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Moody Ready To Contribute

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 7, 2008

GAINESVILLE - Emmanuel Moody has had a less-than-ideal start to his career as a Gator. After sitting out a year following his transfer from USC, Moody received just two carries in his first two games.

When he finally appeared to be getting into a rhythm this season, he suffered a sprained ankle against Mississippi, which was closely followed by the emergence of RBs Jeff Demps and Chris Rainey as big-play threats.

Moody appears to be ready to salvage his season, though. The redshirt sophomore rushed for 72 yards on seven carries in the fourth quarter of Florida's 49-10 rout of Georgia last week and has been impressive in practice.

"He's practiced really well," Coach Urban Meyer said. "He's running hard.

"We don't have a set number of touches or plays but ... we take into account if a guy has a hot hand."

The Gators are finally at full strength in the backfield as Rainey, Moody and Kesthan Moore have battled injuries this season.

"It feels good to have four healthy guys," Meyer said. "It's been a while now since we had that."

TWO-MINUTE OFFENSE: With the Gators' smallest margin of victory this season being a 23-point victory against Miami, they haven't had an opportunity to get into two-minute drill situations much.

Meyer doesn't expect Florida to blow away teams the rest of the season, and the two-minute offense has been an important part of practice.

"We work our tails off on it," Meyer said. "That's a big thing. Sunday night we come in and work on it and during the week we'll work on it Thursday a little bit. That's a concern and I wish we had more opportunities."

Karl Hyppolite

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