Florida Football: Constructing the perfect 10-game schedule for the Gators

Games 7-10 of Florida football’s ideal schedule

A matchup with Arkansas followed by one with Vanderbilt to start the month of November is a dream come true for SEC teams. Both are bottom-dwellers and they could give any contender that extra boost of confidence in the home stretch that could carry over into a division title.

Derek Mason is on the hot seat, the Commodores don’t do anything exceptionally well and even though this game is in Knoxville, there will likely be no fans.

At least we might see more Dan Mullen and Mason fireworks.

OK, so a three-game stretch of Arkansas, Vanderbilt and Missouri is more than ideal; it’s perfect. Florida fans would jump for joy if they had three sure wins on the schedule in a row like that to start the final stretch.

If Florida is unbeaten going into November with this perfect schedule, the Gators will likely head into the month of December with an unblemished record.

Missouri doesn’t have Kelly Bryant and Eli Drinkwitz is in his first year as head coach. This is going to be a total rebuild for the Tigers.

Another tough game on the schedule will come after a bye week as the perfect schedule would give Florida an extra week to prepare for a road game against Tennessee.

A year ago, Tennessee would have been an afterthought on the schedule, especially after losing to Georgia State and BYU in the early weeks, but the Volunteers got hot near the end of the year and won their bowl game over Indiana. This team is not to be messed with and Florida needs to take this game seriously with extra prep.

No one in the conference would have an easier November-December stretch than Florida if things play out this way. With the exception of Tennessee, there might be zero opponents with a winning record at this point in the season in those two months.

Mississippi State just fired Joe Moorhead and hired Mike Leach so there’s another rebuild there, but KJ Costello could be a problem for SEC defenses.

Florida will welcome the Bulldogs to Gainesville in an eerily quiet Swamp, but the familiarity will make a big difference as the Gators will likely take care of business in this cross-divisional game to end the year.

And this caps off a perfect schedule, too.