11-14 Florida Gators are somewhat ‘on schedule,’ Napier says. Is he right?

DALLAS — Billy Napier’s 11-14 start to his Florida Gators tenure has riled up fans and put him on hot seat lists entering his pivotal third season.

But Napier suggested Wednesday that his record is either not as bad as it seems or should have been expected.

“I think we’re on schedule to some degree,” Napier said during SEC media days at the Omni Dallas Hotel.

His statement sounds stunning for a coach with back-to-back losing seasons at one of the nation’s premier programs. It requires two separate bits of context.

The first is specific to Florida. The roster he took over was fine but unimpressive by SEC standards. The program he took over was catching up in facilities and needed to build up its staff, too.

Wednesday wasn’t the first time Napier has raised these issues. At the SEC’s spring meetings in Destin, he reminded reporters that the Gators have gone 15 seasons since their last conference title. The implication: Florida wasn’t a turn-key job.

“It’s one of the reasons we have a seven-year deal,” Napier said then of his contract.

The second bit of context is broader. His UF overhaul hasn’t occurred in a vacuum. It has happened as the transfer portal and name, image and likeness have rapidly, repeatedly, unpredictably transformed the sport.

“Every six months the game has changed,” Napier said. “It’s changed this (recruiting) cycle, and it’ll change the next. We’re competing in an environment where the game is evolving as we’re competing.”

That unpredictable evolution, the argument goes, affects rebuilding programs (like Florida) more than established ones (like Georgia or Alabama).

Thus: 11-14.

If that’s on schedule — to any degree — through two years at Florida, what will on schedule look like in Year 3 against what looks like the toughest slate of games in program history? Napier danced around the question.

“I think you’ve got to get consumed with the process, not the outcome, to some degree, and the thing that I would say with conviction is we have been very close,” Napier said.

But close enough?

Napier went an astounding 16-3 in one-score games at Louisiana, then won three of his first four with the Gators. Since then, he has regressed to the mean; Florida has lost four of its last five. That doesn’t include last year’s losses to LSU (Florida only trailed by three with 10 minutes left) or Florida State (the Gators led midway through the fourth quarter). Failures to stop Missouri on fourth and 17 or field the correct special-teams unit against Arkansas were most damning.

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“Should we have won a couple of games down the stretch?” Napier said. “Would I have liked to close some of those games out in the fourth quarter? Absolutely.”

Read between the lines, and that’s how Napier wants be judged. He said his roster is “starting to look like what it should look like.” He has one of the most experienced quarterbacks in the country (Graham Mertz), 16 other returning starters and enough growing pains to expect the growth to start showing up late in a tight game. Even the off-field changes Napier talked up Wednesday — like revamped nutrition and strength/conditioning programs — should translate into crunch-time performances. So should continuity and chemistry after two full years.

“Change doesn’t happen overnight,” Napier said. “I think ultimately, timing is everything.”

Unfortunately for Napier, the timing means he’ll face the nation’s hardest schedule in a coach’s traditional breakthrough third season. A .500 record with a couple tight wins would be improvement.

Maybe enough to convince fans and decision-makers that his program is on schedule after all.

Gator bits

• Napier said five-star cornerback and Lakeland High product Cormani McClain is “doing just fine” after transferring from Colorado.

• Napier began his formal news conference by remembering Monte Kiffin, the longtime Bucs assistant who died last week at age 84. Napier coached with Monte’s son, Mississippi head coach Lane Kiffin, at Alabama. Napier called him “one of the all-time greats in our profession.”

“Inheritance is what you leave for someone; legacy is what you leave in someone,” Napier said. “Few did it better than Monte Kiffin.”

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