More Elite Players? New Analysis Puts UF, FSU Side by Side
When some fans think about the Florida Gators-Florida State Seminoles football rivalry, their minds may jump to the highlights – the championships, the Hall of Fame coaches and players like Tim Tebow and Deion Sanders.
But few may consider a broader long-term competition, played out on collegiate resumés and in career box scores. It asks the question: Which school is better at producing top players?
Well, that depends on the data.
When it comes to players winning the highest honors – the Heisman Trophy, All-America Team selections, Hall of Fame inductions and hearing their names called on draft day – some of the margins between Florida and Florida State have been extremely close, according to a WRUF data analysis.
Historically, both schools have long track records of producing accomplished players at the collegiate level and beyond, data shows.
To measure each team’s player success, WRUF looked at data on those selected for the Heisman Trophy, the All-America Team, the College Football Hall of Fame and the NFL draft. Much of the data came from Sports Reference, an online hub for sports statistics.
Here is what we found:
Florida ranks 10th among all universities for total draft picks, and Florida State ranks 23rd. For All-Americans, Florida ranks 18th, while Florida State ranks 9th in that category.
Why UF and FSU Succeed
Kevin Brockway, a Gainesville Sun reporter who has been involved in UF football coverage for almost 20 years, credits a great amount of the school’s player production success to the numbers of skilled players who rise through Florida’s high school ranks – and the sport’s status in Florida. Of the nation’s top 300 high school football recruits in 2026, almost 40 were from Florida – ranking it second only to Texas nationwide, according to On3.com, a leading source for college football recruiting news. And, for each of the previous 10 years, Florida had over 30 of the top 300 recruits in the country, according to the site.
“Just the emphasis on the sport in the state and the number of athletes that are here, I think that’s a good base for both (UF and FSU) programs and it’s why both programs have been successful,” Brockway said.
Steve Russell, the former Sports Director of ESPN Gainesville for over 25 years, said finding the right combination of players – and coaches – is critical for football schools. Recruiting and coaching go hand in hand.
“It’s finding the right coach who fits your program and then that coach developing their style, getting the right athletes to fit in it,” Russell said.
The support for college football in Florida enables state schools to bring in top coaches.
“There’s a lot of passion, I think, which leads to certainly a lot of potential for resources for all (in-state) schools,” Brockway said. “Because these schools have strong fan bases, they generate revenue, they can attract high-quality coaching and those coaches at each position group tend to develop their players pretty well.”
And the awards garnered by coaches from the two schools support this statement. Both schools boast not just Hall-of-Fame players, but also Hall-of-Fame head coaches – FSU with Bobby Bowden, who led its program from 1976 to 2009, and Florida with Steve Spurrier, Doug Dickey and Ray Graves.
From the Golden Age to Today
For Florida and FSU, their best combined runs – both in terms of national championships and top-notch player production – were in the 1990s, according to the data WRUF analyzed.
In the 1990s, the two schools captured a combined three national championships. Florida produced 52 NFL draft picks, including 10 first-round picks and four second-round picks. Florida State produced 64 draft picks, including 13 first-round picks and 12 second-round picks.
Nine UF players earned the All-American distinction, while FSU boasted 15, during that time.
During the 2000s, the two schools had another excellent combined decade in terms of national championships won and player production.
UF won two national championships and had 50 NFL draft picks, while FSU sent 56 players to the NFL. Eleven Florida players and four Florida State players were named All-Americans.
After 2010, the number of national championships continued to decrease, but successful player production did not. The two schools won only one national championship in the 2010s – FSU in 2013 – but UF produced its highest number of NFL draft picks in the span of a decade, 60, while FSU produced 53.
“The heyday was the ‘90s in terms of … Florida, Florida State and Miami,” Brockway said. “Starting in Miami in 1983 through Florida under Urban Meyer in 2008, you’re talking about a stretch where those three schools combined for … 10 national championships.”
Since then, recruiting has become national, and other universities have become aware of the football talent in Florida, which has made recruiting harder for state schools like UF.
“Other schools have come in here and have poached some of the best players,” Brockway said. “I think it’s become harder and harder maybe for some of these programs to keep the level of talent home that they used to.”
And the numbers partially reflect this. FSU has had only 19 NFL draftees since 2020, which put it on pace for a total of 32 in the decade – its lowest number since the 1970s, WRUF found.
However, UF has still produced 32 NFL draftees so far, a rate that, if maintained, would put it at 53 draft picks for the decade as the program continues to attract top talent.
“If you look at Napier’s recruiting classes, they’ve been very good,” Russell said. “A lot of it’s young, but there’s good talent here.”
UF vs. FSU: The Future
Which team will prevail in the next decade, or even in Saturday’s next clash, remains to be seen.
At the moment, however, FSU appears to have the advantage on the field. It boasts an offense that currently ranks 16th in seconds per play among teams in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest national division of NCAA football. Additionally, the FSU offense averages 478 yards per game and is ninth in the category, according to the NCAA’s latest rankings. This puts it well above UF’s 332.4 yards per game and ranking of 108th. FSU is also in the top 20 for third-down conversion percentage and total first downs, while UF is outside the top 100 in both.
Plus, the Seminoles have a quarterback with running ability, Tommy Castellanos, who has racked up 480 rushing yards this season and ranks 30th in the category among FBS quarterbacks as of Nov. 25th.
Defensively, the game also seems slanted toward the Seminoles. FSU’s defense currently averages 318.7 yards allowed per game and is ranked 27th in the category among FBS teams, while UF averages 374.1 yards and ranks 69th. FSU also beats out UF in first downs allowed and third-down conversion percentages, ranking 34th and 59th to UF’s 55th and 113th.
However, UF will be playing at home, where it has a distinctly better overall record against FSU – 22-13-1 – than away (15–14–1). And, FSU currently has a record of 0-4 in away games this season, the latest in a 10-game losing streak on the road.
And, let’s not forget that the UF vs. FSU matchup is a rivalry game – a factor that makes the outcome harder to predict.
“You kind of throw records out the window and you just kind of go and play it,” Brockway said.
Category: Gator Sports, Gators Football
