FINAL: No. 8 Tennessee 23, Florida 17 (OT)

WHAT HAPPENED: Tailback Dylan Sampson slammed into the tip zone from a yard out on Tennessee’s first possession of extra time to offer the eighth-ranked Volunteers a 23-17 victory over rival Florida of their Southeastern Convention sport Saturday night time at sold-out Neyland Stadium. Sampson’s rating was his third of the sport for the league’s speeding chief and got here after his 23-yard landing run within the fourth interval put the Vols forward for the primary time with slightly below 10 minutes to play. The Gators, 15 1/2-point underdogs, rallied to tie the rating behind freshman quarterback DJ Lagway after beginning sixth-year Graham Mertz left the sport within the third quarter after struggling what seemed to be a knee harm. Lagway fired a 27-yard landing cross to Chimere Dike on a third-and-19 play with simply 29 seconds remaining in regulation to make the rating 17-16 and stun the gang of greater than 102,000. UF coach Billy Napier, at first, saved his offense on the sphere and threatened a two-point conversion try — and a go on the win — however after Tennessee referred to as a desperation timeout and reset, Napier opted to ship Trey Smack out to kick the point-after and play for extra time. UT received the coin toss and selected to play protection first. The Gators ran three performs, misplaced 4 yards and turned to Smack, who earlier kicked a 42-yard area objective. His OT try from 47, nevertheless, was pushed proper, leaving Tennessee to play for the win. The Vols wanted 5 performs to go the 25 yards, with Sampson crashing throughout on second-and-goal from the 1 and giving the Volunteers simply their third win within the final 20 video games of this collection. Sampson, who got here into the sport with 589 speeding yards and 12 TDs, completed with 112 on 27 makes an attempt and the three scores. Defensively, UF did a principally excellent job of containing a UT offense that started the day ranked No. 5 within the nation at 519.0 yards per sport, because the Vols ending with a season-low 312 yards and practically dropped a second sport in as many weeks as a prime 10-ranked staff. UT sophomore quarterback Nico Iamaleava accomplished 16 of 26 passes for 169 yards, no scores, an interception and was sacked 3 times. Lagway completed 9 of 17 for 98 yards, the one rating, one interception and three sacks, because the Gators really out-gained the Vols with 361 yards of complete offense. Mertz was 11-for-15 for 125 yards and a landing, together with his 13-yard scoring toss to tight finish Arlis Boardingham giving the Gators a 10-0 lead within the third quarter, but additionally ending with UF’s beginning quarterback struggling a non-contact harm on the finish of the play. Mertz joined beginning tailback Montrell Johnson Jr. (12 carries, 85 yards earlier than taking place with a decrease physique harm early within the third quarter) on the sidelines, as the 2 needed to watch the Vols rally from their 10-0 deficit. The UF lead might have been rather more, however the Gators self-destructed on a trio of drives that penetrated the UT 20 within the first half and netted no factors. First, wideout Eugene Wilson III was tackled for a yard loss on a fourth-and-1 jet sweep. Subsequent, Mertz fumbled on a first-down sneak try on the Vols’ 1. And, lastly, after a Florida interception, Smack had a transformed 43-yard area objective taken off the board on the ultimate play of the primary half when the Gators had been flagged for 12 males on the sphere. As a result of that they had no timeouts and couldn’t settle for a 10-second clock run-off, the half ended with the penalty and with no re-kick. UF lastly discovered the tip zone on its second possession of the second half, when Mertz moved the Gators 92 yards in 9 performs, then lobbed his rating to Boardingham. UT wanted lower than 5 minutes to seek out the tip zone for the primary time, with Iamaleava driving the Vols 75 yards in 11 performs and Sampson crashing in on a fourth-and-1 with a six-yard scoring run. On the very subsequent play from scrimmage, Lagway threw an interception in minus-territory that led to a 35-yard Max Gilbert area objective that tied the sport at 10 with 1:37 left within the third quarter. Sampson’s second TD about 5 minutes later made it 17-10 and arrange the frantic end. 

WHAT IT MEANS: Simply the third loss to Tennessee since 2005, but it surely very effectively might have gone in a different way — and possibly given Napier the most important win of his three UF seasons, in addition to some promising prospects for this system — had the Gators not blown these three excellent first-half scoring possibilities. 

IN THE SPOTLIGHT: The Florida protection has made some spectacular strides since these two debacle performances in residence losses to Miami and Texas A&M early within the season. The blokes on that facet of the ball put the Gators in place to steal what would have been a victory just about nobody was relying on.

STAGGERING STATISTIC: Florida was 3-for-6 within the purple zone, with these three come-up-empty killers all within the second quarter. Tennessee was 3-for-3 within the purple zone. There’s the sport.

UP NEXT: Florida (3-3, 1-2) will probably be again at “The Swamp” for a homecoming date towards Kentucky (3-3, 1-3), which has crushed the Gators three straight and 4 of the earlier 5 after shedding 31 straight within the collection from 1987-2017. The Wildcats had a two-game profitable streak snapped late Saturday night time by shedding at residence towards faculty soccer’s 2024 giant-killer, Vanderbilt, which adopted final week’s beautiful upset of No. 1 Alabama by going to Lexington and handing the favored Wildcats a 20-13 defeat.