Should He Stay Or Should He Go?

It was too easy. The Florida Gators (4-7, 3-5) fell short, or should I say fell flat on their face, this Saturday against The Georgia Southern Eagles with a score of 26-20.  What is worse then getting your butt kicked by a FCS school you ask? Paying them $550,000 to do so. That’s right The University of Florida paid Georgia Southern to come to Ben Hill Griffin, these moves are historically made by schools who feel like it would be an easy win. Things didn’t go as planned for the Gators on Saturday, or this season for that matter.

Georgia Southern beat the Gators without completing one pass. None, but they didn’t need to. The Eagles rushed for 429 yards, which according to HLN is the most against a Florida team since 1996. This loss is the Gator’s sixth loss in a row and has locked in their first losing season since 1979. Another terrible fact, Florida has had the longest active bowl streak with 22 years in a row which is now, just a thing of the past. There has been a lot of disconnect between Muschamp and Florida fans, especially after this year. 19-yar-old Gator fan Savannah White says “There needs to be a change. I don’t know if that change will be a coaching change or what, but there needs to be a change.”  This all begs the question, Will Muschamp stay or will he go?

Muschamp met with media today in Gainesville and underwent a flood of questions about his job security, but seemed very secure in his answers. According to the Gainesville Sun, when he was asked if he was concerned with losing his job he simply answered “Absolutely not, “ and that he was “absolutely” sure he would coach the Gators in 2014.  He seemed so sure in his answers until it came to his assistant coaching staff. “I’m not ready to make any statement on that at this point. We’re still playing out the season and those guys are going to coach their butts off. I’ll make that decision when I think it’s right.” What we do know is that the University of Florida athletic director Jeremy Foley has professed his allegiance to Coach Muschamp saying in a statement he made online that “As athletic director, I’m a thousand-percent convinced that Will Muschamp is the guy to lead this football program. Nothing has changed in what we feel about Will Muschamp from the day we hired him. Everyone around here wants the same thing.” I’m not so sure the fans feel the same way. One thing the fans need to keep in mind is the injuries that have plagued the Gators this year. If you haven’t been paying attention, according to Sbnation there have been 10 season ending injuries on offense and defense this season alone, 7 of them being starters. That could play a huge role in the disappointments this season but that doesn’t satisfy the fans. With all of the turbulence from fans, Muschamp continues to gain support from his players. Senior defensive back Jaylen Watkins said, “Everybody is fully behind Coach Muschamp. We try our hardest not to listen to all that on ESPN and just ignore it and know that we only have each other through this whole thing.” The Gators play 2^nd ranked Florida State Seminoles this Saturday at 12pm.

Information from ESPN, The Gainesville Sun, SBnation, Alligator Army, and HLN was used in this article.