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What’s in a number?
For Florida football players, it’s a way to stand out and establish an identity.
Long before chucking visors, Steve Spurrier was known as No. 11 for the Florida Gators as a Heisman-winning quarterback in 1966. Then came No. 7, Danny Wuerffel, the quarterback who won a Heisman in 1996 and piloted UF to its first national title in school history that year. Quarterback Tim Tebow made No. 15 a legacy number when he won the Heisman Trophy in 2007 and led UF to national championships in 2006 and 2008. Tebow’s number has since been passed down to recent quarterbacks Anthony Richardson and Graham Mertz.
Wide receiver Percy Harvin changed his number from No. 8 when he started his career to No. 1 when he led UF to a national title in 2008, before declaring for the NFL Draft.
Running back Montrell Johnson and edge rusher Justus Boone wore the No. 1 jersey on offense and defense last season. But no one is wearing No. 1 this spring.
On Thursday, senior defensive end Tyreak Sapp explained why.
“I just wanted to take a break from the assumptions,” Sapp said. “Take from a little bit of entitlement, too. The number doesn’t change anything. Regardless, you gotta be that guy. On Saturday, that number doesn’t make you make any more plays and make any less plays. You gotta understand that. As long as we understand that, we gonna go out there and be fine with it. Somebody wearing No. 1 or not.”
Sapp said the offense “can do its own thing,” but as a leader on the defense, he’s demanding that no one wears No. 1 on UF’s defense this season.
“That’s about us as a group, especially on the defensive line,” Sapp said. “That’s how we want to play ourselves — the defense. Everybody got to have each other’s back and y’all gotta trust each other.”
Here’s a look at the Florida number changes and new numbers this…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/article/numbers-number-changes-why-no-192941000.html
Author : The Gainesville Sun
Publish date : 2025-03-07 19:29:00
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