Florida Gators Have No Choice But To Trust Treon Harris

Just as the Florida Gators were gaining steam as a program again, their world came crashing down on Monday.

Quarterback Will Grier has been suspended for the rest of the season for taking a banned performance enhancing drug. It’s a true kick in the gut for the Gators and a quarterback they thought was their future star.

Grier has since stated that he didn’t check with the school to see if what he was taking was okay, but that’s besides the point. Now the man taking over for Grier is sophomore Treon Harris. He has experience as he played an extended amount of time last season. He has 1,288 passing yards, 11 touchdowns and four interceptions in his career to date. Harris certainly doesn’t bring the throwing skill level of Grier, but he does bring more of a running dimension that could drive opposing coaches nuts. In just 10 rushes this year he is averaging 6.3 yards per carry.

Obviously, the play-calling is going to have to be changed somewhat with the quarterback switch, but it is not time for the Gators to get conservative and vanilla with their offense. They have a two-game lead in the SEC East with four games to play. Any College Football Playoff hopes still being alive is one thing, but the Gators still do have a decent shot at claiming an SEC East title. They just have to keep on playing loose on the offensive side of the ball.

The defense will continue to shine and carry this team. They did it with Grier and they can do it without him. With players like Brandon Powell, Kelvin Taylor, Demarcus Robinson and Antonio Callaway, the Gators still have plenty of athletic weapons around Harris to succeed. They just need to believe in him. As the late great Yogi Berra said, “90 percent of the game is half mental,” and that couldn’t be more true for college athletics. If the players and coaches don’t have confidence in him, then it will show with their play and his. If they could believe and show trust in him, things could go very well for Harris and the Gators.

The dream season could very well be over for the Gators and things could get ugly. However, the Gators have another option. They could rally around Harris and play with an us against the world mentality. The way I look at it, the Gators have no choice but to trust Harris.

Andrew Frosceno is a New York Giants beat writer and college football writer for www.Rantsports.com. You can follow him on Twitter and Google.