Breaking down Florida football’s final two 4th quarter drives to beat South Carolina

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Florida football found itself in a precarious position, down 10 points with 9:11 to go in the fourth quarter on Saturday at South Carolina.

That’s when Florida Gators wide receiver Ricky Pearsall noticed South Carolina fans behind the UF bench doing a mock Gator chomp.

“I said, ‘OK guys, look in the stands right now, they’re gator chomping,” Pearsall said after Florida’s 41-39 victory. “Take that as disrespect.”

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UF’s final two TD drives went for 75 yards each and included three fourth down conversions. Quarterback Graham Mertz threw two TD passes, a 4-yard TD pass to tight end Arlis Boardingham to cut South Carolina’s lead to 37-34 with 4:40 left and a 21-yard TD pass to Pearsall with 47 seconds left to give UF a 41-37 lead.

“It’s really easy to be like, oh crap, you are down 10 points when the reality is it’s just two drives,” Mertz said. “Two drives and you’re executing. I always try to think of the games in drives and attempts not in points because points can be daunting but when you look up there and you think of it practically as far as drives, that really puts you in the moment. It frees you up just to go play.” 

Florida’s first two fourth down conversions

Florida came up with two fourth down conversions on its first fourth quarter TD drive. The first was on a 4th-and-11 from the South Carolina 49-yard line, when Mertz found tight end Arlis Boardingham open in the flat. Boardingham was shy of the first down marker, but side-stepped a South Carolina tackler and raced for an eventual 14-yard completion down to the 35-yard line to keep the drive alive.

The second came on 4th-and-1 from the South Carolina 7-yard line, when Mertz pitched outside to UF running back Trevor Etienne, who picked up three yards for the first down. On the next play, Mertz found Boardingham for the 4-yard TD.

“Graham Mertz, in particular, you can’t help but respect the competitive spirit of the kid,” Florida coach Billy Napier said. “The toughness, the decision-making. I just thought he was fantastic. Never flinched.”

Final Florida football TD drive featured divine reception

Florida got the ball back down 37-34 with 2:43 remaining for its final TD drive. But it didn’t get off to the best start. Mertz threw three straight incompletions, setting up a 4th-and-10 play. On the play, Mertz was flushed out of the pocket, but heaved it to Pearsall, who came back for the ball and made a 26-yard catch to keep UF’s hopes alive.

“We rep that play a million times,” Mertz said. “Man coverage. I know this guy. I know what he’s thinking. We saw the same thing. And he made a great play. And he’s the best route runner I’ve ever seen.”

Later in the drive, Mertz tried to connect with Pearsall again. This time, the ball deflected off his hands. There was a moment of panic, but it turned to jubilation when fellow UF freshman Eugene Wilson III came up with the deflection for the 22-yard catch and run play down to South Carolina’s 16-yard line.

Call it the divine reception.

“Sometimes it takes luck,” Pearsall said. “But really, honestly, shoutout to (Wilson) because that is a difficult catch, especially being a hot ball like that and tipping it and being that close together and snatching. Not only that, he got yards after that.”

Said Mertz: “Crazy heads-up play. It was a bad ball. I threw it behind Rick. It could have gone another direction. I owe a bunch of credit to (Wilson) there just making a huge play.”

Florida then took a 5-yard loss on a run play. But that set up Mertz’s go-ahead 21-yard TD pass to Pearsall. Mertz stayed in the pocket and took a shot (South Carolina was flagged for roughing the passer) but he found Pearsall in the end zone.

Afterwards, a fired-up Mertz celebrated on the Florida sidelines.

“A lot of emotion,” Mertz said. “I had a very similar situation, lower score — Penn State 2021 at home in Wisconsin. And I threw that ball about five yards over my receiver’s head. So it’s a big weight off my shoulders. A lot of emotion that came out of that at that point.”