FSU football: 3 takeaways from dominant win over UMASS

Special Teams

Ryan Fitzgerald and Alex Mastromanno did their jobs. The former made all of his extra points and the one field goal attempt. T

he latter only punted once but nailed it for 47 yards with no return. However, the mental mistakes made on special teams can’t happen against better teams.

The fumble by Travis Jay was him fighting for more yards, but he can’t allow a guy to literally take the ball from him. The kickoff coverage was awful as FSU players were not on the TV screen when the UMASS returner was past the 10-yard line.

UMASS averaged 28 yards per return which is unacceptable. They should simply kick the ball into the end zone every time. They did force a fumble on one kickoff return, but they had given up too many yards before it happened.

The decision to fair catch two punts inside the 10-yard line was mind-boggling! One of them was inside the five-yard line! I see more teams do this, but it makes zero sense with the probability of the punt going into the end zone being fairly high.

Field position will play a large part in the Clemson game next week, and not hurting themselves with poor decisions on special teams would be helpful if they want a shot of winning that road game.