll go recruit too. Like we'll go recruit like crazy Thursday, Friday. I'll be (at) a lot of places at the back end of the week.

Will Sumrall use a helicopter?

I'll do whatever I got to do to get to where I'm going. But yeah, I don't know what they got set up. But yeah, we got to get better. We got to go to work.

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This article originally appeared on Gators Wire: Florida's Jon Sumrall discusses Florida's upset road win over Texas