FSU football: Noles exceed defensive goals against North Carolina

FSU football got its first signature win in the Mike Norvell era against No. 5 North Carolina Saturday night. We grade the defensive goals for the game.

FSU football seemed to turn the corner in a loss to No. 5 Notre Dame last week. The defense was gouged for most of the game, but it seems they played better in the second half.

They had a goal-line stand against Jacksonville State to end the game and did the same thing against Notre Dame.

What do we know, the defense got a fourth-down stop against North Carolina to end the game and give Mike Norvell a signature win the program desperately needed.

Going into the game, I needed to see some progress from the FSU defense as I asked if we could expect improvement from them against North Carolina.

As I said in that piece, I thought the North Carolina offense was a bit overrated in the preseason, and they haven’t played any particularly strong teams in their first three games.

Make no mistake, I didn’t expect the Noles to win the game against North Carolina, but I did feel they would score a lot of points against their defense.

My question was, which FSU football defense would show up? Would they continue to improve from the second half of the Notre Dame game, or would North Carolina drop 40+ points on them?

Here’s what I said at the end of my defensive goals for the game post:

"If the FSU football defense can get two of these goals accomplished, they’ll at least be in the game with a chance to win it."

I must be a prophet like when you double your money(get it, profit) because the FSU defense accomplished two of those and nearly got all three of them.

Here is how they stacked up with my defensive performance goals.