The boys in Vegas are not too keen on Florida again this year. (Photo via Florida Gators)
In the offseason leading up to the 2023 season, the boys in Vegas did not think much of the Florida Gator football team, giving them a projected win total of 5.5 wins. That projection turned out to be prophetic, as Florida finished 5-7 and did not make a bowl game.
Fast forward one year later, and the projections seem eerily similar.
Not only is Florida’s projected win total again sitting right at 5.5, but now DraftKings has actually come out with some betting lines for individual games— and they don’t favor Florida.
According to DraftKings, Florida is a noticeable underdog in the seven games for which they have come up with lines. Most notably, the Gators are 13.5 point underdogs at FSU, 22 point underdogs vs. Georgia in Jacksonville, and 11 point underdogs at Tennessee. Florida is also slated to be home underdogs against Texas A&M (by 4 points), LSU (by 5.5 points) and Ole Miss (by 6.5 points).
But the real eyebrow-raiser has to be the line against Miami on August 31. The Hurricanes are said to be favored by two points in the Swamp, despite a wealth of turnover on their roster and a new QB in Cam Ward playing his first game in a new system in front of nearly 90,000 bloodthirsty Gator fans.
Of course, this is not meant to be a full-throttle gloom-and-doom piece– they’re just betting lines. I’ve always said that Vegas knows more than most, though they definitely don’t know everything and if you think you have a better pulse on the Florida Gators than the bookies in the desert, you might be able to make some real money off their pessimism. Specifically, I’d look to grab that +2 spread in the Swamp against Miami and maybe even that +4 spread against a similarly new-look Texas A&M team two weeks later.
But, as is the case with everything in life, we’ll just have to wait and see.
