This is a tough game to truly analyze for a few reasons:

1) It was more of a 3 period game than a 2 half game. It’s not a big deal, but definitely didn’t have the flow of a normal game. Not sure if that had any effect on either team but it felt like it did.

2) Florida was horribly coached. Billy Napier is firmly on the hot seat and he decided to rotate his quarterbacks on a regular schedule. It was clear Graham Mertz was the better quarterback on his series. Why Napier kept trotting out D.J. Lagway and not ride Mertz in the second half is beyond me. And I’m a massive D.J. Lagway fan. I wanted him to come to A&M and do think he’s going to be a great college quarterback somewhere. In my mind, Napier certainly didn’t seem to be coaching to win this game. Mertz gave him the best option to win in the second half and he didn’t seem to care or be aware.

3) Florida was missing their best receiver. I have no idea if he would have made any difference but I certainly would have preferred to be tested at full strength.

4) I think this Florida team is completely beaten down. Two weeks ago, they were embarrassed by Miami, and A&M came in and controlled the game from the start. They certainly didn’t seem to put up much of a fight, especially in the second half.

With all of that being said, Texas A&M’s win was EXCELLENT. I expected a little more from Florida, but I’m not going to downplay A&M’s effort and execution in this game.

Texas A&M was far from perfect on Saturday. Yet, they controlled Florida the entire game in their house. There’s no way to minimize that.

A&M cleans up their mistakes and they can beat anyone on their schedule. They’ll need to play a perfect game against a couple of teams or near perfect game against the others but what I saw on Saturday gives me some hope this team and coaching staff can improve as the season goes on.

I certainly wasn’t feeling great after the first two games. Really, just since Notre Dame because McNeese showed us absolutely nothing they were so bad.

Three weeks into the season, I think it’s obvious the easiest wins for A&M are Florida (duh), Arkansas, and Mississippi State. I think Florida might be the most talented of those three but the worst coached. Just a terrible showing from the Gator coaching staff on Saturday.

I feel much better about A&M going at least 6-6 this season and think 8-4 is a real possibility. I wouldn’t even put 10-2 out of reach based on what I saw on Saturday. 10-2 is still a pretty big reach but I do think it’s possible.

College football is crazy, so things can change in a week’s time. Just ask a host of teams from last Saturday.

Wins in the SEC don’t come easy, so there’s no easy win. If you’re not ready to perform, you’re going to get a loss.

With that, here’s how I would rate the coaching staff on A&M’s wins and losses for the rest of the season:

5 wins or less – Terrible
6-6 – Below average
7-5 – Average
8-4 – Good
9-3 – Really good
10-2 – Great
11-1 – Amazing

I’m not going to guess where those wins and losses come from but that’s my current scale for grading this coaching staff. My expectation at this point is 8-4 but I’m all for it being better than that.

We’ll find out a lot more in the next three games.

Let’s talk about some specifics of the game and the most obvious question first:

• I don’t know how Marcel Reed isn’t the clear and obvious starting quarterback. I had questions about him during the McNeese State game but what he did on Saturday was impressive. I have no idea if he can keep this up as we saw what happened to Jaylon Henderson last season. He had an amazing first start against Mississippi State. Then struggled against LSU, got hurt on the first play of the Texas Bowl, and then lost his backup job to Reed ove the spring and summer. The list of quarterbacks who’s first start was their best start (see Kenny Trill) is long, but you have to find out if Reed is for real. Until Reed has any level of struggles, he should be the starting quarterback with no questions asked. I don’t care what Elko says during the week. I only care how he manages his quarterbacks for the next couple of games. Reed needs to start and play the large majority of the snaps against Bowling Green assuming he’s having similar success. You have to ride the hot hand and Reed is hot.

• As for Reed’s specific play, he was terrific. He wasn’t perfect in his decision making but he was really damn good most of the night. I knew he could run like a deer and has a great arm but was really impressed with his accuracy. He obviously had some big plays with wide open guys but his passes were on the mark. We’ve seen plenty of quarterbacks miss wide open guys but Reed made the passes when the big play was there.

• The play of the offensive line was also impressive. Even if the Florida defense was mailing it in. Rolling up 310 yards of rushing is impressive. Our backs certainly deserve some credit, but most of the credit is due to our offensive line controlling the line of scrimmage and opening holes. The most impressive thing without a doubt was the 99 yard drive in the rain in the second quarter. That drive alone broke what little will the Florida defense had. The offensive line deserves massive kudos for their play in this game.

• Crownover and Fatheree were rotating at right tackle early in the game but it looked like Fatheree took most of the snaps in the second half. Not sure if that means he’s won the job or something was wrong with Crownover but I’d love to see someone take over that job. I could be wrong on that and their snaps were equal, but it seemed like a I saw Fatheree more in the second half.

• T.J. Callahan looked really good at center. I’m big on him because he seems to play with a mean streak. It bit him on that 99 yard drive with his personal foul, but he got bailed out thanks to a targeting call. I don’t think Callahan will be a big drop off if he has to play center full time for us.

• Thanks to some creative play calling and routes, we finally saw some receivers running wide open against a Power 5 opponent. I can’t tell you how long I’ve been waiting on that. Some of it was the offensive line giving Reed time and Reed’s ability to extend the play, but it was nice to see.

• The first two games felt like the same old plodding Jimbo offense. This offense felt different than those first two games from the start. No doubt Reed’s athletic ability opened up some things, but the play calling in this game felt a little more forceful. The most obvious was the big TD pass to Cyrus Allen after the Florida score in the second half. I assumed we were going to run the ball most of that series. So did Florida, but Klein called a motion route out of the backfield that completely leveraged their safety cheating to the run. Reed read it perfectly and made a great pass to Allen who utilized the space to find the end zone. It was the perfect play call and execution. If Florida had any thoughts of making a comeback, that play put those thoughts to bed. Just a wonderful play in that moment.

• We only had 178 yards passing but we leveraged the running game perfectly to create two big passing touchdowns. I believe we’re going to need to leverage the passing game more as the season wears on, but I have no issue running down the throat of a team with no will and using the passing game to make sure they’re put away.

• I think you’ll see teams focus more on Reeds ability to run which is fine. I believe we can leverage that via the passing game. There’s nothing more dangerous than a quarterback in the pocket that can pull the ball down and run like a deer when the middle of the field is open. I believe that’s going to open up our passing game as linebackers and safeties have to watch for Reed taking off but we’ll see.

• Defensively, that was a tough game to analyze with the extended breaks. They were dominant in the first and second quarters and then kind of had some issues in the second half. I think this defense would have looked different had we not had that long break between the 1st and 2nd quarter. They seemed to come out a little flat in the second half because the game seemed in hand. We also appeared to rotate a few more of the backups in the second half so I think that was a factor as well.

• I think the most impressive thing I’ve seen from this defense is the adaptation to the fact the defensive line is not going to get pressure on the quarterback by themselves. That’s a tall order for four guys to beat five guys. Instead of just repeatedly hoping it happens, Elko and Bateman are using a 5th defensive lineman as a true edge rusher along with well timed and disguised blitzes to get pressure. It’s clear our defensive line can be disruptive, but it’s also clear that offensive lines are going to do their best to not let it be disruptive. When that happens, you have to be creative in getting pressure. I see that happening. The use of Cashius Howell and Rylan Kennedy has been really good. They’re technically defensive ends but they’ve been used as edge rushers on passing downs like linebackers. They’ve been really effective.

• We need to get used to Nick Scourton getting held to a degree. I saw several times where Scourton would make an inside move and the tackle would just kind of swallow him up with a hug. It’s not an obvious hold but it’s a hold. The refs weren’t calling it so Florida kept doing it. I was actually impressed with the technique Florida was using and don’t blame them for doing it. You can bet other teams are going to try the same thing until it gets flagged.

• I still have questions about this defense’s ability to defend the pass because they haven’t truly been tested, but their plan and execution for shutting down Florida was impressive. At least in the first half. I still think Arkansas is a going to be a good test of this passing defense, but I feel much better about this unit after watching them shut down Florida for a half.

• I think Elko and Bateman’s intention of applying pressure will also help this pass defense. D.J. Durkin had a terrible knack of relying only on the front four to bring pressure. You can’t do that if it’s not working. You have to bring pressure from other areas and it seems Elko and Bateman recognize that. A comfortable quarterback is a dangerous quarterback so you can’t let him get comfortable.

• An offense that can actually score points will be a big factor in how this defenses plays. Being up a few points or having an offense with the ability to respond to a big play is a massive advantage for a defensive. You can play much more aggressive knowing the offense can pick up your slack. Aggressive defenses are better defenses. We saw that on Saturday.

It’s amazing a how a single win can change your outlook on the season. The establishment of hope is an amazing thing. We have hope again.

There’s no way to truly know what this win means for the rest of our nine games. Hopefully, it’s a launch point like 2020, but we could also look back and realize Florida is a beat down team with terrible coaching. No matter what, this win is INFINITELY better than a loss.

That much is for sure.

Even more than just a win, was the play of an offense that finally showed the ability to make plays. There’s no way to know if this is sustainable. All we can do is wait until our next test against Arkansas to know if this was a blip or a trend.

I have hope it’s a trend.