Mullen hints no quarterback change for Gators

For the first time in school history, the Florida Gators will face the Associated Press No. 1 team in the country for the second time in a single season this Saturday when they meet the No. 1 Georgia Bulldogs in Jacksonville.

Florida lost to No. 1 Alabama in September but will get another crack at felling the No. 1 team in the country this weekend. Dan Mullen, however, will not tip his hand at which quarterback he will lead the way for the Gators in that effort.

"We're going to keep playing them the same way," Mullen said when asked if he would make a change at quarterback. "We plan on playing both of the guys like we have."

That would lead fans to expect that Emory Jones would start the game and get the lion's share of the reps against Georgia. The LSU game was really the first truly extended playing time Richardson received that wasn't during garbage time. This statement also isn't new. Mullen was pressed multiple times during the SEC Teleconference during Florida's bye week where he said they planned on playing the same way they had all season.

Florida handles practices differently than a lot of teams. The reps across the board are split very evenly between starters and backup, even at quarterback. It's part of the reason that Kyle Trask was so prepared to take over when Feleipe Franks went down in 2019 and that practice timeshare has continued with Jones and Richardson.

"The quarterbacks, we try to keep them pretty evened out so they're both ready to play," Mullen said Monday. "You're a snap away from those guys getting on the field, so you kind of do that with a lot of positions across the board. You roll them through to get the reps to get them ready to play."

Mullen has also been very resistant to talk about who starts games, regardless of position. He prefers to point at who is ending the game as a more important statistic than who began it.

"I don't get us caught up because I can't tell you. I haven't decided on what play I'm going to run on the first play of the game yet. Hey, we might come out in the wishbone on Saturday," Mullen joked. "All three tailbacks then started no receiver start. So then, all of a sudden, that becomes a weird deal, right? Even if we ran that for one play, that defines then who the starter was. So I don't get caught up in all that stuff -- the starting the game -- as the flow of the game, who plays the most plays. A good question everybody should do is who finishes the game.”

Still, it will be at the forefront of every fans' mind and will be talked about every day until people are blue in the face. Mullen isn't budging.

Could he make a covert decision and start Richardson against the best team Florida will face this season? Perhaps. Is it more likely that Mullen is telling the truth when he has said, now multiple times, that Florida will continue to play its quarterbacks as they have through seven games? That's more likely.