Could Duquesne down Florida State football in the 2022 opener?

In 2021, Florida State football proved that FCS teams are no easy victory. Will 2022 do the same when they face Duquesne?

In the past, my discussion topics have been criticized as “negative” by some who encounter them, but my response has always been that I’m merely realistic. When looking at the upcoming “Week 0” games, the thought of the Duquesne Dukes upsetting the Florida State Seminoles falls into that exact category.

Looking at Duquesne, the state of its football program today is one of great promise. Brad Everett of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, to summarize, describes the Dukes as having a young team headlined by its potential — along with a handful of returning starters.

Last year, they saw their ninth straight season without a losing record, finishing at a solid 7-3. One of their several wins was against the Ohio Bobcats, a member of the Mid-American Conference (MAC). The victory was Duquesne’s first to ever come against an FBS-level opponent.

In short, it appears that the Dukes are here to stay in the FCS’s food chain, but is all that we’ve heard so far enough to scare the mighty Florida State Seminoles? It should be.

Now no, there is nothing about Duquesne on paper that should even make FSU wince. The cause for concern only comes in when comparing the Dukes to the 2021 Jacksonville State Gamecocks — the FCS power that stunned the Seminoles last year.

Jacksonville State was able to trek into Tallahassee and shock Florida State despite having just lost to UAB by a horrific score of 31-0. As for Duquesne, FSU will be its season opener, leaving the Dukes all the more well-rested (and all the less predictable).

And before we continue, let me just say that I can already hear the angry responses: “but Austin, FSU had just suffered a tough loss to Notre Dame before the JSU game, so they weren’t well-rested, either! Now they will be!”

That is true, but going toe-to-toe with the Irish, if anything, makes losing to the Gamecocks all the less justified.

Above all else, both that and the Gamecocks being beaten beyond recognition by the Blazers shows just how easily the Seminoles should have won — but they didn’t. Now let’s get back to the matter at hand.

When it comes to how Jacksonville State’s 2021 season ended, they saw a subpar record of 5-6, with head coach John Grass not even making it to the end of such a run.

The goal of all of this is to prove that if JSU can beat the Florida State Seminoles under the aforementioned circumstances, then the Dukes certainly can under theirs.

Surely a gaggle of FSU fans will have something to say about how well head coach Mike Norvell has built the team up since then, following it up with a complete disregard of my point here. However, those individuals would have done the exact same thing this time last year had someone pondered the chances of the Gamecocks prevailing.

I am not picking Duquesne to beat the Seminoles, nor do I think the game will be overly close. But, to brush the Dukes off as if they’re pushovers would be a wildly ignorant move for FSU fans to make, as last season showed us all why an upset of such magnitude is — you guessed it — realistic.