Florida Football: Sorry 'Bout Your Logo FSU. No, Not Really, Mikie.

Mike Norvell seems to be blaming Billy Napier for the post-game dustup.(UAA Photo)

 We came for the black eyes, bloody noses and a little shin-kicking.

What’s that grand ole mixed sports metaphor, “I came to see a fight and a hockey game broke out!”? Yeah, that one! Hello, and welcome back to the hissing contest between the Gators and Noles. Pardon me if I don’t bring any cheese to Mike Norvelle’s whinefest. And please stop apologizing, Billy. This ain’t no Emily Post/Martha Stewart Niceoff.

Leave your social mores and behavior guides from Michelle Garcia Winner and Dr. Pamela Crooke at the door before this Hatfields vs McCoys shootout winds up being miscast as a Requiem for a Pattycake Party.

We came for the black eyes, bloody noses and a little shin-kicking. 

Florida-FSU competitions are not governed by the Roberts Rules of Order.  The days of apologizing for chopping down cherry trees are over in politics.

It’s been a long drink of water between Seminole ass-whippings and a little misconduct is in order.

Maybe I should start by apologizing to the garnet-and-golders on their side of my House Divided in advance for my support of the rules-benders, but who started this logo spear-planting and take-home sod-bagging anyway? So WarDamnGator and fi on Norvell and his precious little Seminole logo anyway. That’s for all of us with a little Steve Spurrier mean streak in us.

Blame part of my naughtiness on in my colleague/friend Scott Carter of FloridaGators.com, ordinarily one of the nicest people and calmest humans on earth, but who started off my Sunday with this ElonMuskGram:

“#Gators win, plant a flag at FSU.

--FSU players get mad, start scuffle

--#Noles coach Norvell whines, refuses to shake hands with Napier

--Norvell unplants flag, tosses it

--#Gators smoke cigars

--Me, yeah, that's how I like my UF-FSU rivalry.”

Spot on Scott.

So get over the righteousness indignation police stuff Coach Napier and take a bow for one helluva coaching job. You are not the one checking the nurse’s aide station for response to a #911 Gus Malzahn call — like the guy in Tallahassee is. What do they need to beat you, a merger?

Barber celebrates seminal Seminole moment (UAA)

Out of respect for Billy, and because he’s taken so much abuse from his own before performing an exorcism which produced one of the biggest turnarounds in history since Lazarus, let’s hear the Gator coach’s mea culpa about Saturday night’s dustup:

“…obviously what happened there at the end of the game is not who we want to be as a program. And it’s embarrassing to me and it’s a distraction from a really well-played football game. So, I want to apologize on behalf of the entire organization, just in terms of how  the University there. We shouldn’t have done that and we won’t do that going forward, and there will be consequences for all involved.”

Noooo! Personally, many of us just feel they were just finishing up a regular season playing UNcomplimentary ball.

And if they want to take it outside and do a rematch in the bowl game … oh wait!

This was the story of two seasons in one – BDJL (Before DJ Lagway) and ADJL (After). The day between that was Wednesday Oct. 15 and what transpired at practice will be circled in red by Napier forever as BJDDay. Something clicked and a whole new level of football intelligence, camaraderie and commitment surfaced.

"I think midseason is when it all kind of came together. Think the players did a good job of kind of putting their blinders on in the first month, and didn’t allow excuses, didn’t allow blame," said Napier. "Really just went back to work. Go back to that first open date, and I think that Tennessee game was pivotal. The way they responded to that. Just in general, good to have some momentum, and I thought we took advantage. That was the mission, was to capture the momentum we had tonight, and I think we did that.”

Not to be lost on overreacting with a little rude behavior – honestly, compared to the felonious drivers in Athens it was like getting a parking ticket at the Daytona 500 – has been the marvelous comportment and patience of these coaches, players and staffers who refused to stop believing in The Right Stuff. And it will live in the hearts of Gators forever.

Even the mistakes, misfires and shortcomings take root. This is a day when Lagway, uplifted by the spectacular, once-maligned defense which was excoriated for its stupidity, was carried by his teammates because he didn’t have his best stuff, but honestly, he made a couple of brilliant plays akin to striking out the side with the bases loaded.

On Lagway shrugging off a potential sack for an explosive completion, Billy bragged: “Superman. There were a handful of plays that were off-schedule and I think that’s what he does. He’s going to be frustrated because he knows there were six or eight plays out there where he could have been better. But look, we got to play better around the quarterback. I didn’t think we were as sharp.”

Those dropped passes and busted routes were more than offset by the eight sacks, four fumble recoveries and the lights out-defense.

Said Napier: “I thought, defensively, we were really lights out. We had a season high in TFLs and sacks, limited the explosive plays, and then, obviously created some takeaways and were able to take advantage of those on offense and get some points from those. Montrell [Johnson Jr.] goes over 3,000 yards. And look, I think we didn’t have our fastball on offense. I think it was evident there. We had some missed opportunities, and I do think that it could’ve been worse, is what I would say. But I think we struggled at times there. We got to play better around the quarterback.”

There was some special joy – and I don’t mean the logo-spearing – because of a sigh of relief by veterans like Tyreak Sapp:

“It was like a relief, off my back. I’ve gone two years, two years losing to these guys. That’s a great group of guys that they put together, always find a way to put a team together. It’s always a challenge, it’s a rivalry game, we don’t like them and they don’t like us. So, for two years, this has been sitting on us, sitting on me and Shemar (James) especially, because we were here to see it. It was just great to see the work that we’ve been putting in since the offseason. This is one of the best ways to end it.”

Sorry ‘bout your logo, Mikie. There’s a way to stop that. It’s called winning. You and Gus can bring your Spears to Steve Spurrier Field next Nov. 29. Fat chance.