Pat Dooley’s Back Nine: Florida Football In Need Of No. 2 Receiver

The Back Nine comes at you after a glorious weekend that reminds us why we live in Dreamville. In July, there will be none of these reminders, I must say.

10. OK, here is my take on the spring game – it was a great Saturday. It doesn’t mean Florida is going to win 12 games or make the new and improved College Football Playoff. It just means Saturday was tremendous. I saw a lot of good things and can’t wait to see Anthony Richardson 2.0 when the real games begin. Billy Napier has talked about having a different set of plays for Graham Mertz and DJ Lagway. And those will work early in the season. But once they get some tape on him, it’s going to be up to Lagway to have progressed enough to take the next steps. I know this – he has a good teacher in Mertz. “It’s like polar opposites, right?” Napier said. “You have a guy that started 43 games who is incredibly aware, smart, different type of player than DJ, and then DJ, obviously, you can see he is athletic. He can make plays with his feet, and he has no experience. To see those guys collaborate, to go back and forth throughout the spring, and today you can see DJ has made some progress.”

11. Florida definitely needs to find a No. 2 receiver in the portal. I like Kahleil Jackson and Marcus Burke, but they have to have someone to take the double-coverage off Tre Wilson. That guy is elite. And he learned a lot from Ricky Pearsall. “He really broke my ice a little bit,” Wilson said of Pearsall. “He taught me a lot as far as making the DB play my game and not going out there and running concepts all the time, but being creative and being an artist in the game.” That’s encouraging.

12. One more thing on the spring game. The pregame clambake that Johnny Townsend had to benefit pediatric cancer research was an absolute blast and seeing all of those former players there really warmed my heart. Ricky Nattiel and I had a great talk about what his stats would have been if he had played for Steve Spurrier (he said he would have had 8,000 yards and I don’t doubt him even if he was exaggerating.) And then, all of those people in lines to get autographs and selfies because they are Florida Victorious members was a good sign things are headed in the right direction with NIL. It was just a tremendous day.

13. Scottie Scheffler managed to do what Tiger Woods used to do to my Sunday’s – made them anticlimactic. He’s a good guy and all, but he’s too good right now to have thought anyone was going to win once he dug his spurs in. And one of the guys on CBS said exactly what I said five minutes before (although only to my wife, not to millions of people) – that Scheffler is so good the people around him crumble because they quit playing patient golf and feel they have to do something outside their comfort zones. He has no flash and is kind of boring and certainly don’t try that swing at home. The most emotion he showed in four days was the triple fist-pump after his eagle on 13 Friday. But he is the quiet assassin.

14. Tiger Wood shot an 82 Thursday. I shot an 85 when I played. You make the comparisons. Anyway, I can’t let the Masters go without adding to the many tributes for Verne Lundquist, who has been a friend for a long time. It feels like he was a huge part of the best times of my life – SEC Tournaments, college football Saturdays and the Masters. He was often a guest on my radio shows and I will miss hearing him on my television so much I may watch Happy Gilmore every day. Thank you, Verne.

15. Jac Caglianone hit a homer in his sixth straight game, but that is not why Florida salvaged the series against South Carolina. Don’t forget, he had homered in the five previous games, all losses. Florida won Sunday because they hit the ball where it was pitched instead of popping out or rolling over on a ball for an easy grounder. It’s not rocket science guys.

16. And softball also had to win the final game at Missouri to run its record to 35-9. That’s the thing about freshmen pitchers. They can look really good and then can’t find it in the circle the next game. Keagan Rothrock found it Sunday with a one-hitter. The Gators next play host to South Carolina in a weekend series starting Friday.

17. Kind of lost in the shuffle in the Orange & Blue Weekend was that lacrosse beat No. 14 James Madison in front of an enthusiastic crowd at the Diz. Mandee O’Leary’s team is now 13-2 with a trip to Cincinnati up next. Well done.

18. As we are now less than four weeks until the 29^thBob Dooley Invitational, one of my biggest concerns is that we have so many hole sponsors we’re going to have to double up. That’s a good problem to have. This playlist is also a good problem to have:

• “I Still Dream You” by the Cocktail Slippers.

• “All These Things That I’ve Done” by The Killers.

• And for an old one from the album (“Eat A Peach”) we used to listen to on 8-track all the time, “Blue Sky” by the Allman Brothers Band.

WRUF.com sports columnist Pat Dooley can be heard on “The Tailgate” along with Jeff Cardozo from 4-6 p.m. Monday-Friday on 98.1-FM/AM-850 WRUF.