Expectations were high for DJ Lagway to improve on his stellar 2024. He entered this season with top-10 Heisman Trophy odds at the center of a Florida team with playoff aspirations.
Now, nine games into 2025, the sophomore quarterback was benched. He leads the nation with 12 interceptions thrown, three of which came in the first half of Florida’s 38-7 defeat to Kentucky Saturday.
Those turnovers were enough for interim head coach Billy Gonzales to replace Lagway with true freshman Tramell Jones Jr. for the final 30 minutes of the blowout loss.
“That was my decision,” Gonzales said. “I think we had a rough first half, and I thought it might be good for him just to gather and look at it from a coach's point from the sideline.”
While Saturday was among Lagway’s worst performances, it was just the tip of the iceberg on his poor play this season.
Among the 107 quarterbacks who have thrown at least half of their team’s passes, Lagway ranks 98th with a 58.8 Pro Football Focus passing grade. His 5.7% turnover-worthy throw rate ranks fourth worst among those 107 quarterbacks.
In 2024, Lagway showcased his ability to stretch the field among the top quarterbacks in the nation. On passes of 20-plus yards, he completed 19 of 36 attempts for 733 yards, five touchdowns and two interceptions. That earned him not only a 95.6 PFF grade on deep passes, but a marginal 2.6% turnover-worthy throw rate.
This season, however, Lagway has struggled immensely when looking downfield. He has completed only 11 of his 34 deep attempts for 406 yards, two touchdowns and six interceptions. His downfield PFF grade is 60.1, his lowest of any depth downfield this season, and 13.2% of his throws 20 or more yards downfield are deemed turnover-worthy, per PFF.
Lagway’s deep ball proficiency in 2024 was evident in between the numbers, where he completed 10 of 16 throws for 380 yards, two touchdowns and no interceptions. In the same area in 2025, Lagway is four of 14 for 160 yards, no touchdowns and five interceptions.
The sophomore’s struggles Saturday came despite a clean pocket for a majority of the first half. He was only pressured twice throughout the loss. For comparison, he was pressured a whopping 20 times when he threw five interceptions against Louisiana State on Sept. 13.
Meanwhile, Jones was pressured a staggering seven times on just 20 dropbacks Saturday, and the true freshman was sacked once. While Jones did not fill the stat sheet in his relief appearance, he also didn’t turn the ball over.
“He came in and he did what he was supposed to do,” Gonzales said. “You start moving the ball and you get a penalty and you get behind third and long again, you’re not going to be successful that way, so again, we’ve got to be better.”
Oddly, Lagway’s underlying numbers are better when he’s under pressure than when he has a clean pocket. He has been blitzed on 38% of his throws in 2025, but he’s completed 71 of those 103 passes for 742 yards, four touchdowns and two interceptions.
Without pressure, Lagway has been less efficient both in terms of completion percentage and in ball security. He has 100 completions on 162 attempts for 1,269 yards, seven touchdowns and 10 interceptions when not blitzed. His turnover-worthy play percentage on non-pressured throws is 6.1%, compared to 5.1% on pressured throws.
Heading into next week’s matchup against No. 6 Ole Miss (9-1, 5-1 SEC), Gonzales was non-committal on who would be the starting quarterback going forward.
“We’ll take a look at the film,” Gonzales said. “Obviously we think [DJ’s] a very talented young man, but we’ll take a look at everything and move forward once we get back home.”
Contact Max Bernstein at mbernstein@alligator.org. Follow him on X @maxbernstein23.
Max is in his sixth semester at The Alligator and now serves as The Alligator's Football Reporter and is a junior sports journalism student. He previously served as The Alligator's Sports Editor, and served as reporter for women's tennis, volleyball and lacrosse. He also has made multiple appearances on the Paul Finebaum Show. He wants to shoutout his cats, Scooter and Zoe, and also loves niche professional athletes (shoutout Tomas Fleischmann).
