Florida Gators LB Mohamoud Diabate Embracing New Role on Defense

The No. 6 Florida Gators have had issues along the defensive side of the football, particularly in giving up big plays. However, some players have shifted around to new roles, potentially providing Florida with more versatility.

One of those players is sophomore linebacker Mohamoud Diabate, who is embracing the new role he's taking on as an off-ball linebacker this season.

"To me, it's been a good opportunity to just expand my skill-set and learn new things I haven't been able to learn before," Diabate said on Tuesday when speaking with the Florida media. Now, Diabate will continue to make strides as he shifts his gameplan somewhat within Todd Grantham's defense.

As a freshman in 2019, Diabate played primarily on the ball as the team's reserve BUCK rusher, coming in, in place of Jonathan Greenard and Jeremiah Moon. As a pass rusher, Diabate enjoyed plenty of success in limited action, particularly during a Week 9 contest against the Vanderbilt Commodores in which he accumulated three of his season-total four sacks on the year.

Diabate was also responsible for a forced fumble during the contest, a contest the Gators won by a score of 56-0, their most dominant outing of the season by the scoreboard. Now, Diabate will attempt to learn a new role, one that he has been playing on a limited basis during this year's season, adding another versatile defender to the Gators defense.

While he's had some success this year as a reserve, there has been a bit of a learning curve, Diabate said.

"Just, working in space, making different plays in space," he said when asked about the transition. "That's really the difficult thing, coming from playing on the line to backing up, is like, you're going to have to learn how to deal with a lot of faster people in open space. So, that was the biggest learning curve for me."

Instead of handling his one-on-one plays against an offensive tackle. tight end or running back, now, Diabate will need to be able to cover players down the field, making sure a player doesn't cross his face and make a big play as a result. Some of the toughest matchups in college football stem from the linebacker position on the versatile tight ends and running backs in today's game.

Thus far this season, Diabate has accumulated 24 tackles (10 solos), 4.5 tackles-for-loss, one sack and one pass breakup.

During fall camp, Gators linebackers coach Christian Robinson praised Diabate's versatility, noting what a "blessing" it is to have a linebacker of his caliber in the room. At 6-foot-3, 221 pounds, Diabate has the physical makeup to be one of the more intriguing defenders on the team.

"He's going to be a guy that, I expect him to kind of move around and kind of use me and coach Grantham and be able to be diverse in the ways that he lines up," said Robinson in September. "I think that's his strength, really, is just being able to move. You're really never going to know where he's at, that's kind of the blessing of having him in my room this year."

As the season progresses, and with linebacker James Houston IV questionable this week after being out against Arkansas, expect Diabate to continue playing a large role on the Florida defense if only due to his versatility. In the meantime, he will need to sharpen his tools against tight end Kyle Pitts, whenever he is to return, in practice.

There's one thing Diabate knows about Pitts, however: "You can't guard Pitts. Pitts cannot be guarded."