No. 8 Florida heads to No.
25 Missouri on Saturday with more than an SEC game on the schedule. The Gators are carrying the memory of their last trip to Columbia, and that defeat has been used as fuel inside the program this week.
Florida and Missouri have never had much of a natural connection. They’re separated by a thousand of miles, and they’ve only met 13 times in football.
But the recent results at Faurot Field have given this matchup a sharper edge. Florida has dropped three of its last four games there, and the most recent loss still lingers because of the image attached to it: former Gators defensive end Tyreak Sapp sitting on the sideline while Missouri players, including current Chicago Bears wide receiver Luther Burden III, stood in front of him and one of them mocked him with a baby Gator chomp.
Gators coach Jon Sumrall made sure his team knew about that night.
“I mean, the last time Florida played there and lost, there were still guys who are on this team,” Gators safety DJ Coleman said. “He brought that up today to us, and I feel like it’s going to be motivation, because we’re trying to make history this season, and I feel like this is a small piece of history that we can control right now.”
Florida is 4-0 and 2-0 in the SEC, and the start has already matched last year’s win total. The Gators backed that up with a 52-28 win over then-No.
4 Ole Miss last week in the Swamp, a result that came against a Rebels team fresh off an emotional victory over LSU. Through four games, Florida’s first four opponents are a combined 12-4, and the Gators have 28 touchdowns - just one fewer than they scored all of last season.
Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz sees the Gators’ start as a reflection of Sumrall, a coach he has known since their overlapping days at Arkansas State and Tulane and through recruiting trips around Mobile, Alabama.
“You can just see with the energy that he brings, the passion - his energy is infectious. The way his team plays reflects the passion,” Drinkwitz said. “If you know Jon at all, just reflects the way he carries himself, the confidence and physicality that he brings.”
The Tigers are 3-1 and 1-1 after a 31-24 loss at Mississippi State, where they blew a fourth-quarter lead. Missouri safety Elijah Dotson said the focus now is on fixing the mistakes and moving on.
“Obviously we’ve got things we need to clean up,” Missouri safety Elijah Dotson said, “but that’s what practice is for. We’re going to clean that up this week and get back to work.”
The recent series has been tight throughout. The last three meetings between Florida and Missouri have all been decided by a touchdown or less, and the Tigers have taken the past two in Columbia by a combined three points. The latest came on Nov. 18, 2023, when Missouri edged Florida 33-31.
Injuries could also shape the matchup. Florida wide receiver Vernell Brown III is questionable after straining a knee against Ole Miss.
He has 17 catches for 271 yards and two touchdowns, along with two punt return touchdowns. Missouri is also waiting on edge rushers Langden Kitchen and Darris Smith, both dealing with lower-body injuries.
On the field, Missouri will have to deal with one of the nation’s most dangerous offenses. The Gators are fifth nationally at 532.8 yards per game and have been piling up explosive production. Florida running back Jadan Baugh has emerged as a serious Doak Walker Award contender, ranking No. 2 nationally with 600 rushing yards through four games and leading the country with 11 touchdown runs.
Missouri’s backfield situation is different. The Tigers are still without All-American running back Ahmad Hardy, who was shot as an innocent bystander following a concert in Mississippi in the offseason and has not returned to practice. Jamal Roberts has been handling the featured role in his absence.
In Other News...
Jon Sumrall Just Made Floridas Secondary Concern Even Bigger
Floridas defense left the Missouri game with more questions than answers, and the secondary is right at the center of it. The Gators gave up five touchdowns on drives that began with a punt or kickoff, a jarring jump for a unit that was supposed to have enough talent in the back end to hold up better than that. Instead, explosive plays kept putting the defense in bad spots, and the overall result made the problems look bigger than a single busted coverage or one rough quarter.
Jon Sumrall did not try to dress it up afterward, saying there are multiple issues in the secondary and no simple fix waiting to clean them up. His message was blunt enough to make the concern feel even more real: Florida needs players to win their one-on-one battles. For a defense built with highly rated talent, that is a tough place to be, and it leaves the Gators staring at a problem that goes beyond scheme and into execution. [Read more 🡒]
Floridas Ranking Hit Looks Bad But One Result May Save Them
Floridas latest result did enough damage to raise questions about where the Gators land in the next AP Top 25, especially with several ranked teams around the country also stumbling. The poll is expected to shift only modestly after a weekend in which just three teams in the rankings lost, but Floridas own situation stands out because a rough outing can look worse when the rest of the field largely holds serve.
There is still a chance the Gators avoid a deeper slide, though, because the committee of voters has a few other results to weigh, including Pittsburgh staying unbeaten and teams such as UCLA, Kentucky and Boise State adding their own wrinkles to the picture. Mississippi State and Alabama are part of the same crowded conversation too, which is what makes Floridas place in the next poll so uncertain until the new rankings are revealed. [Read more 🡒]
Jon Sumrall Just Challenged Florida's Maturity After Its First Loss
Floridas first loss of the 2026 season landed hard, and Jon Sumrall did not soften the blow afterward. The No. 8 Gators were thumped by No. 25 Missouri, 45-17, in a game that exposed problems on both sides of the ball, with the head coach pointing directly to defensive breakdowns and an offense that never got its ground game going.
Sumralls criticism went beyond scheme and execution, getting at the bigger-picture issue of maturity after a defeat that had been building for the wrong reasons. With South Carolina, Texas and Georgia next on the schedule, Florida does not have much time to let the sting linger, and the response in the coming weeks will say plenty about how this team handles its first real setback. [Read more 🡒]