In the moments following a 24-14 win at South Carolina last Saturday, completing a 6-0 sweep of the SEC East, Florida coach Jim McElwain had a curious choice of words when discussing Florida Atlantic, his team’s next opponent.

“We’ve got a team coming in that’s full of a bunch of Florida guys that wishes they were Gators,” McElwain said in his TV postgame interview at Williams-Brice Stadium.

On the surface, calling out the Owls’ roster as a team that “wishes they were Gators” seems out of character for a coach who spent the past two weeks talking up below .500 opponents Vanderbilt (4-6, 2-4 in the SEC) and South Carolina (3-7, 1-7 in the SEC).

FAU, a Conference USA team, launched its football program in 2001 and is well off the radar of the state’s Big Three (Florida, Florida State and Miami). The Owls have a 72-106 all-time record and only two bowl bids in school history. The Owls, 2-8 this season, are currently a 31-point underdog for Saturday’s game in The Swamp.

Focus could be an issue for a Florida team in unfamiliar territory, having not played in an SEC Championship Game since 2009. Since a 27-3 win over Georgia in Week 9, the national media’s discussion of the Gators has been about which SEC West team they will face in Atlanta and if they will make the playoffs. As much as the coaches preach taking things one week at a time, college football teams are still made up of college students who watch TV and read Twitter.

McElwain’s “wishes they were Gators” comment might be his way of trying of motivate his own team, which needed a late field goal to beat Vanderbilt at home and was up only three points (17-14) in the fourth quarter against South Carolina. Playing up the in-state rivalry aspect of the Florida Atlantic game could help his players to focus on the task at hand and not look ahead to the Week 13 showdown with FSU.

“There’s a ton to prove for (our) guys,” McElwain said at his Monday news conference, “and they know how hard these guys (FAU) will play. They’ve got some weapons.”

With 53 Florida high school products suiting up for UF and FAU, motivation won’t be an issue for the players who wish they were Gators. The question is whether it will be an issue for the Gators themselves.