Florida Football: 5 reasons to be optimistic about 2019 season

1. Playing in the SEC East is a blessing

As if you all don’t already know, there are two divisions in the Southeastern Conference. It’s no secret that the SEC West is the harder division to trapeze through year after year. Let’s run through who the Gators play right now and who they would have to play if they were to switch sides of the conference.

As it stands right now, this team plays in the SEC East. Year after year, they face off against teams like Georgia- a group that is just now really getting their feet under them and putting together some quality seasons. Kentucky, who we just discussed a few slides ago, are a hit or miss type group right now.

Then we have Missouri, who now has Kelly Bryant but little else. Vanderbilt, well, that is a laugh at this point in terms of football. Tennessee seems to be putting something together — maybe. South Carolina can’t be consistent and live up to expectations if their lives depended on it.

In the West, you start with Alabama — yeah enough said on that front. Then, you add Texas A&M who is on the rise as well as LSU. Ole Miss has a good offense, most of the time. Mississippi State has built a defense that has everyone shaking in their boots. Auburn will be fine once they finally get a new coach. Then there is Arkansas and, well, they just aren’t included at this point.

For Florida, it seems that playing in the East is a blessing among blessings. They simply match up better with teams like Kentucky and Tennessee than they do with the likes of the West. Therefore their opponent list is a reason to be optimistic for the 2019 campaign.