Florida State’s Ja’Khi Douglas is tackled by a Georgia Tech defender during Saturday’s game at Aviva stadium in Dublin.
Peter Morrison, Associated Press
Remember the kerfuffle last season when the final four-team version of the College Football Playoff snubbed Florida State?
Seminole fans were furious. Florida politicians were outraged.
This year the CFP will feature a 12-team bracket . . . and Florida State could miss out again, thanks to its stunning loss to Georgia Tech in Dublin, Ireland.
Count college football analyst Paul Finebaum among those who didn’t weep for the Seminoles.
“You know who’s to blame?” Finebaum asked. “It’s not the coaching staff, it’s the Florida State fans. They acted like fools and they never stopped, even during the pregame show they continued to show their rear end and that’s why I haven’t stopped laughing. I don’t know about you guys, you hate to be cruel like that, but this is a program that has isolated itself, that is on an island whose fan base is disliked and disrespected. Not only by people just walking down the street in Birmingham, but by its own league.”
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Yes, well, Florida State and Clemson have been working to extricate their programs from the Atlantic Coast Conference and find greener pastures. So we’re guessing some folks around the ACC were happy for Georgia Tech.
No. 11-ranked Missouri has a shot at reaching that 12-team bracket, although most experts currently have them on the outside looking in due to their weak schedule.
But if the Tigers win the games they are supposed to win and established powers like Florida State keep suffering surprising losses, then Truman’s odds will improve.
Writing for USA, Paul Myerberg described the hit Florida State absorbed overseas:
Losing to Georgia Tech very strongly suggests that Florida State is not going to win the national championship, or even come within a whisper of the College Football Playoff for the second year in a row.
The Yellow Jackets are pretty good. Right? Who knows? With just one game down in this 2024 season, all we can say for sure is the Jackets are a field goal better than the Seminoles.
But as a sign, this isn’t a good one: Tech beat No. 10 Florida State 24-21 in Ireland on a 44-yard kick as time expired.
A year ago, the Seminoles went undefeated during the regular season and still couldn’t get into the top four. Under multiple different postseason formats — regular bowl games, the Bowl Championship Series and the four-team playoff — Saturday’s loss would’ve left Florida State on the edges of the championship race or even been an immediate disqualifier.
The 12-team college football playoff will alter the complexion of the regular season. Beyond changing the pressure of November games, though, the new format will give teams such as Florida State much more room for error and allow for one or even two losses before being eliminated from the conference-title race. But they also face a schedule that still includes Clemson, Miami and Notre Dame and have little margin for error.
When all it takes to get into the playoff is to win 10 or more games in a Power Four conference or just win a league title regardless of your final record, losses to teams such as Georgia Tech take on much less meaning.
Needless to say, Florida State coach Mike Norvell has been feeling some heat this week.
Here is what folks are writing about college football:
David Cobb, CBSSports.com: “The (Missouri) Tigers took two big steps forward last season by going from six wins to 11 with a campaign capped by a Cotton Bowl victory over Ohio State. Now comes the step back. The Tigers lost defensive coordinator Blake Baker to LSU and five draft picks from that side of the ball. While a prolific offense should have no problem putting up monster numbers against a weak schedule, Mizzou could be exposed if/when it has to face the SEC’s best.”
Andy Staples, On3.com: “Georgia Tech whipped Florida State up front in a way that suggests the Yellow Jackets can play with almost anyone on their schedule. The problem is that schedule is still very hard. Georgia Tech drew the toughest ACC schedule (Florida State, Louisville, Virginia Tech, Miami, N.C. State) and has two of the toughest non-conference opponents of anyone in the league (Notre Dame, Georgia). But remember, the Yellow Jackets don’t have to beat Georgia to make the College Football Playoff. They just have to win the ACC.”
David Ubben, The Athletic: “The (Ole Miss) Rebels, who field one of the program’s best-ever rosters, haven’t opened a season ranked this high in the AP Poll (No. 6) since 1970. In the four-team Playoff, it would be hard to see them reaching the finish line, considering coach Lane Kiffin has come within 14 points of Alabama or Georgia just once. Not anymore. How many SEC (and Big Ten) teams make the field will be a talking point this fall.”
Bill Connelly, ESPN.com: “Week 1 is for learning, and some of the teams with the most interesting questions square off. We’ll learn about Notre Dame’s remodeled offensive line, Conner Weigman and the new A&M offense, remodeled defenses at LSU and USC, and which embattled coach is more likely to pull off a 2024 surge, Miami’s Mario Cristobal or Florida’s Billy Napier.”
Pat Forde, SI.com: The man who started a massive coaching carousel chain reaction in late 2021 has lost some luster and could use a return of his mojo. Hired away from the Oklahoma Sooners in a stunner, Lincoln Riley had a splashy first season with 11 wins, a berth in the Pac-12 championship game and a Heisman Trophy for Caleb Williams. But defensive liabilities were evident that season and became glaring in ’23, leading to an 8–5 dud. Now comes a massive change of scenery and upgrade in conference competition, which coincides with life after Caleb. The schedule is spicy: LSU in Las Vegas; at Michigan; vs. Penn State; vs. Notre Dame; plus potential rebound teams Wisconsin and Nebraska. Is Riley’s program tough enough for that grind?”
Ross Dellenger, Yahoo! Sports: “No power conference saw more head coaching changes than the Big Ten. At UCLA, DeShaun Foster takes over for Chip Kelly, who left for a coordinator position at new Big Ten conference mate Ohio State. At Indiana, Curt Cignetti replaces the fired Tom Allen, who also remains in the Big Ten (he’s the defensive coordinator at Penn State). In Ann Arbor, Sherrone Moore is Michigan’s first first-time head coach in nearly 30 years after his promotion upon Jim Harbaugh’s departure for the NFL. Michigan State hired Jonathan Smith, formerly of Oregon State, to replace the fired Mel Tucker. And, finally, there’s Washington, where Jedd Fisch arrived from Arizona following DeBoer’s exit to Tuscaloosa. Whew! Got all that? They each face their own kind of adversity. Moore and Michigan are embroiled in the NCAA’s investigation into the sign-stealing scandal. Cignetti, despite returning about 20 starters, takes over a program that has finished with a winning record twice in the last 16 years. Smith and the Spartans get a schedule that features trips to Oregon and Michigan and a home game against Ohio State. In Los Angeles, Foster is searching for a quarterback after five-star prospect Dante Moore left for Oregon, and in Seattle, Fisch returns, at most, two starters from last year’s team that lost to Michigan in the championship game. Good luck, guys!”
Carter Bahns, 247 Sports: “College football is in many ways unrecognizable in 2024 as a conference realignment, rules changes and playoff expansion mark seismic changes to a sport rooted in tradition. The paradigm shift hit nobody harder than Oregon State and Washington State — two castaways in a Western region entirely fractured by Big Ten, Big 12 and ACC expansion. While those two schools work to stay afloat in a college football world determined to leave them behind, perennial (former) Pac-12 contenders like Oregon and USC have bigger stages than ever before. This season marks a big step in the distancing between the haves and have-nots, particularly out west, where the largest brands take center stage and the rest settle into new niches. How the Beavers and Cougars move forward, how the other former Pac-12 schools fare in their new leagues and whether the Mountain West will have a seat at the Playoff table will define West Coast football in the first year of this wacky era.”
Jerry Palm, CBSSports.com: “Mike Elko takes over at Texas A&M after a successful run at Duke and should be a breath of fresh air the program needs after stagnating under Jimbo Fisher. Elko should send a thank you note to the SEC office for his gift of a first-year schedule. If you want to make a run at the College Football Playoff, you couldn’t ask for a better one. They have some highly ranked teams like Missouri and Texas, along with a season opener vs. Notre Dame, but all of those games are at home. In fact, all of their most difficult games will be played at Kyle Field. Games at Auburn and Florida will not be pushovers, but they may only have to win one of those for a CFP berth.”
“I think Penn State’s got a really good team and a great culture. They would have been in the playoff with 12 team playoff the last couple years. I think (LSU quarterback Garrett) Nussmeier is going to be one of the sleepers in college football this year at quarterback. LSU always has skilled guys.”
Former Alabama coach Nick Saban, naming two top teams that need to get more attention.
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Publish date : 2024-08-26 22:54:00
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