Why Tennessee football fans can revel in Billy Napier struggles at Florida | Adams

When the SEC began divisional play in 1992, Florida football future seldom had looked so bright.

Third-year coach Steve Spurrier had won 19 games in his first two seasons and was heading toward the brink of a football dynasty. From 1993 through 1996, Florida would win four consecutive SEC championships and one national title.

Now, in the final year of divisional play, the Gators are a long way from those heady days when they owned the SEC East. They’re a popular pick to finish in the bottom half of the SEC East, which means Billy Napier could qualify for the dreaded coaching hot seat after just two years on the job.

A second consecutive losing season would make him the first Florida coach since Raymond Wolf in 1946-47 to have back-to-back losing seasons. Will Muschamp didn’t even have back-to-back losing seasons.

That possibility must delight Tennessee fans as Napier takes his turn Wednesday at SEC Media Days in Nashville.

Alabama is UT’s oldest rival. Two-time defending national champion Georgia is the team Tennessee is chasing during its resurgence under coach Josh Heupel. But Florida has dealt it the most misery since the conference split into East and West divisions.

The Vols never won fewer than eight games in the 1990s. They went 45-5 from 1995 through 1998. They won SEC championships in 1997 and 1998. And they won a national championship in 1998.

All that winning made them the No. 2 program in the division. Worse yet, they were second to a program headed up by an East Tennessee native who didn’t just beat the Vols. He often made fun of them.

Four years after Spurrier departed, Urban Meyer put the Gators back on top of college football. From 2005 through 2010, he won two national titles. And he never lost to Tennessee.

As difficult as that might have been for UT fans, losing to lesser coaches had to be just as painful. It’s one thing to never beat Meyer. But the Vols never beat Muschamp, who was fired after four seasons at Florida. They also never beat Dan Mullen, who was fired after four seasons.

No wonder, Tennessee so cherished last season’s 38-33 victory over Florida at Neyland Stadium in Heupel's second season. Before that, they had lost 16 of 17 games to the Gators.

The victory was magnified by what happened later. The Vols went on to post an 11-2 record and a top-10 finish while Florida plummeted to 6-7 and rarely looked worse than in a 30-3 loss to Oregon State in the Las Vegas Bowl.

Suddenly, Tennessee – after a long procession of bad hires – has a coaching advantage on Florida. Granted, that’s based on a small body of evidence, and much of Florida’s failure last season could be attributed to the recruiting shortcomings of Mullen, Napier’s predecessor.

But Heupel didn’t inherit a bountiful roster, either, when he replaced Jeremy Pruitt in 2021. The Vols lost 10 players with starting experience to the transfer portal in the transition from Pruitt to Heupel. Nonetheless, Heupel still won seven games in his first season and had Tennessee contending for the College Football Playoff halfway through November.

Anybody think Florida will be in the running for the CFP this season? Even if it’s improved, you might not tell by its record against a schedule that starts with Utah, closes with Florida State, and has Tennessee, LSU, and Georgia in between. And its 2024 schedule looks even more taxing.

Gators fans at least can be encouraged by Napier’s recruiting. Florida ranks third nationally based on its 2024 commitments, according to the 247Sports Composite.

Those commitments won’t help this September when the Vols try to win in The Swamp for the first time since 2003. They will be favored to do just that.

If so, they could end a division rivalry the way it began. In 1992, Tennessee beat Florida 31-14 at Neyland Stadium.

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That wasn’t a sign of things to come. Even when the Gators have been at their worst, they frequently prevailed against the Vols.

But based on how the Gators struggled under Napier last season and the way the Vols have soared under Heupel, Tennessee fans probably wish the SEC East wasn’t about to go away.

John Adams is a senior columnist. He may be reached at 865-342-6284 or john.adams@knoxnews.com. Follow him at: twitter.com/johnadamskns.

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Tennessee football fans can revel in Billy Napier struggles at Florida