A new name to add to the defensive coordinator board; Jay Valai. He is the co-defensive coordinator at Oklahoma. Valai is also responsible for coaching the defensive backs. He is making 750k with the Oklahoma Sooners. Coach Fuller Salary was going to be close to 1.8 million if he had continued to coach at FSU. Valai is a coach who has also quickly moved up the ranks. Oklahoma had Valai and Todd Bates run the defense with head coach Brent Venables also involved in the defense. The Sooners defense this year is 23rd (Scoring Defense), 15th (Rushing Defense), 16th (Total Defense). They are 13th in (Yards Per Play). Oklahoma has 33 sacks this year. Does he bring his best pass rusher with him to FSU? (Mason Thomas-8 Sacks) Who played high school football at Cardinal Gibbons high school in Fort Lauderdale.

Why Valai: Check them boxes....He played college football under Bret Bielema at Wisconsin. He has coached at Georgia (Kirby Smart-2016-2017), with the KC Chiefs (2018), Rutgers DB Coach (Greg Schiano), Texas -(2020-Under Chris Ash), Alabama (2021-Nick Saban) and now Oklahoma (Brent Venables). He has coached under the whose -who of defensive coaches. He has been prepared to the guy. He is young. He is going to be a future head coach if he continues to rise at the same rate. He has coached in the SEC (Alabama, Georgia, OU), Big 12 (Texas). He has coached in the NFL.

Can he recruit: (Peyton Bowen -5-Star DB-Texas, Makari Vickers-Robert Munroe School-Tallahassee, Earl Little-American Heritage-(Alabama), Jam Miller -Alabama Leading Rusher - (557- yards-7 Touchdowns-5.21 AVG). He has shown the ability to recruit Texas (Peyton Bowen), Florida (Vickers), state of Washington. He has landed 1 (5), 18 (4) star recruit. He is a big game hunter. He can relate to the athletes which comes out of high school these days.

Why Not? This comes down to the Tino Sunseri conversation. Would you be willing to give a coach who has not been THE GUY the DC job at FSU. Valai has learned from the best but is this the time to take a chance on a coach who would be the DC. He would be given the keys to the car. He checks a ton of boxes. There are bigger names but what are the odds those guys show up at FSU.

Final Thoughts: I have known Valai since he played at Wisconsin. He is very impressive as a coach. I have seen him work and this guy goes all in. He loves to recruit the state of Florida. He does not shy away from going after the very best players. Oklahoma is not a school that has more NIL than FSU. Let Valai go and recruit Florida with an FSU logo on that shirt and he will excel. He is someone that is going to get the shot real soon to run his own defense.

News and notes from around the nation. A few nuggets on prospects in the mix for FSU:

I have a message out to Terry to see if he plans on taking an official visit to FSU. Will update later.

FSU 91 Western Carolina 57 The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly


The Good

FSU improves to 7-1 in dominating fashion over WCU. The Seminoles made it a mission to not have any drop off after pummeling UMass last Friday. The 'Noles rolled right from the start of the game building a double digit lead a little more thn three minutes into the contest. They made it clear that it would not be a matter of getting the win, but what the margin of victory would be. As it turned out the final score was the largest differential in the game. Leading from start to finish, the Seminoles just continued to put the pedal down for the entire forty minutes. For those of you who had a short term investment in the game, obviously the Seminoles easy surpassed to 20.5 point spread.

FSU's defense. The Catamounts average 30 three point shots per game connecting on nearly 50%. Tonight they launched 36 but made just 8 (22%). Credit the Seminole defense which was very active all game long causing deflections (they want 35 per game, they got 50 tonight) generally getting hands in the face of the shooters. WCU had enormous difficulties in dealing with the length of the Seminole defenders. If it wasn't a deflection it was steal. Fifteen of WCU's nineteen turnovers were from FSU thefts resulting in 17 points.

Overall good passing tonight as FSU logged 19 assists on their 31 made baskets.

FSU's shooting. 57% from the floor, 9-21 (43%) from the arc, and 20-26 (77%) from the stripe. I can't say the WCU defense was particularly tough. But FSU stayed focused in this game taking advantage of what the Catamount defense gave them. Which was just about everything. Also the 'Noles were able to control and push the tempo to their liking.

The 21-3 run over the last 7:46 of the first half that blew the game wide open giving FSU a 49-20 lead at intermission.

Three Seminoles in double figures. Dequan Davis with 19 ( a season high), Jamir Watkins with 14, and Malique Ewin with 12 (all in the first half).

Plays of the game: Watkins sees the defense back way off of him leaving him all alone at the arc on the left wing. He of course canned it, 30-17. Watkins from the left wing throwing a line drive pass on a rope to Chandler Jackson cutting to the rim for the lay up, 34-17. Davis with the banked three off the glass to give the Seminoles that half time lead of 49-20. Taylor Bol Bowen on the inbound play taking an off balance shot while falling to the floor plus the foul, 59-36. All five players touching the ball with quick passing around the floor resulting in Christian Nitu hitting a wide open Justin Thomas cutting to the rim for the slam dunk , 79-48. There were plenty more stellar plays that would make this diatribe much too long.


The Bad

The second unit struggled on both ends half way through the first half which was unusual for this group this season. What was a healthy double digit lead at 20-5 turned into single digits, 23-15.

Turnovers, 18 of them in what Leonard Hamilton said after the game were turnovers of "good intentions". I don't believe I have ever heard turnovers described that way. Not so much the result of anything that WCU did defensively, but the result things like passes off target or without proper touch according to Hamilton. Obviously he wanted fewer of those, but he did not sound that concerned and that it was correctable. It was still 18 turnovers however.


The Ugly

While overall defending the perimeter was good, there were those few moments communication in switching fell apart and fell apart badly leaving a shooter standing all alone. Thankfully WCU was not knocking down those shots.

The loose ball rolling on the floor that Watkins just sort of stood there waiting for it to roll to him. Meanwhile the Catamount player (Ice Emery, great name) was not going to wait for that and the result was the transition basket the other way, 54-36. Not Watkins' best moment. But he has very few of those moments.


Up Next

Florida State with an entire week off from games before going on the road to face LSU next Tuesday at 9:00 PM as part of the ACC/SEC Challenge. The Tigers are currently 5-1 after a triple OT victory over UCF, 109-102, and will face Northwestern State on Friday. This will obviously be a tough test for the 'Noles as LSU has five players averaging double digits. The game will be on the SEC network according to the LSU website.