GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The Florida Gators are turning to Steve Spurrier to help fix the team’s floundering offense.

Steve Spurrier Jr., anyway.

Interim coach Billy Gonzales said Wednesday the younger Spurrier, who was hired as an offensive analyst earlier this year, will be more involved with quarterback DJ Lagway when the Gators (3-4, 2-2 SEC) play No. 5 Georgia (6-1, 4-1) in Jacksonville on Nov. 1.

Gonzales will have tight ends coach/offensive coordinator Russ Callaway organize the offense alongside quarterbacks coach Ryan O’Hara in the booth. O’Hara will be on the headset calling plays to Lagway.

Spurrier, meanwhile, will be on the sideline working directly with the sophomore quarterback.

“What we’re trying to do right now is tweak a couple things so we can put our players in a better situation to go out and make plays and perform at a higher level,” said Gonzales, named the interim after Billy Napier was fired Sunday. “We all understand that’s what we need to do. So that’s the No. 1 goal for us as a coaching staff right now.”

Napier was dismissed, in large part, because he failed to get Florida’s offense on track in his four seasons. The Gators totaled a combined 50 points in losses to South Florida, LSU, Miami and Texas A&M this fall, and they rank 15th in the league in scoring.

Facing the Bulldogs without Napier could show how much of a hindrance he was to an offense that believes it has enough talent to compete in the SEC. Gonzales has made it clear he wants to open things up more and get the ball down the field to receivers.

Spurrier is a part of the plan. The 54-year-old son of a Hall of Fame player and coach who is a living legend in Gainesville, Spurrier spent the past two years at Tulsa. He also worked at Mississippi State (2020-22), Washington State (2018-19), Western Kentucky (2017) and Oklahoma (2016). Before that, he spent a decade working under his famous father at South Carolina (2005-15).

“Whenever you’re around one of the greatest offensive minds in history, it’s obviously going to rub off on you as well,” Gonzales said. “He’s been involved, but now he’s going to have more of a role because he’s going to be down there on the field with the quarterback looking in his eyes and getting a chance to talk to him and review the film that’s being relayed.

“It’s going to put us in a great situation to help DJ and the quarterbacks perform on the football field.”

Lagway has thrown for 1,513 yards, with nine touchdowns and nine interceptions, this season while playing behind a shaky offensive line. He has looked better of late as he moves closer to fully recovering from a derailed offseason that included core-muscle surgery, nagging shoulder pain and a strained calf muscle.

“It’s been a long journey, and I’m thankful for the good and the bad,” Lagway said. “God doesn’t make any mistakes. I’m just excited to see where my journey continues and how I can continue to get better.”

Florida State coach Mike Norvell vowed Wednesday that he and his team “are going to get it right,” as questions swirled about his long-term future following a 3-4 start to the season.

In his first comments since athletic director Michael Alford issued a statement Monday that said there would be a full program evaluation when the season ends, Norvell said he knows the results have not been good enough.

The low point came last week in a 20-13 loss to Stanford, the ninth straight ACC loss for Florida State. After opening the season with a win over Alabama, the Seminoles are now in danger of their season snowballing for a second straight year. Florida State went 2-10 in 2024, a year after winning the ACC championship.

“I know and understand the expectations. There’s no higher expectation than what I have,” Norvell said. “I know it’s not been good enough.”

Florida State is on an open date this week, trying to correct the mistakes that have plagued them in four straight losses — all by one possession. Norvell said different issues have cropped up in each game that have cost them — from penalties, to blown assignments on defense, to turnovers, to an inability to sustain drives and score.

“The team, the staff we’re working extremely hard to get it right. We are going to get it right,” Norvell said.

He added that the statement Alford issued did not come as a surprise, because he is in constant contact with him, university president Richard McCullough and other decision makers on campus.

“I know we have to win games,” Norvell said. “I take great ownership in our results. It’s not been good enough. I hate it for Michael. I hate it for our players. I hate it for the program. I hate it for everybody. That’s on me and this staff and this football team to get that right.

“We’re going to get it fixed, and we’re going to get better.”

Norvell revamped his roster and coaching staff after what he called a disastrous 2024 season, hiring Gus Malzahn as his offensive coordinator and Tony White as his defensive coordinator and going into the transfer portal to add starters across the board. But the recent results harken back to the problems Florida State had a year ago, only adding to the frustration among Seminoles supporters.

Asked how his team could go from dominating Alabama in a 31-17 victory in the opener to losing on the road to Stanford, Norvell said, “It’s college football. There’s great parity. Every team, if you give (them) opportunities, they’re all capable. It’s a weekly focus. Is your best going to show up? If you’re not able to execute to your best, if you’re not able to respond, if you have a bad play or a bad moment, anybody can give you challenges. I believe in this team. I believe in the talent that we have, the way that we will finish. I know what we’re capable of.”

Norvell was also asked whether finishing the season strong will be enough for him to return for a seventh season at Florida State.

“I have a lot of confidence in the long term of what this will be. Until somebody tells me different, I have the absolute belief in the long term,” Norvell said.

Tennessee coach Tony Vitello is finalizing a deal to become the next manager of the San Francisco Giants, sources tell ESPN, marking the first time a big league team has plucked a manager directly from a college program without any experience as a professional coach, sources told ESPN.

Following days of negotiations in which Vitello considered staying at Tennessee, where he won the Men’s College World Series in 2024, a deal is on the verge of being finalized between the two sides. He will replace Bob Melvin, who was fired Sept. 29 following an 81-81 season, the Giants’ fourth consecutive year without a playoff berth.

Vitello, 47, was regarded as one of the best coaches in college baseball, a high-energy recruiting wizard who built talent-laden teams and turned around a program that had toiled in mediocrity for decades. He emerged as the Giants’ main target after former San Francisco catcher Nick Hundley withdrew from consideration.

By making Vitello his first managerial hire, San Francisco president of baseball operations Buster Posey is banking on the success at Tennessee translating to the major leagues. Chosen over former Baltimore Orioles manager Brandon Hyde and two other former big league catchers interviewed by the Giants — Kurt Suzuki and Vance Wilson — Vitello distinguished himself as one of the preeminent coaches in the country during a two-decade career as an assistant and head coach in college, enough so that the Giants were willing to pay the $3 million buyout on his contract, sources said.

The closest facsimile to Vitello would be Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy, who spent 25 years coaching in college before joining the San Diego Padres as a minor league manager. Murphy then spent eight years as Brewers bench coach before taking over as manager in 2024, when he won National League Manager of the Year.

Vitello’s move to the major leagues will come at a far more rapid pace. Outside of a first-place NL West finish in 2021, the Giants have finished third or worse in the division every year since 2017. Beyond the dominance of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Giants are seen by evaluators as a less-talented team than San Diego and Arizona as well. San Francisco’s core of first baseman Rafael Devers, shortstop Willy Adames and third baseman Matt Chapman is solid — and could be strengthened this winter via free agent spending, according to sources.

Following more than 10 years as an assistant coach at Missouri, TCU and Arkansas, Vitello took over a moribund Tennessee program before the 2018 season and posted a 341-131 record, advancing to the Men’s College World Series in 2021, 2023 and 2024. With a pair of eventual first-round draft picks and four second-rounders, Tennessee beat Texas A&M to win the school’s first baseball national championship last year.

Vitello, whose boisterous personality endeared him at Tennessee and chafed other SEC schools, would enter an entirely different realm in MLB. Whereas college jobs are often defined by the success of recruiting classes, major league teams are constructed by baseball-operations departments with the manager relied upon for clubhouse cohesion, in-game decision-making, bullpen usage and daily media interactions.

The reticence of MLB teams to dip into the college ranks for managers is long established and has run counter to the hiring practices of other professional sports leagues. NFL teams have regularly plucked head coaches from the college ranks, and in the NBA, there is no stigma associated with college coaches. Major league organizations have been more open to hiring coaches from college than managers. Pitching coach Wes Johnson left Arkansas to take the same role with the Minnesota Twins in 2019; he left the Twins three years later to accept the pitching coach job at LSU before joining Georgia as its head coach prior to the 2024 season.

Vitello’s philosophies on the game and personality, sources said, intrigued Posey and aligned with what the future Hall of Famer hopes to build in San Francisco. In an interview with ESPN in June, Vitello said his reputation as a rabble-rouser did not bother him and that he had no plans to change his approach to coaching, which called for pushing boundaries.

“I think you don’t know where the line is until you cross it. And then you make an adjustment,” Vitello said. “I don’t want our guys, if they give them a coloring book, I don’t want them just coloring inside the lines. You know, come up with something different.”