If Saturday night's SEC Championship was Kadarius Toney's final game in a Gator uniform, he certainly made the most of it.
The senior wide receiver hauled in eight catches for 153 yards against the top team in the country, highlighted by a 51-yard house call on a rainbow pass from Kyle Trask that tied the game at seven early in the first quarter.
Six of his eight grabs came in the first half as he continued to convert big-time catches in key situations during all three of Florida's scoring possessions before halftime.
"It was very exciting just to be here because I can't name the last time I even came here," Toney said. "This is my first year actually having this experience, embarking on this journey with these guys.
“It's kind of exciting. It just didn't come out the way we wanted it to. You can look at it that way, but as far as getting to it, doing different things, it was pretty neat."
While the past two weeks haven't exactly gone as planned on the field, the fight and effort shown by Florida against Alabama is a testament to how much this team cares, especially on the offensive side of the ball.
"I think it should set the tone for the next few years to come because these guys are going to know the standard, know what it takes to get there," Toney said of the toe-to-toe performance with Bama. "It should just drive them to go harder."
Toney hasn't announced whether he'll play in the Cotton Bowl against Oklahoma on Dec. 30, but if he chooses to sit out and prepare for the 2021 NFL Draft, the belief he's done more than enough to bolster his draft stock after his play during the 2020 season.
The 6-foot, 193-pound Mobile, Alabama native exploded in the passing game and brought an element to his game nobody knew existed after three seasons with the Gators.
From the beginning of the year, Toney solidified himself as the No. 2 guy for Trask behind tight end Kyle Pitts. He's had at least six catches in six of his last seven games and found the endzone four times during that span.
Through 11 games, Toney is first on the team in catches (70), first on the team in receiving yards (984), and second on the team behind Pitts with 10 touchdowns.
His growth as a wide receiver was the type of transformation from one season to another that you don't see very often. But Toney put the work in, and now a guy who was a big question mark heading into the season when it came to being drafted to the NFL at all, has a legitimate shot of hearing his name called within the first three rounds in late April.
"I feel like I made a lot of strides through learning and practicing from coach Billy Gonzales," Toney said. "Just running different routes, different patterns, different ways to get open. I feel like I got more into that and took off I guess."
