GAINESVILLE, FLA. ? Questioning new Florida coach Ron Zook is as popular in Gainesville this week as doing the Gator Chomp.

The less popular, but more accurate thing to do is to take an unflinching look at Steve Spurrier the kind of players he recruited, and the team he left behind.

It is no longer a championship-caliber group, as the Gators showed in their 41-16 loss to top-ranked Miami on Saturday.

In two weeks, they likely will find out they aren’t really in the hunt for the Southeastern Conference title, either. They travel to Tennessee for a rematch with the team that manhandled them last December in a 34-32 loss.

Spurrier the coach, not the recruiter helped make that game close, mainly because of his brilliant offensive mind, and the fact that his quarterback, Rex Grossman, was willing to stand in and take a beating.

With Zook a Kansas University assistant under Mike Gottfried in 1983 in charge and new offensive coordinator Ed Zaunbrecher still trying to figure out what his players do best, there was no keeping things respectable against the Hurricanes.

The offensive line got shoved around and couldn’t protect Rex Grossman long enough for him to throw downfield. Besides Taylor Jacobs, Grossman still is looking for a receiver who can beat press coverage against good defensive backs.

The defensive front got bullied. It allowed 306 yards rushing, and has now given up 692 yards on the ground in the last three regular-season games.

“I’ve only been here two games,” Zook protested, when asked about deficiencies that date back to last year.

And that’s the point: So far, it’s not really the coaching that’s the issue, it’s the level of talent that is being coached.

Linebacker Matt Farrior illustrated Florida’s problem when he said the Hurricanes essentially ran the same running play over and over again, and the Gators couldn’t stop it.

“We knew when it was coming, but it was just a matter of everybody doing their assignment, and we just couldn’t stop it,” Farrior said.

Zook defends his players, but also acknowledges he’s got problems.

“I don’t know if I was surprised or not,” Zook said when asked about the lack of numbers at certain positions. “I think that happens at any program. Teams kind of go through cycles.”

Spurrier always felt recruiting was overrated, and always downplayed the analysts who lauded or panned his classes every year. The proof, he said, didn’t come until a few years down the road, after the players had been in the system a while.

Usually, Florida’s talent level lived up to the hype.

But that attitude took its toll over time.

Three of Florida’s last four recruiting classes including Zook’s first class, put together under short notice last season have been generally considered subpar.

Now, Zook is paying the price.

He’s got a good quarterback (Grossman, who came to Spurrier, not vice versa), one proven receiver (Jacobs), a few good tailbacks (Earnest Graham, Ran Carthon, Ciatrick Fason) and a pretty good defensive backfield (Todd Johnson and Guss Scott). After that, there are problems.

He’s got an undermanned offensive line that never really learned the nuances of run blocking in the old regime.

The best player on the line, Jonathan Colon, got worked over by Miami’s Jerome McDougle last week. At one point, the Gators were struggling so badly that Zook juggled the entire line in hopes of finding some magic remedy.

On the defensive front, Ian Scott is the best player, but he struggled against Miami. Arpedge Rolle and Tron LaFavor are a couple of senior defensive linemen who haven’t had any impact. Zook is desperate for answers at middle linebacker, where Farrior was out of his league last week.

Pointing out the talent problems he inherited isn’t meant to completely absolve Zook.

The Gators would have surely scored more than one offensive touchdown last week with Spurrier at the helm. And they surely wouldn’t have lost by 25 points at home. Zook is a special teams and defensive specialist whose special teams and defense were awful.

But there will be plenty of time to put the new coach under the microscope.