Billy Napier asked about hot seat chatter ahead of Florida-Kentucky game

Billy Napier has faced speculation about his Florida coaching future all year.

Before the Gators played their first game of the 2024 season, the UF head coach was included on many “hot seat” lists. Napier’s seat appeared to be burning up after Florida started the season 1-2 with blowout home losses to Miami and Texas A&M.

Though there were reports of buyout money being raised after the Texas A&M game, Napier remained the head coach and temporarily quieted the noise in the system with back-to-back wins over Mississippi State and UCF.

The Gators are now halfway through the regular-season schedule and 3-3 following the overtime loss at Tennessee. As we enter the second half of the season, there’s renewed attention to which coaches are on the hot seat. On Wednesday’s SEC teleconference, Napier was asked about how he handles speculation about his job.

“Yeah, I mean, I don’t have any control over that,” Napier said. “So, I think one of the most important things that we can do when put in these positions and having these great opportunities is focus on doing the best job you can do for your players and your staff.

“You get into the season, you’ve got to hit the reset button and it is literally, you are in the moment, present and focused on the task at hand.”

Ahead of the season, speculation was Napier would need to go better than 3-3 in the first 6 games. When the calendar turns to November, the Gators will finish their conference slate by facing No. 5 Georgia, No. 1 Texas, No. 8 LSU and No. 18 Ole Miss. The 2024 regular-season finale against Florida State no longer looks as daunting with the Seminoles at 1-5 on the year.

Up next for Florida is Kentucky. Napier is 0-2 against the Wildcats. If Napier falls to 0-3 against UK, he might not be around for next year’s contest. Napier thinks the Gators are getting better as they get into the second half of the season.

“One thing I can say about our team is that I do think we are improving,” Napier said Wednesday. “I’m excited about this group of players, their attitude, their character, the way they’ve handled some of the adversity. And obviously they put it on the line last Saturday night and came up a little short, but I do think both the performance-character and moral-character of our team has continued to improve.”

Andrew Olson

Andrew writes about sports to fund his love of live music and collection of concert posters. He strongly endorses the Hall of Fame campaigns of Fred Taylor and Andruw Jones.