FSU FOOTBALL
Florida State lost to the arch-rival Miami Hurricanes by a score of 28-22 on Saturday. This was a disappointment for those Seminole fans who were sitting in a sold-out Doak Campbell Stadium.
The fan base is up in arms about Coach Norvell and the Seminoles after their loss. However, the program is exactly where most individuals thought the expectations would be as a 7 or 8-win football team.
The Alabama season-opening win over-inflated things by most around the country. The Seminoles were projected to be a College Football Playoff contender (not saying that it still can't happen), but this is a squad that went 2-10 last year and is still learning how to win.
NO MORE EXCUSES
Florida State fans can no longer make excuses. The program allocates a significant amount of resources to football. They renovated Doak Campbell Stadium, built a football-only facility, and Norvell took a pay cut to help with NIL. That should be a recipe for success.
However, the issue lies in the emphasis on high school recruiting. The misses on the trail have haunted this program, especially in the offensive and defensive trenches. Coach Norvell brings the energy on the high school recruiting front, but they were content with bringing in transfers to put a temporary band-aid on not landing high schoolers.
This is how to accomplish long-term stability in a program by grabbing elite high schoolers. Florida State is seeing that now with landing quality 2025 recruits and playing them as true freshmen. This is the time when they need to stack excellent classes together. The worrisome issue is that Coach Norvell has never landed a top-ten recruiting class, so the talent level might not be up to par.
Miami wide receiver Malachi Toney and defensive end Rueben Bain Jr. were two high schoolers that the Seminoles were heavily going after and missed on. Even though they lived in proximity to Miami, that should never stop teams from spending resources on getting those prospects to come to Tallahassee.
This is where Florida State has to look at itself in the mirror and do a better job in high school recruiting. With that said, I believe that Coach Norvell will make the necessary adjustments and land a top-ten class in the 2026 cycle.