New Florida Gators head coach Jon Sumrall has really hit the ground running since his arrival in Gainesville late last year.
Between his widely lauded staff hires, consensus top-10 recruiting class and myriad media appearances, the 43-year-old looks as though he can do no wrong.
Granted, the games need to be played before anyone can make a full judgment, but the vast majority of Gator Nation appears smitten with their newest head ball coach.
Part of what makes him so appealing to the Florida faithful is his ability to seemingly always say the right thing in the eyes of Gator fans.
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His vows to jump off the top of Ben Hill Griffin Stadium echoed the sentiments of every Florida fanatic from Key West to Pensacola, and Tuesday in the Panhandle, Sumrall once again dropped a one-liner that is sure to be music to the ears of Gator fans who were paying attention.
When asked what he would have done if Florida had not allowed him to finish at Tulane and coach in the College Football Playoff after he accepted the job, Sumrall revealed he might have stayed in New Orleans for good.
To the uninitiated, that feels like an honest answer from a coach who loves his players and wants to finish the job he started, and while that may have been all Sumrall meant by his answer, any Florida fan who was wrapped up in the Lane Kiffin sweepstakes last fall can’t help but think that was a thinly veiled shot at another SEC coach in the building.
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It’s no secret that Kiffin and Sumrall were both in the running for the Florida job, with the former even leading the race until his change of heart led him to Baton Rouge.
It’s also not a secret that Kiffin left Oxford in the midst of a Playoff run that saw the Ole Miss Rebels a goal-line stand away from playing for a national championship.
Kiffin has since expressed regret for the way he handled his exit, but fortunately for Sumrall, he will never have to play the “what-if” game that the new LSU coach has to play.
Even more ironically, Ole Miss and Tulane actually met up in the first round of last year’s CFP, meaning Sumrall and Kiffin could have competed against each other on the field while both being linked to the Gators’ head coaching gig.
Did Sumrall mean to take a shot at Kiffin with his answer? Probably not.
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But it probably made Florida fans give a subtle fist pump knowing they ended up with the psychotic competitor that will stick things out until the end, rather than the coach who will jump at the next shiny opportunity that flashes in front of his face.
Like I said before, time will tell whether the Gators ended up with the right choice.
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Talk is cheap, and if Sumrall flames out while Kiffin wins a few national titles at LSU, Florida fans will barely remember the rosy honeymoon period with their latest head coach.
But, for right now, Sumrall is absolutely crushing “talking season,” and Tuesday in Destin represented another W for the Gators’ newest head coach.