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NCAAF 2025 College Football Season Judging by the number of phone calls his family received, DJ Lagway could have transferred to any of the high school football powers in talent-rich Houston instead of sticking with Willis, an also-ran that hadn’t won a district title in more than two decades. Lagway never considered it. He wanted the hard road. Advertisement “Listen, ” said his mom, Niki, “my son loves an underdog story. ” Like transforming Willis from a 2-8 team his freshman year into district champions as a senior. Or the even bigger one now facing him and the Florida Gators. Last week’s 18-16 home loss to USF reheated the seat of head coach Billy Napier two games into his fourth season and renewed questions about the direction of a program 17 years removed from its last SEC championship. To make matters worse, the Gators’ schedule is one of the toughest in the nation; Saturday night’s trip to No. 3 LSU is one of eight remaining games against teams ranked in the top 20 of the latest AP poll. It’s unclear how or if the Gators can recover quickly enough to salvage their preseason College Football Playoff hopes and avoid another spin on the coaching carousel. But any path to success rests on the broad shoulders of the 6-foot-3, 247-pound quarterback charged with finding a way to save Napier and Florida football. Again. Lagway started to rescue Napier and the Gators before he even arrived on campus. Napier was finishing a 6-7 first season when Lagway committed as a junior in December 2022. A few weeks later, Florida lost 2023 quarterback signee Jaden Rashada over an eight-figure name, image and likeness dispute that launched an NCAA inquiry and remains the subject of a federal lawsuit. Lagway, a Class of 2024 prospect, did not waver. With little on-field proof of concept to tout, Napier and the Gators could sell only five-star hope to an uneasy fan base. Lagway became the crown jewel of a recruiting class that spent much of that cycle ranked third nationally in the 247Sports Composite. Lagway’s high school coach, Trent Miller, saw the hype firsthand during a 2023 recruiting visit to The Swamp. “We’re walking from the facility to the stadium, and you’ve got all these kids wanting autographs and taking pictures, kids wearing Lagway jerseys inside the stadium, ” said Miller, Willis’ coach and athletic director. “This kid’s still in high school. What are we doing? ” Advertisement Lagway and the future became even more important as the Gators lost their final five games in 2023 to make Napier the first Florida coach since Raymond B. Wolf (1946-47) to start with back-to-back losing seasons. The mounting defeats helped spur eight blue-chip decommitments in the month and a half before the early signing period. Napier’s Gators lost more high school recruits from 247Sports’ Composite top 500 players in that stretch than Ole Miss and Arkansas signed (seven apiece). The defections nullified Napier’s biggest selling point and intensified concerns about his ability to return Florida to national prominence. Lagway, again, did not waver. Of his class’s top 20 quarterbacks, only eight others have never decommitted or entered the transfer portal. “Not one time did he even think about doing anything different, to be honest with you, ” said his father, Derek. The struggles of Napier and the Gators were never reasons for Lagway to reconsider his decision. They reinforced it. They made the underdog possibility even greater for Gatorade’s national high school player of the year. “I don’t think he ever tried to step into any shoes of being anybody’s savior, ” his private quarterback coach, J. P. Tillman, said. “But I think he believes that he can be a program-changer. ” Lagway quickly became one last season. Napier’s job was in peril after he started 1-2 with ugly home defeats against Miami and Texas A&M and lost starting quarterback Graham Mertz to a season-ending knee injury at Tennessee. But Napier had Lagway. His freshman phenom threw a touchdown in the final minute to force overtime in a respectable loss to the Playoff-bound Volunteers. Lagway keyed a 48-20 rout of Kentucky and had Florida leading Georgia in the second quarter before getting sidelined with a hamstring injury. When athletic director Scott Stricklin announced that Napier’s job was safe — despite Florida’s 4-3 record — he cited the “foundation that promises greater success next season and beyond. ” Advertisement That foundation was built directly and indirectly on Lagway. In Napier’s first 26 games at Florida, the Gators completed only 15 passes of 40-plus yards. Lagway had five in his first start. The star of Lagway’s second start was Jadan Baugh, who rushed for five touchdowns against Kentucky during a freshman all-SEC season. One reason he flipped late from Arkansas? The chance to play with Lagway. The Gators added Playoff-spoiling upsets over LSU and Ole Miss in November to end the season as one of the nation’s hottest teams. Lagway ended with the highest passing efficiency (154. 9) of any true freshman. It was enough for Florida to land in preseason CFP projections and Lagway to become a trendy Heisman candidate. The buzz peaked at the spring game. Although Lagway only handed off the ball as he nursed a shoulder injury, his postgame autograph line stretched from end zone to end zone. His agent, Justin Giangrande, was not surprised. Giangrande is a Florida alumnus who remembers tearing up at big games during the Tim Tebow era, so he has a deeply personal (not just professional) understanding of what a star quarterback means for a program that produced three Heisman winners (Tebow, Steve Spurrier and Danny Wuerffel). “I think the Gator fan base, he’s given us hope, even in dark times, even last year when it was losing games, ” Giangrande said. “Yeah, we’ve still got DJ Lagway, you know? We’ve got a shot. ” The Gators still have Lagway, but he has not yet re-created his freshman magic. He was among the nation’s leaders in explosive passes last season; through two games, he’s in the middle of the pack nationally. His passing efficiency (152. 8) is down 2 points. He overthrew multiple receivers against the Bulls, perhaps a side effect of being sidelined for most of the offseason because of shoulder and leg injuries. The lowest point came in the closing minutes, as Florida had the ball with a chance to seal the win. Lagway’s first-down incomplete pass stopped the clock, preserving precious seconds USF used to drive for the winning field goal. Advertisement “I feel I threw a pass when I shouldn’t have, ” Lagway told reporters. If Napier agreed, he wouldn’t say so publicly. He defended his quarterback, instead focusing on the correct reads Lagway made and highlighting his “exponential improvement” since being fully cleared to practice. “He’s got the keys to the car every week, ” Napier said. The car is approaching another crossroads for the program and the embattled coach who leads it. The roster built by Napier, who is 20-20 in Gainesville, is still talented enough to compete for a Playoff appearance. He and the locker room shrugged off last year’s rough start for an eight-win redemption that saved Napier’s job; maybe they can do so this season, too. Then again, with No. 5 Miami and No. 7 Texas looming after LSU, it’s also easy to envision the season careening into the Gators’ fourth coaching search in 11 years and more calls to the Lagway family about DJ’s future in an era with few transfer restrictions. That sounds like the makings of another underdog story for a quarterback who craves them. “He’s all for the rebuild, the competition, whatever it takes to try to put the team on top, ” his dad said. “He’s not gonna run from any of that. ” (Top photo: James Gilbert / Getty Images) Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle Matt Baker is a senior writer for The Athletic covering college sports. He previously spent nine years as the Tampa Bay Times’ Florida college football reporter and also covered college athletics at the Tulsa World and Springfield (Mo. ) News-Leader. Matt’s an Indiana native and graduate of Northwestern University.