Florida football seen as 'underrated' by CBS Sports expert

With the Florida football season just a little over a week away, head coach Billy Napier and his staff are putting together their final preparations as they open their season against the 19th-ranked Miami Hurricanes in the Swamp.

Despite the spotlight often shining on its SEC counterparts, the Gators can make a case as one of the conference’s most underrated teams according to CBS sports writer Richard Johnson.

Johnson predicts the Gators will finish as the eighth-best team in the SEC which is higher than where the other experts predict Florida will finish. The majority have the Gators as the 12th-best team in the SEC just behind the Auburn Tigers.

You can view CBS Sports’ SEC expert picks for the 2024 season here.

What Johnson said about the Gators

“The most popular refrain in preseason analysis this summer has been that Florida’s schedule is the hardest in college football history,” Johnson wrote. “But … what if it’s not? In a sport where top 15 teams finish unranked every single year, the odds are that we will not consider Florida’s schedule as much of a murderers row in December that we think about it as in September.”

Johnson went on to add, “Florida will also be improved enough on the line of scrimmage to be dangerous in at least some of its hardest run. They aren’t a 10-win team, but the Gators aren’t a five-win team either.”

Florida’s season opener for 2024

The Florida Gators and No. 19 Miami Hurricanes square off on Aug. 31 in Gainesville, Florida to open their schedule for the 2024 season. Kickoff is set for 3:30 p.m. ET and will be broadcast on ABC Sports.

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