The Florida football program will be honoring National Championship-winning coach Urban Meyer when the Tennessee Volunteers roll into town for a regular season game on Nov. 22, the team announced on Wednesday.
Florida will honor Meyer for his induction into the National Football Foundation College Football Hall of Fame.
Florida honoring Urban Meyer when it hosts Tennessee this season. https://t.co/yuC3zxUgWx
— Ryan Schumpert (@rschump00) August 20, 2025
Tennessee and Florida are 2-2 in Josh Heupel’s four seasons at the helm on Rocky Top. Florida has won both meetings in Gainesville, 2021 and 2023, while Tennessee has won both Knoxville contests in 2022 and 2024. Last year’s victory over the Gators came on an overtime rushing touchdown from future-SEC Offensive Player of the Year Dylan Sampson with the lights shining down on Neyland Stadium.
Meyer, though, was 6-0 in his time at Florida against Tennessee. The Vols had won the two previous meetings in 2003 and 2004, but the Gators rattled off six straight wins under Meyer against the Volunteers from 2005 to 2010. Tennessee will look to spoil Meyer’s homecoming with its first win in Gainesville since that 2003 season in the penultimate game of the regular season later this fall.
Barring the 2020 COVID season, the Tennessee and Florida series has traditionally been one that’s been played in the earlier part of the SEC slate. Not this one, though. The Volunteers and Gators will meet in Gainesville in the second-to-last game of the season as a change from the norm this year. You have to go all the way back to the 2001 season to find the last time the rivals squared off later than Oct. 4, and that one only happened in December because of the tragic 9/11 events that occurred on the Tuesday before the originally scheduled September game.
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Florida’s schedule, which ranks as the second-hardest schedule in the country according to USA Today, is a gauntlet. The Gators will host the Vols at the end of a month that includes games against Georgia (Nov. 1), at Kentucky (Nov. 8), and at Ole Miss (Nov. 15).
Tennessee, meanwhile, has an easier stretch leading into that rivalry contest. The Vols host Oklahoma on Nov. 1, have an open date on Nov. 8, and host New Mexico State on Nov. 15. There’s an argument to be made about which team’s preceding slate will have them more ready for that crucial SEC contest, but Tennessee will likely be the less banged-up team with an off week and a non-conference NM State game leading into it.
There aren’t any odds out for Tennessee’s game against Florida yet, but here’s a look at some of the lines around the Vols’ season as a whole:
Stay tuned to Rocky Top Insider for complete coverage of the 2025 Tennessee football season as it kicks off against Syracuse on Aug. 30 in Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
