Notre Dame Football: Previewing a renewed rivalry against Florida State

Notre Dame football is no stranger to meeting Florida State the Florida State Seminoles on the gridiron. Will the 2020 matchup live up to others in the rivalry?

Florida State football and Notre Dame football don’t have an incredibly long history, but they have had some fantastic games when they have met. This includes the 1993 Game of the Century in South Bend, and 2014’s heart breaker in Tallahassee.

This season, Florida State visits the Irish, but no one expects it to be one of those all time great meetings. Most, expect it to emulate 2018’s beat down that the Irish handed the Seminoles. Florida State hasn’t had a great quarterback since Jameis Winston, and there offensive line has been a national joke. Add in a third coach, Mike Norvell, in four seasons, who has had multiple player revolts before his first snap as Florida State head coach, and it’s hard to expect much from Florida State in 2020.

2019 Florida State

From early in the season, it became clear the Willie Taggart hadn’t brought much improvement in his second season as head coach. That was always going to be a problem for boosters, who quickly came to the conclusion that he wasn’t the man for the job, paying an $18 million buyout to fire him.

So, what went wrong?

First and foremost in any discussion of Florida State’s recent struggles, is their offensive line. It was as if Jimbo FIsher forgot to recruit and develop the line in his later years at Florida State, which is what ultimately led to his struggles in later seasons. Taggart, simply wasn’t able to fix the mess in his two seasons. Florida State was 125th in sacks allowed, which didn’t help the quarterback by committee that was the marriage between James Blackman and Alex Hornibrook.

In fact, the only saving grace on offense was Cam Akers at running back. He ran for 1,144 yards and 14 touchdowns. He caught another 4 touchdowns on 30 receptions. The issue, he’s now a Los Angeles Ram.

On defense, the Seminoles still had excellent athletes, like Asante Samuel Jr at corner and Marvin Wilson at defensive tackle. Even with all that talent, Florida State produced just a run of the mill 67th in points allowed, at 27.8 points per game.

2020 Florida State

Luckily enough for Florida State, they have Samuel Jr and Wilson back on defense. To go along with  Wilson and company is a new defensive coordinator, Adam Fuller. Fuller comes to Florid State with Mike Norvell from Memphis.

While the defensive tackle position is set, there’s almost no proven talent at defensive end. They’ll need a ton of production in run defense from those defensive tackles, because linebacker is depleted as well.

The secondary has a lot of natural talent, but they will get beaten just like they did last season without help from the front seven. As long as opposing quarterbacks have all day to throw, Samuel Jr. and company will be asked to do too much in coverage.

Prediction

Florida State is transitioning systems, still doesn’t have an offensive line, needs to replace Cam Akers, and only has one position on defense to truly be confident in. Notre Dame shouldn’t struggle with Florida State at all. Notre Dame wins, 38-16.