There are seven FBS college football teams in Florida, and Green, Gold and Bold set out on a mission to rate the fan bases of each program.
We’re not going to rate the best, because each school has devoted followers who will tune in no matter the opponent or their team’s record.
Conversely, we won't rate which program has the worst fans. You know what I’m talking about. They are the fans who want to fire the coach if their team punts on its first possession of the season.
Every school has its share of those.
No, we are looking to rate which school has the most “entitled” fans. You can tell by their delusions of grandeur about their supposed superiority, amazed that hardly anyone else views them the way they see themselves.
With that in mind …
- UCF: Entitlement rating: 100 percent.
This one dates to 2017 (yeah, we’re still dredging that up) when the Knights went 13-0 and beat Auburn in the Peach Bowl.
They were not invited to the College Football Playoff because it wasn’t due to disrespect. They weren’t good enough. But that didn’t stop Athletic Director Danny White from declaring UCF the national champion, throwing a parade, and providing championship rings to the players.
Now, this just in, head coaches don’t leave national championship programs a few days after the season ends. However, Scott Frost struck while the iron was hot and jetted off to Nebraska about as quickly as he could.
That didn’t work out so well, but I digress.
Two years later, White left town for Tennessee.
Two years after that, UCF jumped to the Big 12. The Knights have back-to-back losing seasons and are 10-15 in conference play.
They are picked to finish last this season in the Big 12.
That’s not disrespect. It’s reality.
2. Miami: Entitlement rating: 90 percent.
Miami suffers from long-range delusion that dates back to the 1980s and ‘90s, when the ‘Canes won four national championships in nine seasons.
Hurricanes’ fans seem to be stuck in that time warp and believe that every year will be A RETURN TO GLORY!
This just in, folks: Since joining the ACC in 2004, amid hoopla that they should have standing reservations at the conference championship game, guess how many titles the Hurricanes have won?
Zero.
They have just 12 plus-.500 ACC records. In one memorable stretch from 2009-16, Miami was either 5-3 or 3-5 every year in conference play.
Last year, they were 9-0 and seemed a lock for the 12-team playoffs before losing three of their last four.
Entitlement denied.
Miami fans should be used to that by now.
3. Florida State. Entitlement rating: 88 percent.
The Seminoles slid into this spot for their whining over the decision by the College Football Playoff committee to overlook their unbeaten season in 2023 after quarterback Jordan Travis suffered a gruesome leg injury against North Alabama. The committee sized up several close calls the Seminoles had that season against lesser opposition, and correctly decided they shouldn’t get an invite.
Snubbed, about half the team left before the bowl game, a grizzly 66-3 loss to Georgia that infuriated fans even more.
FSU followed up on that fiasco with a 2-10 season -- one win was over Charleston Southern – which had more than a few people in Noles Nation turning on head coach Mike Norvell a year after nominating him for sainthood.
4. Florida. Entitlement rating: 70 percent.
There was a time when Gator Nation would have topped this list, but Florida has had to swallow some humble pie over the last few years, and that has a way of putting things into perspective.
They’ve had to watch while Georgia reasserted itself as the power in Florida’s division. The Bulldogs have won seven of the last eight games against the Gators.
They’ve even lost three of their last four against Kentucky, so nothing is a lock anymore.
Hopes are running higher this year because of quarterback DJ Lagway, and the Gators did close with five straight wins last season. But I don’t detect the same swagger Florida had under Steve Spurrier and even Urban Meyer.
5. USF. Entitlement rating: 40 percent.
There was a time when Bulls Nation could have been higher on this list, certainly ahead of UCF.
I mean, after all, more than a few fans are still reliving the glory days in 2007 when USF beat 17th-ranked Auburn on the road and 5th-ranked West Virginia at home – all within three weeks.
But they lost four of their next seven games. Later, the stretch of bad mojo wrought by Charlie Strong and Jeff Scott had fans – what were left of them, anyway – hiding under the covers.
Consecutive 7-6 seasons punctuated by bowl wins have rekindled hope, but not entitlement.
That could change if they can navigate the opening stretch this season against Boise State, Florida, and Miami. But we’ll get back to you on that one.
6. Florida Atlantic. Entitlement rating: 15 percent.
Owls fans surely know by now that their team wasn’t ready for what it faced when joining the American Athletic Conference two years ago after years in the Sun Belt.
Heaven knows FAU has swung for the fences. It hired Lane Kiffin, Willie Taggart, and Tom Herman as head coaches. But Kiffin left for Mississippi after an 11-3 season in 2019, and both Taggart and Herman were shown the door.
They’re starting over with Zach Kittley, who may be a good hire. But if he is, he’ll be gone soon enough.
That’s life in the lower regions of the Group of Five.
7. Florida International. Entitlement rating: minus-10 percent.
FIU might be the most anonymous football team in Florida. The Golden Panthers haven’t had a winning season since 2018.
They’ve been a combined 18-47 since then and are starting over again with new head coach Willie Simmons.
Even Mario Cristobal, now Miami’s head coach, was fired from FIU after just one winning season in the six years he was on the job.
Many teams have a marketing slogan or catch phrase. For these guys, that would be: “FIU, One Of America’s Football Teams.”