FSU Football knows what is ahead of them this season, but one website both calls out their second year coach and compliments his chances this season.
Look, by now we have covered to no end what took place during the 2018 season for the FSU football team and their first year head coach, Willie Taggart – and once the final whistle sounded on what was the first losing season in over four decades, the clock began on how long Taggart had to make that moment a distant memory.
At the same time, while a section of the fan base and across college football is choosing to blame everything on Taggart after just one season there is a growing group that realizes the disaster that was left before he took the job from former “leadership” and that he has the ability and talent on the field to make a season like that not take place.
All of this makes FSU football one of the must see events during the upcoming season – and one website is riding the fence with both the pressure and expectations placed on Taggart during the 2019 season.
College Football News has been publishing their last predictions for the 2019 season during the spring – and ranked Taggart as the coach who is most on the hot seat in the ACC this season
"He got the one year mulligan, but as the head coach of a program that hadn’t missed out on a bowl game since 1981, Taggart had better come up with a monster Year Two."
At the same time, they called Taggart one of the five coaches who will be much better in 2019.
"This wasn’t the Florida State of 2013 that the new guy was taking over. Jimbo Fisher bailed on a 5-6 team that had no blocking from a bad offensive line…and wasted a strong defensive season.…If the Noles can get by Boise State in the season-opener in Jacksonville, getting past six wins to go bowling again shouldn’t be a problem. No, there won’t be an ACC Championship…but the needle on the Taggart era should start pointing up."
I get where they were going with things because it is truly possible to say that Taggart and FSU football must improve based on necessity as well as saying they have the players to do it without question. With a slightly easier schedule this season and plenty of talent on the field, the chances of going back to a bowl are far greater than the first back to back losing seasons since the 1970s.
Taggart has made it very clear that he understands the pressure that came with the job and knows he must turn things around – and if the Seminoles can get to eight or nine wins this season, the critics will start to fade away.