Both the Gators and Pirates end eras on Saturday.
Florida's 2014 campaign finished at 7-5 following a 28-20 win over East Carolina in the Birmingham Bowl. Here are the key numbers from the Gators' victory.
14.5
Florida defensive end Dante Fowler Jr. declared for the NFL Draft a while back. He brought the lumber in his final game as a Gator. He logged three sacks and two hurries and helped to disrupt ECU's passing game just enough to eventually record a win.
The former blue-chip recruit's career somehow finishes with only 14.5 sacks and 34 tackles for loss in three seasons. Those are perfectly solid totals, but he's one of those players that looks great when he looks good, one whose stats don't match what FELT like his level of dominance. He only had 5.5 sacks in the first 11 games of the season, and if you watched the combination of technique and rage that he brought to the table in Birmingham, you'd have guessed that number would be closer to 15.5.
Regardless, he played well for interim coach D.J. Durkin, and without him, Florida probably wouldn't score win No. 7.
17
It was a little bit awkward. Word leaked before the game that former Florida starting quarterback Jeff Driskel had secured his scholarship release and would be donning a Gator uniform for the last time on Saturday. We even began to see rumors of where he might end up attending school next year (Louisiana Tech, Duke, et cetera.). And then starter Treon Harris got hurt in the third quarter, and Driskel had to play.
Driskel's final appearance was anything but impressive. He completed eight of 17 passes for 48 yards and a sack (average yards per pass attempt: 2.4) and rushed twice for 11 yards. Whoever's fault it may be, he just wasn't on the same page as most of his teammates, and that didn't change in Birmingham. Still, he got to finish in victory formation. That's something.
In my Birmingham Bowl preview, I wondered which Florida underclassmen would step up on offense and begin to take leadership roles for 2015. Harris was hit-or-miss before injury -- 5-for-11 with an interception and a sack and two touchdowns, nine carries for 44 yards -- and sophomore running back Kelvin Taylor only saw four carries for zero yards. But freshman Adam Lane rushed 16 times for 109 yards, and while receiver Demarcus Robinson gained just 36 yards in six receptions, fellow sophomore Ahmad Fulwood showed some jets in taking a short pass 86 yards for a score in the third quarter. Freshman Brandon Powell caught three passes for 20 yards and a score. So there's that.
Lane was the primary star, though, and it might be interesting to see if he surpasses Taylor in the spring. Taylor was so intriguing as a freshman and disappointing as a sophomore. We'll see if a new coaching regime is able to reignite his flame, or if Lane is the new anchor.
We'll also see if the new guys can help Robinson find where he dropped his mojo. After catching 21 passes for 339 yards in the first two games of the season, he caught only 32 for 471 in the 10 games that followed -- five for 104 against LSU, four for 137 against Eastern Kentucky, and 23 for 230 against everybody else.
70
In his final game, ECU quarterback Shane Carden was asked to shoulder quite the load. He registered 70 attempts against a strong Florida defense, and despite breakdowns (four sacks, two picks, an early pick six, five break-ups, seven hurries), he kept slinging. And after Florida took a 28-14 lead with Fulwood's long touchdown, Carden and ECU kept trying to move forward. But two scoring opportunities stalled with field goals, a third ended when a big Fowler sack forced a punt, and with one last chance to tie the game, a Carden lob dropped into the hands of Florida's Vernon Hargreaves.
This is the end of an era for East Carolina. Ruffin McNeill's sixth season in Greenville will begin without Carden and Justin Hardy. Carden threw for 11,991 yards and 86 touchdowns (and, yes, 30 picks) in three years, and Hardy caught more passes than any receiver in ECU history. In his final game, Hardy caught 11 of 19 passes for 160 yards and a touchdown.
ECU will return receivers like Isaiah Jones (a solid No. 2 possession option in 2014) and Trevon Brown (a home run threat as a freshman before injury), and the defense will return three of its top four tackles and 10 of its top 16. Losing Carden and Hardy doesn't mean the end of McNeill's success ... but it will seem strange watching the Pirates in 2015 and not seeing these two.
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