Swamp Bullies

2025 Florida OL preview

Back again, looking ahead to the 2025 college football season. Sorry for the long layoff, just a reminder to always take time to take care of yourself. And your yard. But mostly yourself. Getting back into the swing of things, I wanted to spend some time studying a unit that really impressed me last year. After watching the Clemson OL earlier this summer, I felt compelled to take a deeper dive into the Florida Gators offensive line. The unit as a whole was incredibly impressive when I was evaluating Brandon Crenshaw-Dickson for the 2025 NFL Draft. First off, they are an experienced group even with losing their starting right tackle. The other four starters from last year’s line are returning, as well as a gifted youngster who is also draft eligible. Secondly, they have some real talent with this group. And thirdly, they are one of the most cohesive and detailed groups I’ve studied in my time evaluating players. The staff involved in both bringing this group together and developing have done a great job so far, and I’m optimistic this season could be an incredibly gratifying culmination of their efforts.

So I would like to take some time to first dive into the individual pieces of this unit before I show some of the beauty in the play of this line as a whole. Everyone knows the star of any OL is the LT, and at Florida his name is Austin Barber. So that’s where we’ll begin.

Austin Barber (LT 58)

Barber has been on my radar since 2023, the Gators are a pretty consistent staple in my draft evaluation process. Whether I was evaluating one of Barber’s teammates or the player lined up across from him, there were high level flashes littered throughout his tape.

He stands out among his teammates as the most talented player on the line. His combination of size, play/grip strength, movement ability and awareness are promising with someone who has only been a full time starter for one season. Barber’s best highlights are in the run game.

The play below is one of my personal favorites. Barber sends the edge player crossing his face into the sifting TE, and then kicks out the LB creating a crease for the back to run through. Plays like this show that not only does Barber see and process things very quickly, but is also able to react and change on the fly.

(Overload on right side, end man)

Barber does a great job fitting his assignment with excellent hand placement. However, he mostly relies on a 2-hand punch to set his hands. Along with his high-hipped build, this can lead to a lot of leaning and lunging. This is a perfect example, where he’s able to land his strike perfectly, create extension and drive his feet to create displacement. Then he gets a little out over his toes and gets sent tumbling after getting bumped at the whistle. It’s a good rep and the play is over when he falls, and there are definitely worse reps out there.

The most promising thing to me was that Barber steadily improved his hands and base throughout the season. Particularly in pass protection. Early in the season, I thought Barber really struggled against edge rushers pressing upfield. He was often presenting a soft edge in true pass sets, and getting crushed by cross chops. He started varying his pass sets and becoming more active with his hands. The inconsistency that comes with new techniques and learning was frustrating at first, but it began to pay dividends late in the season.

I hope Florida leans into their drop back pass game more in order to get more reps with Barber in true pass sets. They have the QB to do it, that’s for sure. I think Barber has all the potential to develop into and NFL tackle. I think he has an fairly high floor with his blend of size and technical acumen as well. My hope is that this season, with this team, he’s able to move into the spotlight more and show the nation he’s ready for the big show. If he can continue to improve his consistency, and continue to flash against high level college competition, Austin Barber could be one of the top tackles taken in the 2026 NFL Draft.

Jake Slaughter (C 66)

The pivot man of the Florida OL is Jake Slaughter. A tough, quick-footed and smart man in the middle, Slaughter clearly sets the tone for the whole group. Slaughter was a team captain and made multiple first All-American lists for his play while starting all 13 games for the Gators.

I consider Slaughter to have an incredibly high floor as a starting center. He has excellent movement ability in space. In Florida’s zone heavy scheme, Slaughter really showed his ability to climb and track at the 2nd level. And while he doesn’t consistently show the ability to displace defensive lineman, there is definitely a great understanding of leverage. He’s also a finisher, which is also much appreciated.

In pass protection, Slaughter shows and stout anchor and hardly gives chase to stunts and blitzes. Along with his normal blocking duties, Slaughter was also entrusted to call protections for the offense. Which, based on my notes, usually went as well as you could possibly hope most of the time.

Slaughter’s biggest concern to me is his size, and I will state for the record that it does not show up in his film (often). He’s listed at 294lbs on Florida’s official website and that gives me some pause about his overall ceiling. He’s also a redshirt senior, and like Barber his only full season starting was last year. And one final blemish in my notes, and is true for his LG as well (we’ll discuss further a little later), Slaughter ends up on the ground a lot and it not from normal leaning and lunging. He and his teammates get their feet tangled up a lot, and I hope that gets cleaned up this upcoming season. Overall I think Slaughter, with continued improvement and consistency, could easily be a day 2 selection in next spring’s NFL Draft. Especially any team interested in a rangy, wide zone style center.

Damien George Jr. (RG 70)

Damien George Jr is another RS Senior, and is the first (and only) transfer player we will be discussing with the Gators. George was previously with Alabama, and after transferring has started the previous 2 seasons at Florida. George is easily the most physically imposing member of the Gator OL, listed at 6’6 362. With that size George is also powerful and long, providing a stout presence on the interior.

George’s biggest strength, his size, is also his biggest weakness. That much man provides a huge leverage disadvantage with smaller DTs, as well as limiting his foot speed and quickness in short areas. He was a 4-star OT recruit coming out of high school, but I think the Florida staff did the right thing by him and moved him inside. If he can clean up some of his pad level issues, I think George is another high floor player that can provide some pop in the run game as well. The play below is easily my favorite individual effort from anyone during this film study. I mean how could it not be, it’s a double-pancake home-run block.

Knijeah Harris (LG 77)

Harris, a true junior, rounds out the interior players slotted to start for the Gators this fall. He started every game for the Gators last season, and hopes to build off a really good start to his career. While he’s nowhere near the same stature as George, Harris is just as stout and blessed with the natural leverage to control defenders at the point of attack. His tape is boring frankly, just a lot of 1v1s where he’s able to latch and shut down rushers early in the rep.

I do think Harris has the advantage of having 2 NFL caliber players on both sides of him. I also don’t think Harris is the level of athlete the other 4 players on the line are. He often misses his 2nd level targets from loose angles as well. Harris does do well on double teams, inside zone concepts and pulling, as long as he’s staying tight to the line.

Harris is still a very young player, so I’m not ready to cap his athletic ceiling just yet. He shows he has NFL play strength, and even if his athleticism is capped I think he could thrive in a downhill run scheme or a pass heavy attack. He needs to improve his overall run game, and that’s where I hope to see the most development from him this upcoming season.

Bryce Lovett (RT 53)

Finally, I’m excited to talk about Bryce Lovett. A RS Sophomore, Lovett is the least experience of the group and currently slotted to take over for Brendan Crenshaw-Dickson at right tackle. Lovett rotated in at RG and LT last season, and had some really athletic flashes. He’s got quick feet and a good anchor in pass protection, and showed some explosiveness in the run game.

(RG)

I think there’s reason to be optimistic about Lovett, a lot of it comes from his raw athletic tools. If he can show the same level of improvement and consistency as the rest of this group was able to show last year, I think we’re talking about the second most gifted player on the line behind Barber. He’s obviously got the most to prove.

(LT)

The Unit

So now that you have an idea of the pieces, let’s look at how they fit together. I’ve mentioned (probably a couple of times) that Florida is zone-heavy with their run scheme. Their preferred fastball is inside zone from the gun and pistol. They love bringing motion and condensing the formation, allowing their lineman to get to work.

Both the Kentucky and Ole Miss games were just excellent games to watch the Gators run the ball. When these 5 guys get moving downhill and have the offense and rhythm, this offense was an absolute delight to watch. I think if they are able to get early leads next year, it will be incredibly hard to stop this offense from just eating up the game clock.

I think they’l be able to take early leads because of the protection they can provide for their star QB, DJ Lagway. Lagway, in my opinion, is a playmaker. When he was healthy in the back half of the season and starting for Graham Mertz, he was really incredible down the stretch. He is not scared to stare down the barrel of pressure and throw rockets down the field. The really cool thing is, he won’t have to worry about pressure too often.

The Gators don’t even have to take some huge developmental step on the OL for the offense to become better. They’ve set a very solid floor. But if the young skill players around them can elevate to the level of the OL, we’re talking about a very dangerous offense, not just in the SEC but potentially in the country. And I still think there’s HUGE potential for growth from the offensive line! I think this unit could be similar to last year’s LSU squad, that had all 4 draft eligible starters taken in the NFL Draft. The Gators will be a dangerous team, and it’s because they’ve built the OL to be a powerhouse.

Again, sorry for the long stretch between articles. Life is hard. But moving into July I’ll be ramping up the content, I promise. I have a slew of defensive players to get to. I don’t think I’ll be evaluating full units again either. That was a lot of note taking and jumping around for clips. Too much time for me, so I’ll do shorter articles focusing on single players or teammates (hint for next article, more Florida Gators). So thanks again if you’ve read this far, it’s much appreciated!

Jared