FSU football: 3 takeaways from ‘Noles loss against Florida

FSU defense played well enough to win

I will be the first to say Adam Fuller’s defense missed too many tackles against Florida and needed to play better on third down. They allowed Florida to convert 11 of 19, which is way too many, but a lot of that was FSU running zone coverage instead of man-to-man.

The reason they did that was that Florida had mobile quarterbacks that could make them pay if they ran a ton of man-to-man. FSU’s defense forced three turnovers and held Florida’s offense to 4.63 yards per play, which is well below their season average.

They also had several players in position to make plays, but the players didn’t make the play. One play, in particular, was Kevin Knowles on Florida’s second touchdown catch of the game. He was about an inch away from tipping the third-down pass away. Both Florida touchdown passes happened on third down.

The FSU defense limited Florida to 139 rushing yards and forced a key three-and-out when Alex Mastromanno pinned Florida in their territory. However, the muffed punt by Ontaria Wilson changed the momentum in the game, and the defense has to go right back out there.

That’s when the majority of the missed tackles began to take place. It’s a shame because if you said they’d hold Florida to 24 points, I think most people would think FSU likely wins the game.