Florida Football Working To Improve Depth

The Gators are one week into spring practice for the upcoming football season. News conferences have been taking place all week with coaches and players on both sides of the ball.

Ron Roberts

Beginning his second season with the Gators, Ron Roberts will serve as the teams executive head coach, co-defensive coordinator and linebackers coach.

First, Roberts mentioned one important area of improvement was getting players reps “But our first goal for us is, really, there’s guys that we have in backup positions or maybe haven’t seen a significant time, these young players that we’ve got to get them in the candid category in spring practice.”

Furthermore, regarding the progress the team made at the end of last season, and how they want to carry that momentum into spring practice Roberts said “It was a lot of guys that, you know, getting play at the end of the year, and we got guys out that you know, they’re gonna be fighting for positions as we go through spring and fall camp. So I’m excited about the growth we made. We’re obviously still not where we want to be, but I think we made serious growth going in the right direction.”

Additionally, when asked about the 25 turnovers created in 2024, the seven turnovers from the 2023 season and the goal for the 2025 season, Roberts stated  “Our hunt would be in the 30, That’s the number we would like to hunt.”

day 1 vibes…#GoGators pic.twitter.com/ULZ6kOhv6w

— Florida Gators Football (@GatorsFB) March 7, 2025

Gerald Chatman

Entering his second season with the Gators, Gerald Chatman serves as the team’s assistant coach and defensive line coach.

Moreover, when discussing the leadership of Coach Billy Napier, Chatman stated “I’ve never seen coach flinch. You know in times of adversity I think that type of leadership carries over to the coaches and ultimately carries over to the players.”

Continuing on, Chatman talked about young players coming in and dealing with new adversity. “I like to put the pressure on them early. I want it to be tough. I want him [players] thinking about it when he goes to sleep at night. and wake up thinking about it.”

Finishing up the press conference, Chatman talked about the expectations going into next year. “We’re gonna be sound. We have a scheme that allows us to utilize our personal and put them into a position to be successful.”

spring is here #GoGators pic.twitter.com/H2IPZIuEz6

— Florida Gators Football (@GatorsFB) March 6, 2025