From dog to favorite

[TheRealVille]

Amazing how one weekend can totally change perceptions of college football teams.

On Friday no one thought UCF would lose to Louisville. The Orlando team was on the cusp of the top 25 while the Cards were all but being thrown under the bus by a good amount of fans. Louisville was 7 point home underdogs to a group of 5 school.

The next day the Golden Knights not only lost the game but their star QB. The Cards on the other hand as changed a lot of critics minds while the team moved way up in the computer rankings. Malik was a warrior leading the Cards to victory while limping. He may well be the ACC offensive player of the week.

Now going to FSU next weekend the Cards will be likely road favorites. It's FSU who is in shambles just a couple of weeks after almost beating Notre Dame. A loss to a FCS team and a blowout loss at home today to Michigan State as 15 point favorites has the Seminoles at 0 and 3.

It's the other coach that is on the hot seat and not Satterfield. It's a FSU program that the Cards have had lots of success the past few years. So this week the Cards fan base will be debating how the Cards better not lose to this team.

A quick change indeed.

 

[jmac1029]

FSU lost to Wake Forest on the road. Miami lost to Michigan State.

 

[TheRealVille]

That's right. I got Miami and FSU mixed up for some reason. The Noles looked bad today with 6 turnovers. They have something to prove next week or they will be 0 and 4. Cards have to be ready for a fight.

 

[GoldCard]

FSU may have already fired Norvell by the time we play them. That kind of scares me because they might have some new energy with him gone. He has lost that team.

 

[Thecycle27]

Early in season FSU will be desperate at home. I would feel very good with them coming here not so much going there.

 

[2330859]

UL and Duke provided the most respect this weekend for an ACC that is clearly struggling right now.

Clemson looked quite pedestrian yesterday at home trying to hang on to a thin lead against GT.

Closer to home, UK was very fortunate to prevail against an FCS Chattanooga team; I wonder just how long the local media will remind their public about their fortunate escape? Compare the WDRB headlines when UL beat D1 EKU, with their headlines on UK beating FCS moccasins. There was no mention that Ali played the entire game for UK, despite a pending court appearance for leaving the scene of an accident. Nothing to see here, just move on.

 

[Ipartiedwithhopgood]

UL and Duke provided the most respect this weekend for an ACC that is clearly struggling right now.

Agree ACC is just not good but I think I'd add WF to the short list of teams that might be on an upswing.

 

[Ipartiedwithhopgood]

Early in season FSU will be desperate at home. I would feel very good with them coming here not so much going there.

Agree 100% they are also probably going to scrap most everything they've been doing the last two weeks and formulate a new strategy.

My guess is they change starting QBs and go back to Travis, and just try to run the ball down Louisville's throats using his running ability and multiple RBs.

Cards have started slow in every game this season I think @ FSU is a game they really need to be ready to play, FSU could fold if you force them to play from behind, but if they jump on the Cards early they will not let up.

 

[billoliver40]

Wake looked good. Clemson didnt. I have no clue what FSU is going to do...they are desperately looking for something.
The Cats played a bizarrely poor game.
Lotta lessons I hope are learned from that.
Florida beat Alabama everywhere but the scoreboard. Mike Leach tried to see just how many passes a kid can make...67 in a loss to Memphis.

Georgia, to me, is right this minute head and shoulders the #1 team in the nation.

 

[CardsFirst]

Agree ACC is just not good but I think I'd add WF to the short list of teams that might be on an upswing.

Hard to tell about WF they’ve yet to have any real competition. FSU is a dumpster fire and the other two wins were against lower level competition. I’d be ready but I think that game is winnable.

 

[Morgantown Card]

FSU may have already fired Norvell by the time we play them. That kind of scares me because they might have some new energy with him gone. He has lost that team.

FSU is stuck in the Ring of FARRRR'd. It is tough to get out of.

 

[TheRealVille]

FSU just needs a star QB. Momentum in football is paramount for success because it breeds confidence. These are youngsters, students who still for the most part are immature.

Today's culture is instant gratification and when it's hard to reach, young people just don't have enough life experience to adjust or simply deal with adversity.

If FSU had the Ole Miss QB, they would most likely be undefeated instead of winless. The teams confidence would explode with every TD. Instead, the team can't decide who the starting QB is. Since Jamison Winston left, the Seminoles can't find another star QB whether it be through transfer or high school. They're not winning.

The FSU program was so accustomed to reloading that they had no good solution to rebuilding. I think any of their recent coaches would have stayed on had he had a all conference type QB.

FSU has the recruiting numbers but in this game, you need a top level QB to really compete. There's always rare exceptions like Wisconsin, but have the Badgers ever really been a threat to win the playoff? Nope!

If and when FSU wins a big game, it will be due to one of those QB's having a great game. Hopefully its not next Saturday.

 

[nccardfan]

FSU is stuck in the Ring of FARRRR'd. It is tough to get out of.

Booger already has Dion packed and heading to Tallahassee. Prime Time.

 

[Louis III]

Wake looked good. Clemson didnt. I have no clue what FSU is going to do...they are desperately looking for something.
The Cats played a bizarrely poor game.
Lotta lessons I hope are learned from that.
Florida beat Alabama everywhere but the scoreboard. Mike Leach tried to see just how many passes a kid can make...67 in a loss to Memphis.

Georgia, to me, is right this minute head and shoulders the #1 team in the nation.

Why Georgia? They scored 3 offensive points vs Clemson and blew out 2 bums. They are good, but head and shoulders.....nope.

 

[billoliver40]

Why Georgia? They scored 3 offensive points vs Clemson and blew out 2 bums. They are good, but head and shoulders.....nope.

Defense. Best I've seen this year. The offense will develop as it settles in, but the defense will keep them in every game.

Just to admit...I've been fooled by about a dozen teams so far...so theres always that.

 

[TheRealVille]

Ole Miss looks better than any team I've seen. Of course that will probably change once they begin SEC play.

And watch out for Oregon. I think this season is wide open for the playoff.

 

[KozmasAgain]

Alabama and Clemson don’t look as dominant as they normally are and I think it is their quarterbacks. They normally have great quarterbacks but now they just have average quarterbacks at best. This is shaping up to being a crazy year where you might see Oregon and Cincinnati in the final game because the normal cast of characters don’t look that great. It sure would be a good year to have a great team.

 

[Louis III]

Alabama and Clemson don’t look as dominant as they normally are and I think it is their quarterbacks. They normally have great quarterbacks but now they just have average quarterbacks at best. This is shaping up to being a crazy year where you might see Oregon and Cincinnati in the final game because the normal cast of characters don’t look that great. It sure would be a good year to have a great team.

I am not saying that about Bama, they always throw in a game where they look beatable. I am VERY interested in the Ole Miss game this year. Clemson, 100% agree. I hope Clemson goes 9-3 or worse this year.

 

[EKYCard643]

Dating back to the end of 2019 FSU is 3-11 and Norvell is 3-9 at FSU.

2021:
Lost to Jacksonville State.
Lost to Wake by 21.

2020:
Lost to Ga Tech
Lost to Miami by 42
Lost to Notre Dame by 16
Lost to UofL by 32
Lost to Pitt by 24
Lost to NC State by 16
Lucked out and had Clemson game cancelled

In their 6 losses last year the average score was 40-17.

The state of FSU's football program makes our program look like Bama.

Florida State spent over $20 million to fire Taggart and his staff at the end of 2019. Then along with everyone else suffered through 2020 and spent $26.5 hiring Norvell and giving him a 6 year contract not including the fact they're probably spending around $5 million on staff contracts. Norvell's buyout is only around $3-$4 million BUT if FSU fires him without cause they owe him 85% of whats left on the contract. Roughly speaking I think if they fired Norvell at the end of this year they'd owe him somewhere around $15 million and this obviously doesn't include the $2-$3 million it would likely cost to fire his staff. (Also I'm not sure if coaches get paid their buyout on top of whats owed to them. Would Norvell get the $3-$4 million buyout AND 85% of this salary?) So this would mean that if FSU were to fire him at the end of the year they would have spent somewhere between $40-$50 million to fire coaches in basically 2.5 years and this also doesn't include the fact they would have to pay a new coach and staff to come to FSU and this would likely cost another $30 million for the coach and $5 million-ish for the staff.

I don't know that FSU can afford to fire Norvell.

Enjoy your time down there Chubba!

 

[Thecycle27]

The real question for Norvell has he lost his team? The one thing about Satterfield I never thought he lost the players. That played out Friday night. As long as Norvell hasn’t lost the players Saturday will be a tough test.

He is making several depth chart moves which may make it even harder to get everyone on the same page. Year 2 and people aren’t happy makes for a really tough job. Throw in Deion Sanders hanging in the wings makes it even more difficult.

Like last Friday for Satterfield Saturday is a pretty big game for Norvell.

 

[TheRealVille]

I guess I understand concern when playing a elite level program like FSU but if Louisville loses to them Saturday, I believe Satterfield is back on the hot seat. It's not fair but if you haven't noticed, nothing on this planet is fair.

FSU has lost 11 out of their past 14 games. They have been blown out by Wake, Pitt and Louisville last year. They lost to GT and NC State and this season lost to FCS team Jacksonville State.

The best they have played was against Norte Dame this season but the Irish almost lost to Toledo the following week. So much for the Seminoles performance against ND.

If Louisville is anywhere as good as we think after that win over UCF, losing to this FSU team would be like losing to Syracuse or Duke. It wouldn't be like losing to Ole Miss.

Right now the line is 2.5 for the Cards. I predict it will be at least 4 by gameday. I believe Louisville will win by two TD's or more because it doesn't matter what any of these players talent evaluation was in high school.

But at the risk of being called a jinx, I do realize Louisville could lose this game, but in my opinion it would be to poor play by the Cards and not great play from FSU.

 

[LeFors4Ever]

Louisville. We can get blown out by big time athletes. We can show up and surprise a team like ND and we can throw a dud in against a Georgia Tech. It's our DNA.

This is a DNA game, what's our 2021 DNA? Is our defense trash and does Malik make bad decisions? Or are we a team on the rise?

My opinion on the season changed 0% after Friday, because we've been about what I've thought we would be. I think we need to show consistency. How do we respond after all that emotion? How do we play when it's not a hyped up home crowd and we need big plays? That's what we need to see. I'm still in the range of 5-7 wins, which is good, this is a game where we trend towards 7 with a win.

 

[Ipartiedwithhopgood]

Probably too young to be consistent.

Ups n downs.