Five Storylines to Monitor Throughout Florida Gators 2021 Spring Camp

Unlike last season, the Florida Gators football program is slated to undergo a full spring training camp. What are five storylines to watch throughout that camp?

Regulated football activities are returning to the University of Florida at an earlier date than usual in 2021, a positive considering the inability to conduct a full spring camp last season due to Covid-19.

With the start of spring camp beginning on Thursday, Feb. 18, the Gators will look to get a jump start on their offseason program as they start to prepare for kickoff in the Swamp on Sep. 4 versus FAU.

As a team that struggled mightily in a multitude of areas throughout the 2020 season, Florida is looking to regroup from the unprecedented circumstances the year brought with hopes of restructuring both offense and defense to a level of contention with the college football heavyweights.

To do so, the presence of a spring camp will be a significant factor in player development and the implementation of various schematical adjustments being made from last season. As players – new and veteran alike – step onto the practice field for the first time in 2021, the excitement to be back in the thick of things is running high. 

"We’re excited to kick it off. We’re excited to get going ... I think [our] guys really excited to get back, hopefully looking forward to more normalcy moving forward into next season. I know [I'm] excited to be able to have spring practice," Dan Mullen said in his pre-spring press conference on Tuesday.

In coach speak, what is accomplished in the spring – and offseason in general – affects the outcomes in the fall.

As a result, what are the most important storylines to monitor throughout the spring to ensure that the 2021 season's odds sway in their favor?

A large portion of players going through spring camp for the first time

For the first time, a plethora of members on the Florida Gators roster will be submerged into the high-intensity setting of spring practice. As a vital factor in the college game, the ability to grow as a program relies heavily upon the premise of spring practice.

Providing a well in advance opportunity for athletes to develop their skillsets, equip themselves with the knowledge of the playbook and gain an in-depth understanding of the expectations set out for them, spring practice is a vital tool used to take the individual and team performance to the level of near-mastery before fall camp begins.

However, as Mullen pointed out in his opening statement on Tuesday: "One of the interesting things coming into it is how few guys that we have that have gone through spring practice ... A lot of the ’19, ’20 and ’21 recruiting classes that have not really had a spring practice – that’s one of the most important developmental times." 

"The ’19 class came in ... they had the ’19 season and then ’20 spring ball was canceled. So they didn’t get that. The ’20 class a lot of them showed up on campus early, they had no spring ball. And then we have all of this year’s class is showing up early, so quite a big chunk of guys. So this is going to be a critical couple of weeks for us with spring practice and development for these guys to get prepared for the future.”

With the lack of time to develop, underclassmen have been deprived of reaching their full potentials, a piece to the puzzle that Mullen and company used to justify the lack of utilization from sophomore and freshman defensively last season. 

With the ability to participate in spring practice this year, the members of the 2019, 2020 and 2021 recruiting classes get a valuable opportunity to build the foundations for the 2021 season.

Will younger players find themselves more involved in the offensive and defensive rotations as a result of more practice time? Will the overall team chemistry be better with the increase of operating on the field together?

Emory Jones taking over at the helm

Kyle Trask is moving onto the NFL following one of the best seasons by a quarterback in Florida history, leaving Emory Jones to make his long-awaited debut as the Gators lead signal-caller in 2021.

Providing a different skillset than Trask, given his elite mobility and a "cannon arm," according to Mullen, the offensive philosophy is set to change drastically.

In a situation that allows Mullen to revert to his play-calling style of choice, coined as the smashmouth spread, the Gators' head ball coach recognizes the ability to spread the field that Jones provides and the opportunity for creativity that it allows for.

"You look at guys like Anthony [Richardson] and Emory with cannon arms, their ability to improvise and extend plays. All of a sudden the field is spread. I think we saw even a couple glimpses of it in the bowl game, that the field’s spread out and someone loses a rush lane. That turns into a 20-, 30-, 40-yard play with those guys on the field."

Showcasing an excellent knack to create plays deep down the field through the air or on his feet, Jones brings an unpredictability at the quarterback position that will be interesting to watch progress both in spring camp and when the regular season rolls around.

Jones, along with Richardson, "Bring a very different skillset to the table. So ours is to kind of manipulate around the strengths of what those guys are going to do well within quarterback runs, zone reads, the ability for them to scramble and improvise and even have to be more complex in the pass game because you’re multi-dimensional because some of the threats they pose to the defense,” Mullen said when asked about the changing scheme offensively with the difference in styles from Trask to the guys now on the roster.

By the end of spring camp, where Jones is at in terms of his transition from backup to full-time starter will be a sign of things to come from the Florida offense next season.

Holding all the intangibles necessary to pick up where Trask left off and take the Gators back to Atlanta, the importance of the spring rests in him growing comfortable in all portions of his game while continuing to assert himself as the leader of the offense.

The offensive line is being reconstructed with the departure of two starters

Losing Stone Forsythe and Brett Heggie from the veteran lineup of offensive linemen presents the Gators with a daunting task in replacing bodies on the offensive trenches. A task the coaching staff is all too familiar with.

Following Dan Mullen's first season as the head coach at UF, four starters from the offensive line departed from the program come the year's end. Looking to reform a solid unit around then-center Nick Buchanan, Florida struggled to find sustainability in the rushing game and was significantly hindered offensively because of it.

Fast forward to 2020, John Hevesy's position group continued making steady improvements, mainly where the left side of the line of scrimmage was concerned. Occupied by Forsythe at the tackle spot and Richard Gouriage at the guard, the Gators saw impressive production from that duo.

Where the line faltered was on the right side of the center, Heggie, with two players expecting to return to the starting lineup in 2021 with Stewart Reese and Jean Delance, with Delance being the most inefficient of them all by far.

In this year's spring camp, reconstructing a sustainable offensive line is a must, considering the changes from a predominant upbeat passing offense to a more methodical run-oriented attack with Jones at the helm.

The reconstruction is likely to include guys like Ethan White and Joshua Braun stepping into the lineup for the first times as week one starters. The unknown is how they are going to rework the pieces to give themselves the best opportunity to run the football.

Will Gouriage take over for former partner-in-crime at the left tackle spot? How does the previous experience as backups aid the center-quarterback exchange chemistry between White and Jones? Will the Florida coaching staff pull the trigger on looking for a fresh face to occupy the right guard position or keep Delance there for his final year of collegiate eligibility?

All of these questions are set to be answered in due time.

A transition in the secondary with new staff and personnel

No more Marco Wilson, no more Brad Stewart Jr., no more Donovan Stiner, no more Shawn Davis, no more Ron English, and no more Torrian Gray for the Florida Gators. 

Out of every position group in dire need of a complete makeover going into 2021, the secondary was that group. 

Riddled with poor play and communication issues on the back end of the Gators defense all season long, the Florida defensive backs struggled to make positive impacts for a struggling defensive unit. However, despite the evident inefficiencies, the refusal to pull veteran talent plagued the team even more. 

In 2021, there is no option. 

Equipped with one of the best cornerbacks in the SEC in Kaiir Elam – who saw his fair share of struggles early in the 2020 season as well – as the only returning starter on the team, Florida will start fresh where the secondary is concerned from top to bottom. 

Bringing new defensive back coaches Wesley McGriff and Jules Montinar during the offseason, the Gators have remodeled the room to provide a sense of new beginnings to a once-prominent position at the University of Florida.

"Jules will be working with the corners. I think we had that out there. And [McGriff] Crime Dog's gonna be safeties, nickels, and doing that and working together and just kind of making sure all of those guys—I think it's critical for us to have that whole communication within the secondary, so they're going to be working together, you know, not just individual position but also together quite a bit,” Mullen said.

As a group that is filled with talents such as Jaydon Hill, Jason Marshall Jr. and TreVez Johnson at the cornerback position, as well as Rashad Torrence, Trey Dean III and Corey Collier Jr. at safety, options to evaluate the talent on the roster to pinpoint what works best provides a belief that the units previous lulls could be put behind them moving forward.

Implementing a rotation of linebackers

Similar to the secondary unit, the linebackers of Florida's defense were a major hindrance to the defense's success in 2020. 

However, the linebacker group is retaining all but two players from last season. As a result, there is a possibility that the operation will occur by committee rather than by the traditional system.

Last season, Ventrell Miller and Amari Burney closed out the season as the two primary linebackers at the second level for the Gators. Given the obvious weakness they exhibited in coverage, many called for a more frequent rotation to allow younger players like Ty'Ron Hopper and Derek Wingo to see the field.

While that never to fruition, 2021 will bring a similar debacle if the defense is to trot out a similar line that produces similar results. With guys like Mohamoud Diabate jockeying for more playing time in coach Christian Robinson's unit, something must give way as early as the spring camp.

Will the Gators attempt to yet again get by on the backs of a previously inefficient duo or conform to the fanbase's wishes in employing more of Hopper, Diabate, and Wingo in the 2021 season?