FSU Football: ‘Noles offense been incredibly balanced so far

FSU football was expected to have a run heavy offense in 2018, but its been incredibly balanced through four games.

The FSU football offense hasn’t looked like anything we expected four games into the season. We were expecting way more run game versus the pass and much more scoring and more tempo under Willie Taggart.

However, we’ve seen glimpses of what we expected, especially in the last game against a solid defense in Northern Illinois.

One thing we were not expecting is to run such a balanced offense, but that’s exactly what has happened through the first three games.

Willie Taggart’s offense is based on the run game but the Noles have actually passed the ball a little more than they’ve run.

They’ve run a total of 293 total plays with 150 passing plays (51 percent) and 143 rushing plays (49 percent) and you’re not going to get much more balanced than that.

Now, there are a number of factors to consider for this. One is the Noles have played mostly from behind in those three games which has forced them to pass a bit more. Also, they just have not been able to run the ball as effectively as they want.

The Noles are only averaging 2.87 yard per rush with Cam Akers leading the way with 4.57 yards per rush. However, that’s deceiving because 85 of those yards came on one run against Virginia Tech in the opener.

If that long run is removed Akers is only averaging 3.15 yards per carry. We said the offense would have to rely more on the passing game after the second game and that still seems to be the case.

Almost all of the explosive plays are coming via the pass, but the Noles are committing to the run enough to help the passing game happen.

I expect the Noles to stay committed to the run but it’s going to be interesting to see if they get net more explosive plays in the run game against a tougher slate of defenses on the schedule.

It seems the offensive line isn’t opening enough holes for the backs to find running lanes, and when they do the backs (especially Akers) isn’t patient enough to allow the holes to finish developing.

The biggest thing is getting positive yardage on first down. We saw this more in the NIU game, particularly during the first two touchdown drives and hopefully it’s a sign of things to come.

The offense is averaging 5.10 ypp through four games which is a yard and a half less than Taggart’s offensive average over the past three seasons.

I wrote about their performance against NIU being a confidence boost to ride into the Louisville game and it couldn’t come at a more opportune time.