GAINESVILLE, Fla. — He might have been any coach eating a taco during lunch after practice on a summer day so drippy swamp-hot you could understand why Gatorade was invented here.
Then Urban Meyer leaned forward and peered up from his office couch. His eyes fixed on the questioner as he conveyed the intensity that has made him, at 41, the hottest young coach in college football.
"I cannot wait until [Saturday]," he said, almost in a frightening way, of Florida's opener against Wyoming. "I can ... not ... wait."
This is not any coach.
Bowling Green understood it in 2001, when the school took a chance at a 30-something receiver coach from Notre Dame.
Utah knew in 2003, when it hired Meyer and, two seasons later, went 12-0 and won the Fiesta Bowl.
Florida Athletic Director Jeremy Foley sensed it last fall, when he went private jet to private jet against Notre Dame in a race for Meyer's services.
And, even though Meyer is Catholic, is named after several popes and loved (loves) Notre Dame, Foley beat the Irish to Utah and to Meyer.
Foley, afterward, said he felt as if he'd gone 10 rounds with Lennox Lewis.
"Obviously, that's some formidable competition right there," he said of Notre Dame. "I thought it was dead important we got it right for Florida.... There are not a lot of good ones. There are not a lot of great ones. And a lot of the great ones like it where they are."
Steve Spurrier had "it" when he coached Florida to a national title and six outright Southeastern Conference titles in a 12-year run that ended in 2001.
Foley remembers that the bigger the game, the more Spurrier acted as if he were waiting for a bus.
"I get the same feeling for Urban," Foley said. "He lives for that scenario. He relishes it, like Steve."
Foley gestured toward Meyer's adjacent office.
"You've got to think a guy like Urban Meyer has prepared his whole life to be in that chair."
Although Meyer would never say it, Florida was probably a better fit than Notre Dame.
At Florida, Meyer has walked into college football's boiler room. His bracket of the SEC, the East Division, boasts three teams with national-title aspirations -- Tennessee, Georgia and Florida -- and a South Carolina team now coached by Spurrier.
"It's really like no other," Meyer says of the SEC. "It borders on insanity."
Like anyone with certain skills, Meyer wanted to take his innovative spread-option offense and test it where the risk and rewards both were high.
Meyer's reputation is significant enough that last spring, Bill Belichick, coach of the three-time Super Bowl champion New England Patriots, visited Gainesville before the NFL draft.
Meyer was like a schoolkid as he awaited the arrival, compiling a list of questions he wanted to ask Belichick.
Meyer claims the secret to his success is sponging off nimble minds.
"I'm a stealer," he said, "a cheater. I call people."
Turns out Belichick wanted to talk to him -- for five hours -- about the offense that made Alex Smith the No. 1 pick in this year's NFL draft.
At Florida, in terms of Meyer's high-stakes poker game, the ante now gets upped.
Meyer inherits a quarterback, Chris Leak, who last season led the SEC in yards passing per game at 266.4, and threw 29 touchdown passes.
This isn't Utah anymore, or Bowling Green -- this is bowling for dollars.
Meyer was brought to Florida to win SEC titles and the national championship.
Those expectations ultimately took their toll on Spurrier, who admits now he was burned out when he left Florida for the NFL.
Spurrier won 10 games in his last season at Florida and coached in a BCS game, the Orange Bowl. He felt that wasn't enough.
Hearing that Meyer had spoken at 21 Gator Club functions his first spring, Spurrier laughed, saying Meyer had better get used to it.
"I talked to him once and I said, 'Wait till you do about 10 years of those things,' " Spurrier said.
One reason Spurrier removed himself as a candidate to return as Gator coach was that he sensed 10 wins a year wouldn't be good enough.
Meyer's response: "I have too much respect for college football where I hope we have that problem, where winning 10 games isn't good enough. I'm telling you it is enough.
"It bothers me that he said that. I don't know him that well. I admire him. That's a shame if that's really the way it was. We're talking about the SEC.
"I don't think that's the people here. I think that's him. That's what makes him a great coach."
Meyer's early impact rates as significant in terms of everything he can do before playing a game.
Florida took several steps back after Spurrier left, on and off the field.
The Gators lost 15 games the last three seasons, and discipline waned under Ron Zook, the lowlight occurring last year when Zook got caught up in a fraternity ruckus involving his players.
The SEC can be a rambunctious place, but Meyer has already put clamps down.
FloridaToday.com recently reported that since last season ended, 23 players from South Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia had been arrested or cited.
