Florida State’s mock-worthy season reveals another truth: Be careful what you wish for
Behold, Florida State football: the gift that keeps on giving.
The joke that never, ever stops being funny. The Aesop fable that has come to life, and delivered moral lesson after moral lesson. If only Maryland were still in the ACC, so that the Seminoles could lose to the Terrapins, too, and deliver the college football version of the Tortoise and the Hare.
You know the story: The cocky, arrogant hare who ridicules the slow-moving tortoise, accepts a challenge for a race and then falls asleep, allowing his supposedly inferior opponent to win. Sound familiar, Seminoles? It should.
FSU suffered its latest indignity Friday during a 23-16 loss at Duke and, to quote N&O columnist Luke DeCock: “Hahahahahahaha.”
Indeed, we are laughing. The school attempting to sue its way out of the ACC under the guise that it’s too good and too valuable for such a lowly conference is now 1-6.
The school whose fans believe to be some kind of college football royalty (and the Seminoles were, at one point, but are no more), just lost to one of those other ACC schools FSU supporters love to put down: one that supposedly doesn’t care about football; that doesn’t “invest” (whatever that means, given that every school invests in football these days) and doesn’t “get it.”
Indeed, that’s always been the subtext of Florida State’s problem with the ACC: That the conference just doesn’t understand the importance of football (as if it’s some sort of regal and noble pursuit that requires higher understanding). That its schools just don’t treat it with as much reverence. That the high and mighty Seminoles just don’t belong in a league alongside such lowly company, especially that which (according to FSU) doesn’t worship at football’s altar.
And you know what: It is true. Fans of most ACC schools haven’t been brain-rotted by a singular focus on one particular athletics endeavor. That’s a good thing, by the way. Having varied interests and passions is a positive. FSU supporters would be wise to diversify their interests, too, given that over the past eight seasons (including this one) the Seminoles are now 30-32 in the ACC.
And that includes the 8-0 conference record of a season ago.
The deserved derision and mock-worthiness of this debacle of a season continues to be endlessly entertaining. It also continues to deliver valuable lessons. For one, FSU continues to prove just how nonsensical some of its arguments are. Pretty much all of its legal arguments are nonsensical, by the way, but we’re only talking here about the ones suggesting FSU doesn’t have enough money.
That it just has to leave the ACC, for fear of falling behind. Well, so much for that given the reality that the Seminoles continue to lose despite considerable financial advantages over competition it deems “less than.” FSU just lost to Duke, a school FSU fans would have you believe has practically never heard of football. Two weeks ago, FSU lost against SMU — which isn’t even taking a cut of ACC revenue because it wanted that badly to be a part of the conference.
So there’s that: Five of Florida State’s six defeats are proof that, no, you don’t necessarily need the most money or resources to compete. Just ask most of the schools that have defeated the Seminoles.
But also, too, FSU’s plight is another instance of “be careful what you wish for.” It has so desperately wanted to take on the role of the victim; to characterize itself as some persecuted sufferer of ACC tyranny. But really, the reason why everyone has taken so much joy in watching the Seminoles lose is because it’s a lot like seeing the schoolyard bully finally getting what he deserves.
And we’re not using bully to describe what the Seminoles were throughout the 1990s. FSU indeed bullied the rest of the ACC on the field back then, and backed up whatever talk came with it. All the talk more recently, though, has been akin to aging heavyweight prize fighter that doesn’t understand he’s well past his prime and will very much likely never be what he was, at least not in any kind of sustained way. That’s FSU these days: a bully who can’t back up the talk, whose defeats offer much satisfaction.
FSU will undoubtedly leave the ACC one day, but its departure will come a lot closer to 2036 — and the end of the conference’s Grant of Rights agreements — than its fans think. And then the Seminoles will learn what Oklahoma, USC, UCLA and Washington are learning now: That life in a new league isn’t as great as maybe they thought it’d be. That, hey: A lot of schools that think they’re too big or too good or too “valuable” to lose will, in fact, lose. A lot.
It will be funny, watching the Seminoles go 6-6 every year as a middle of the pack Big Ten or SEC team. It just won’t be as funny as this has been. But enjoy that money. It won’t provide any guarantee of success then, just as it hasn’t now.
ONE BIG THING
You know it probably wasn’t going to end well for Mike Houston in Greenville after ECU’s 55-24 loss at Charlotte earlier this month. That’s a no-go for the Pirates, who were long the state of North Carolina’s best non-ACC program, but who’ve certainly been passed by in that regard by Appalachian State — and now, apparently, by Charlotte, whose program is still new.
And so it wasn’t all too surprising that ECU fired Houston on Sunday, the day after a 45-28 defeat at Army. The timing, though, was mildly surprising. The loss against the 49ers, after all, was a lot more shameful than losing on the road against a ranked Army team. And was it that bad at ECU, that athletics director Jon Gilbert couldn’t wait?
Well, yes. Apparently so.
A bigger question, now: What does ECU aspire to be in this landscape?
THREE TO LIKE
1. Manny Diaz, ACC Coach of the Year?
No one was quite sure what to expect out of Duke this season, after the loss of Mike Elko and the departure of several key contributors. But it’s safe to say no one expected anything like this — a 6-1 start that includes the Blue Devils’ first victory against FSU. As we approach late October, nobody in the ACC has done a better head coaching job than Diaz. Give the man his props.
2. The Wolfpack, right on cue.
N.C. State found itself trailing 23-10 at Cal early in the fourth quarter Saturday, and it was fair to wonder whether the Wolfpack would simply roll over and stop fighting. Now it’s fair to wonder whether its 24-23 victory can be the catalyst toward another strong finish. State’s first six games were a disaster. No denying that. But under Dave Doeren it has at least proven resilient.
3. Remembering Tylee Craft.
It has not been a good season for North Carolina. Fan support is dwindling. Angst is rising surrounding Mack Brown, in the sixth season of his second UNC head coaching tenure. But perspective is needed. The Tar Heels gathered Sunday to honor and remember Tylee Craft in Sumter, South Carolina. Craft, who died of cancer at 23, will continue to be an inspiration.
THREE TO ... NOT LIKE AS MUCH
1. An unpatriotic showing against the service academies.
We owe a great deal to our service academies and the least any school can do, in a football sense, is to offer some decent competition. So much for that. ECU fared so poorly against Army — trailing 24-0 at the half — that Houston lost his job a day later. Charlotte did no better against Navy during a 51-17 defeat. A not-so hot take: Are Army and Navy, which require much deeper commitments beyond that to a sports team, uniquely equipped to navigate this era of college sports? Probably.
2. Friday night football.
Look, it’s not new. Friday night college football games have been a thing for a while. But they remain strange, out of place and a bad idea. And they further underscore the reality that TV just rules all, at the expense of, well, everything. As memorable as Duke’s victory over Florida State was, it should’ve come on Saturday. Leave Friday to high school football and TGIF reruns.
3. Enormous coaching buyouts.
One of the best gigs in the world has to be that of a fired FBS college football coach. Even Houston, whose ECU teams have been bad for the past year and a half, will be due nearly $3 million after the school fired him on Sunday. According to ESPN’s Pete Thamel, ECU will now owe Houston $2.8 million. While schools complain endlessly about money, and constantly ask fans to contribute more and more (and more), remember a lot of it is because they overpay coaches and then have to fire them — and then have to pay them a lot of money to go away. Houston’s buyout isn’t even that big, relative to the rest of the sport. But almost $3 mil to do nothing? Sounds pretty nice.
THIS WEEK’S BEST PROGRAM IN THE STATE
Well, surprise, surprise: It’s Duke! Again. But for once, the Blue Devils actually had some competition in this category. Indeed, that hand-in-the-dirt, blue-collar Wolfpack staked its claim, with all kinds of grit and fortitude in rallying for victory at Cal (and, as every ACC team has long understood, it’s not easy to just roll into Berkeley and leave with a W).
But Duke was 0-22 against Florida State and not only ended that streak but also added to the Seminoles’ misery.
CAROLINAS RANKING
1. Clemson (in a league of its own); 2. South Carolina (with a nice “35-9 welcome-to-the-SEC, Oklahoma,” victory against the Sooners); 3. Duke (can the Blue Devils’ magic continue against SMU and Miami?); 4-6: Some order of N.C. State, Wake Forest and North Carolina, depending on the week; 7. Coastal Carolina; 8. Appalachian State; 9. Charlotte; 10. ECU.
