FSU Football: Why Marvin Wilson, Cory Durden will dominate in 2019

With both FSU football players returning for another year in Tallahassee, Chop Chat’s Sam Tschida breaks down why each will have monster 2019 seasons.

After the debacle that was the 2018 season, many FSU football fans were desperate to find anything that would provide some sort of hope for 2019. The best player on the team, Brian Burns, was leaving, there was still uncertainty at QB, the 2019 recruiting class was losing commitments, and the offensive line was losing their four-year starting center.

Combine that with several gaffes from the social media team, and the beginning of the offseason was tough for FSU fans. However,  heading into the 2019 season, ‘Noles fans can find hope in one part of the football program at least: the defensive line. Specifically, the interior of the defensive line. Despite the loss of stalwarts Demarcus Christmas and Fred Jones to graduation, there are a lot of reasons to be excited this season.

Marvin Wilson, the former five-star defensive tackle out of Houston, returns for his third season in Tallahassee with massive expectations. With him joins sophomore Corey Durden, who surprised many fans last season when he had a very solid season in a mostly-supporting role. This season, both Wilson and Durden will take leading roles on defense, and fans should be excited for a huge season from both of them.

After starting his career in 2017 behind both Christmas and Derrick Nnadi, Wilson took over full-time starter status and never looked back. He totaled 41 tackles with four sacks and earned honorable mention All-ACC honors. Wilson was dominant last season and should be one of the best defenders in the ACC if he keeps making plays like this.

Here, Wilson takes advantage of hesitation from the Miami offensive tackle, who doesn’t pick up Wilson from the guard quick enough. Wilson uses his power to rip right through the attempted block and plows through the quarterback for a loss. Wilson’s power, awareness, and quickness are all reasons why he is one of the most dangerous defensive linemen in the country going into 2019.

Starting alongside Wilson in the middle is third-year player Corey Durden. After redshirting in 2017, Durden split snaps as a backup last season with Fred Jones and Robert Cooper and ended up having a very productive season. He tallied 22 total tackles, six of which came for loss and added on two sacks, becoming one of the impact freshmen on defense.

What makes the sophomore tackle so dangerous is his quickness off of the ball. While Wilson is a more powerful tackle who has quickness in his arsenal, Durden’s best ability is his quickness at the line, which he compliments with good strength.

When matched up against a guard or center one-on-one, Durden excels, and several of his tackles for loss came from him exploiting those matchups last season. While he does struggle moreso against powerful linemen, Durden put on weight during the offseason and looks ready to excel again this year.

Both Wilson and Durden have looked good in practice so far according to reports, and each looks to build off of monster 2018 seasons. Expect both players to dominate the trenches this year, and don’t be surprised to see each of their names on NFL rosters in the coming years.