Florida Gators Father's Day gifts: Celebrate with our collector's book, page prints, gear
Looking for the perfect Father's Day gift for the Florida Gators fan in your life?
To be crowned 2025 national champions, Florida basketball had to traverse a gauntlet unlike any team in recent years. En route to a 36-4 record and cutting down the nets at the Alamodome, the Gators twice knocked off the country's top-ranked team (Tennessee in January, Auburn in February), captured the SEC tournament (first time since 2014), toppled the NCAA tournament's overall No. 1 seed (Auburn again) and basked in their latest shining moment (while quashing Houston's dreams).
And you can relive the glory of the Gators' third national championship and first in nearly two decades through a book and page prints from The Gainesville Sun and USA TODAY.
Gator Nation never will forget the iconic moments: Crushing Tennessee's spirit with a 30-point victory and later in the title game of the SEC tournament, the impossible Elite Eight comeback against Texas Tech, an epic final half to eliminate Auburn in the national semifinals, and the brilliance of Walter Clayton Jr., the first Gator to be a consensus first-team All-American (plus be compared to Steph Curry).
Check out the lineup from The Sun and USA TODAY. You will want to own a piece of Gators hoops history.
Buy our Florida championship book
'CHOMP-IONS! The Florida Gators' Rise to the Top of College Basketball' takes you courtside for every electrifying moment of a championship run that rallied fans nationwide. This 208-page, archival-quality coffee-table book from The Gainesville Sun, the Gators' hometown newspaper, and USA TODAY captures the blood, sweat and cheers behind Florida's first national championship since the back-to-back titles in 2006-07.
Packed with dynamic photos and compelling stories, 'CHOMP-IONS!' commemorates the unbreakable spirit that propelled Florida to the pinnacle of college basketball once again. This keepsake retails for $44.95, plus shipping and handling, but you can receive a 25% discount by ordering right now. We'll do the math: That's $33.71. Find the book at Florida.ChampsBook.com.
Some fans will never take the coffee-table book out of its shrink-wrapping so that it can be passed down to future generations, all brought up the right way to know that It Just Means More.
Order Florida Gators championship book
Buy Florida commemorative page prints
Now that your coffee table and bookcase have been properly adorned, don't forget about your walls. The Gainesville Sun and USA TODAY have three full-page prints that you will want to display proudly.
"NATIONAL CHOMP-IONS" celebrates Florida's 65-63 thrilling victory over Houston in the national championship game. The page print captures the postgame craziness at San Antonio in all its glory and joy as the team sports its championship shirts and shows off its hard-earned trophy. There are two slightly different versions of "NATIONAL CHOMP-IONS" — one by USA TODAY and one by The Gainesville Sun, the hometown paper of the Gators.
Buy USA TODAY'S NATIONAL CHOMP-IONS page print
Buy Gainesville Sun's NATIONAL CHOMP-IONS page print
'GATOR CHOMPS!' celebrates Florida's 86-77 victory over Tennessee in the championship game of the SEC tournament. The page print from THE SUN captures the postgame scene at Nashville as coach Todd Golden hoists the hardware and confetti rains down on his team.
The page prints are produced on high-quality, acid-free art paper and start at $15.25, plus shipping. Upgrade options include framed copies and background choices of canvas, acrylic, metal or wood through the USA TODAY Store.
Buy GATOR CHOMPS! commemorative page print
Get Florida championship gear
Looking for Florida national championship hats, T-shirts and more?
Fanatics is among the options for championship gear.
Buy Florida Gators championship items
Read our Florida Gators coverage
The Gainesville Sun provides the world's best coverage of the Florida Gators. Follow the Gators at gainesville.com. Order a print subscription at 800-443-9493.
Thank you for supporting local journalism.
Order digital and print subscriptions for The Sun
Go to The Sun right now!
(This story was updated to add another page print and a new photo gallery from the national championship game.)
Contact Gene Myers at gmyers@gannett.com. Follow him on X @GeneMyers. After nearly a quarter-century as sports editor at the Detroit Free Press, Myers unretired to coordinate book and poster projects across the USA TODAY Network. His reading recommendation for this month: 'Flying High,' a hardcover book on the Eagles' Super Bowl championship from Delaware Online/The News Journal. Details at Fly.ChampsBook.com. Check out more books and page prints from the USA TODAY Network.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Times
7 minutes ago
- New York Times
Can Florida State football climb back from historic collapse? What's next after rock bottom
The first move Florida State made after its worst season in 50 years was to stop the humiliation. The Seminoles' 2-10 campaign had mercifully ended moments earlier with a 31-11 loss to Florida. When the Gators planted their flag triumphantly in the Tallahassee turf, FSU head coach Mike Norvell personally took the archrivals' emblem and threw it to the ground. Advertisement Critics cracked that the postgame uproar was the most fight the Seminoles had shown all year. But, eight months later, it also looks like a fitting preview of Norvell's rebuilding plan after one of the most incomprehensible collapses in college football history: Florida State saw a problem and addressed it with the fire and desperation Norvell stresses daily, then vowed the disgrace would never happen again. 'Nobody ever wants to face disappointment, no one ever wants to get knocked down,' Norvell said. 'But I'm built for this journey. This program is built for this journey.' The journey ahead for both is unmarked. No coach or Power 4 program has suffered a bigger year-over-year tailspin than the Seminoles, which went from 13-1 ACC champions in 2023 to dead last in the league last fall. They were the first preseason top-10 team to win fewer than three games since 1956. But this isn't the first time Norvell has had to lead the Seminoles up from rock bottom. A month into the 2021 season, Norvell was 3-10 overall (0-4 in Year 2) and still stained by an infamous loss to Jacksonville State. Two days after an unsuccessful rally against Louisville, Norvell delivered a fiery 4 1/2-minute rant that served as a recruiting pitch to anyone fed up with the latest 'failure' (his word). It was a turning point for the program. FSU won five of its final eight games that year, and at least 10 players Norvell added in the ensuing offseason — the ones who saw the problems and wanted to be a part of the solution — became core contributors to a 23-4 run over the next two years. Look closely enough, and you can see similarities between that roster makeover and the one Florida State just finished. Norvell's 2022-23 portal classes prioritized production, whether it was in the Power 4 (Michigan State receiver Keon Coleman), Group of 5 (Western Michigan defensive lineman Braden Fiske) or FCS (Albany defensive end Jared Verse). All three starred at FSU and became top-40 NFL Draft picks. Advertisement After unsuccessfully overvaluing potential with big-name, blue-chip backups in the 2024 cycle, Florida State swung back toward proven performance this offseason. A portal class ranked sixth nationally by 247Sports totals at least 319 starts; 17 of the 23 transfers enter with at least five in their careers. Tommy Castellanos was the only player in Boston College history to record more than 2,000 passing yards and 1,000 rushing yards in the same season, inviting comparisons to Norvell's last playmaking star quarterback, Jordan Travis. Squirrel White left Tennessee with the seventh most catches in Volunteers history. Luke Petitbon was one of the ACC's top centers at Wake Forest, and Jeremiah Wilson's four interceptions last year at Houston were tied for third in the Big 12. Castellanos, Wilson and former USC receiver Duce Robinson all rank among The Athletic's 90 most impactful transfers this cycle. 'I wanted to have an emphasis on guys that have done it,' Norvell said. 'That doesn't mean that everything went great for them. I wanted to see their response.' The same was true with his existing roster. There were, Norvell said, 'tough conversations' and 'tough decisions' about who showed enough resolve to deserve a spot in the rebuilding process. The exodus, for one reason or another, included Norvell's top signee in 2023 (receiver Hykeem Williams) and 2021 (receiver Destyn Hill), the 2022 ACC defensive rookie of the year (end Patrick Payton) and the highest-rated quarterback Norvell has signed at FSU (Luke Kromenhoek). Of the 60 Seminoles who participated against Memphis — the sky-is-falling mid-September loss to Norvell's former team — 36 are gone. More starters from that game transferred out (seven) than remain (five). The roster churn led Norvell to a group of players that 'said yes to the expectation.' It's almost the exact same phrase Norvell used to describe those who fought through his early struggles to turn the program around last time. Players at last month's ACC media days used another word: desperate. Advertisement 'Desperate to win, desperate to eat, just desperate to succeed,' defensive back Earl Little Jr. said. Or, in the case of Castellanos, desperate to make Florida State feared again. He made ripples this offseason when he said he didn't see Week 1 opponent Alabama stopping him. Though the bravado was not always well-received by a quarterback who was 11-9 as the starter at Boston College and left before the end of last season, he said the support was universal from former players itching for a return to national relevance. 'It's my job to reinstall some good times, some happiness, some laughs, some joy that comes with winning,' Castellanos said. 'We want everybody to be able to get back to the old Florida State.' If this Florida State does get back to looking like the old Florida State, it will be with a new-look coaching staff. Before the season was over, Norvell fired three of his original hires: offensive coordinator Alex Atkins, defensive coordinator Adam Fuller and receivers coach Ron Dugans. In December, Seminoles Hall of Famer Odell Haggins moved from defensive line coach to a broader assistant role, ending a 31-year tenure that was the longest of any position coach at one school in the country. Co-defensive coordinator Randy Shannon was out, too. Their replacements included the highest-paid assistant in Nebraska history, defensive coordinator Tony White, and former Auburn/UCF head coach Gus Malzahn as offensive coordinator. Hiring Malzahn did more than add the experience and knowledge of a sitting Power 4 head coach who came 13 seconds away from leading Auburn past the Seminoles for the 2013 national championship. Because Norvell spent two years under Malzahn on Tulsa's offense staff, he can trust his mentor to run the system with a quarterback (Castellanos) whom Malzahn originally signed at UCF. Norvell traded his biggest strength — calling plays — to have more time for personal conversations and one-on-one meetings than ever. Perhaps deeper relationships can repair or prevent any intangible weaknesses that festered last fall. Whether any of these changes work is unknown. No Power 4 program has ever had its win total drop so much from one season to the next, and the recent results of somewhat similar roller-coaster rebuilds are mixed. Of the 11 other preseason top-10 teams to finish with fewer than five wins in the past 50 seasons (excluding 2020), four rebounded to finish ranked the next season. The best-case comparison is what Brian Kelly did at Notre Dame after yo-yoing from 10-3 in 2015 to 4-8 the next year. With a revamped staff led by three new coordinators, the Fighting Irish bounced back to go 10-3 in 2017. Kelly won 54 of his final 63 games and made the Playoff twice before leaving for LSU after the 2021 regular season. Advertisement A worst-case scenario mirrors what happened at Florida under Will Muschamp after a crumble from an 11-1 regular season in 2012 to 4-8 with a home loss to then-FCS team Georgia Southern. Running back Matt Jones said the shame lingered all the way until the next fall. When 2014 began, Jones said the Gators put 4-8 behind them, and the chemistry issues and finger-pointing subsided. But even an overhauled offense and top-10 recruiting class with three future Super Bowl champions couldn't turn things around; Muschamp was fired after a 5-4 start. 'We put up a fight (on the field), and that's just what happened,' said Jones, the Gators' leading rusher in 2014. 'We came up short.' Michigan State landed somewhere in the middle after falling from the 2015 CFP to 3-9. Mark Dantonio went 10-3, 7-6 and 7-6, then stepped away from a stagnating program in February 2020. Norvell has owned last year's failures, beyond uprooting the Gators' flag and immediately apologizing when the 2-10 season was finally over. In December, he voluntarily cut this season's pay by $4.5 million 'while recognizing that the results and expectations need to be upheld to the highest level.' The restructured contract also gives him the chance to earn $750,000 back with every nine-win season starting in 2026. Norvell's buyout would be north of $50 million after this season, cooling hot-seat speculation around a marquee brand projected to finish seventh in the 17-team ACC. Instead, it puts him and the Seminoles in a rare spot. The first four years of Norvell's tenure were defined by 'The CLIMB,' the motivational catchphrase that became the title of the program's YouTube series. The process worked all the way to the precipice of the four-team CFP. Now, after a historic free fall, is it possible for Norvell and the Seminoles to climb back? 'When you're climbing a mountain, there might be some times where you slip and where you stumble,' Norvell said. 'But the most important step along the journey is the next one.' Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle
Washington Post
3 hours ago
- Washington Post
Ward solid in NFL preseason debut, leading one scoring drive in Titans' 29-7 loss to Buccaneers
TAMPA, Fla. — Cam Ward's pro debut was solid, if unspectacular. The first overall pick in this year's NFL draft completed five of eight passes for 67 yards, but more importantly was composed and looked comfortable running Tennessee's offense in the Titans' 29-7 preseason-opening loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Saturday night.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Steelers HC Mike Tomlin 'extremely comfortable' with sitting Aaron Rodgers this week
The Pittsburgh Steelers are sending a skeleton crew down to Jacksonville this week for the team's first preseason game. Meanwhile, the Jaguars are planning to play everyone on their roster on Saturday. One player who won't be suiting up for the Steelers this week is quarterback Aaron Rodgers. When head coach Mike Tomlin addressed the media on Thursday and went down the long list of starters who would sit out this week's game, he sounded quite confident in his decision to rest Rodgers despite his limited work with the team this offseason. "I'm just extremely comfortable with my decision not to play him this week." Tomlin said. A calling card of the Steelers offense under Tomlin in recent years has been slow starts. Not just to games but to the season. It might be prudent for Tomlin to change up how he handles the preseason to help this offense hit the ground running in the regular season but Tomlin is steadfast in his approach. This article originally appeared on Steelers Wire: Steelers HC Mike Tomlin 'extremely comfortable' with sitting Aaron Rodgers this week
