To say that Florida State football is struggling this season would be the understatement of the century. What happened in the loss to Syracuse?
This game did not go well for Florida State, at all. Honestly, just saying it didn’t go well is being nice. The Seminoles fell to Syracuse, 30-7, snapping a 10-game winning streak over the Orange. Was the 2017 season what the Seminoles wanted? Not at all, but this year may just be even worse.
Willie Taggart just completed his third game as head coach and I don’t think it would be an overreaction to put him on the hot seat as of right now. Losing to Syracuse is the same as Florida losing to Kentucky, it isn’t a good look for a new head coach. However, enough talking crap about Florida State just for fun- let’s get to the takeaways.
3. This offense needs to learn about security, soon.
We learned one glaring thing from the Florida State loss to Syracuse- this offense doesn’t protect the ball or their quarterback. Both of those things will all but screw you out of any kind of successful season.
The Seminoles aren’t good y’all. It’s extremely disappointing for the fans down in Tallahassee. If they want to compete against anyone this season. Deondre Francois was disappointing, finishing 18-for-36. The Seminoles only converted one third down the entire game, yes just one.
2. Florida State plays defense- in the red zone. That’s it.
Watching Florida State absolutely be demolished by Syracuse was extremely disappointing for a fan of good, competitive football games. I will tell you this, anyone who says that Florida State is just a bit “down this year,” is trying to hard to be nice and is lying to you.
From what I saw, this Florida State team knows how to play defense well. However, they only seem to want to play it when they enter the red zone. Ask any coach of any football team and they will tell you how bad that is. You can get excited about trading touchdowns for field goals all day long, but you can still lose to multiple field goals will your offense isn’t scoring much at all.
Syracuse didn’t score a touchdown until the third quarter. They were only 8-of-19 on third down. Those statistics would make you think that this team could be victorious, but that wasn’t the case. Simply put, Florida State lost on field goals instead of touchdowns. The red zone defense may have pushed the score down a bit from what it could be, but it didn’t help them much at all in terms of their now 1-2 record.
1. Sloppy football came back to bite the Seminoles.
The Seminoles finished the game with 10 penalties for 81 yards. That is only 19 yards short of an entire football field worth of penalties. Not good Florida State, not good at all. The quarterback was sacked four times. The Orange doubled the Seminoles in first downs and in total offensive yards. There were dropped passes, missed handoffs and every other kind of mistake possible.
Florida State isn’t what they once were. This team isn’t going to make any positive noise in the ACC this season. They are not going to upset anyone or be a game changer for anyone’s season. This win doesn’t mean that Syracuse is a force to be reckoned with. It means that the Seminoles played yet another sloppy game and as a result are 1-2 with no positive matchups in sight.
They do play Northern Illinois in Week 4 and that may be a win for the Seminoles. However, in Week 5, Louisville may just demolish Florida State. Of course, if they play as sloppy in the next few weeks as they did today- they can kiss even a five-win season goodbye.
Good luck Florida State, this is the definition of rebuilding year.