Carl Johnson wants the current Gators to make their own legacy
by Bob Redman, aka “Hollywood Bob”
He played for two national championship teams at Florida. Guard Carl Johnson came to Florida as a five-star prospect and was one of dozens of stars that were on the squad back in the 2006-2010 seasons. He wants the Gators to get back to those days but believes that the current team needs to make their own path to hopefully the kind of success he and his teammates had.
Johnson joined dozens of former Gators on campus for the spring game and also took part in Johnny Townsend’s foundation get together to raise awareness for the Children’s Oncology Unit at Shands and UF Health. We caught up with Johnson at the event and he was having fun seeing a bunch of his old teammates and giving us the lowdown as to what he is up to.
“I’m actually here in Gainesville, check me out,” Johnson said. “I own Egg and Bagel. We’re a bagel shop downtown. I live here, my mom is still here, my dad is still here. They moved here from North Carolina. It’s just Gainesville. I love it. It reminds me of home, small town, but starting to get big now. It’s starting to turn into a big city, so I still love it here.”
“Great time (at Townsend’s event), lots of fun. It was good to see a lot of old faces after about 15 years. Good to connect with my old guys and have a good time, Major Wright, Chris Rainey, Will Hill, David Young, John Brantley, and I’m probably forgetting some guys.”
Johnson loves his Gators but admits that the fun has been taken out of the program since he and the guys were bringing back the big hardware. He believes things are about ready to improve.
“It’s kind of hard to watch it when you’re used to winning a lot and they’re not winning so much,” he said. “But I still support the program. I’m a Gator until I die. I know this new coach will turn it around. It just takes grit. They gotta bite down a little bit.”
Johnson wouldn’t mind getting closer to the program, but he really does want the team to look back at past successes in the program and work to realize those goals on their own
“They emailed and sent some things out, but I don’t read emails much,” Johnson said about the program reaching out to him. “I believe in letting them do their own things. When we came here in 2006, Tebow and my class, we had room to grow, there were no high expectations. But ’96, that was the goal we tried to accomplish and we ran for it. People compared them to ’06 and ’08. I think that’s a stifling kind of pressure and those kids really can’t grow. They need to embrace their own era and just run.”
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