Enters the portal. I know he had snapping issues but can he block?

A strong defensive start and a balanced scoring attack helped the FSU men's basketball team convincingly win its ACC home opener vs. Georgia Tech.

Rumors that he might hit the portal! He was coached by Surtain in high school I believe.

With 11 minutes to go in the fourh quarter and Washington leading Texas 34-21, I was ready to hit post thread with the following message but then the UT quarterback threw a pair of dimes to make the score 33-28 with a little under 8 minutes remaining to put Texas right back in it.

All season long, Fish and I have had a respectful debate about Washington.
I didn't think their defense was good enough to win a playoff game let alone the national championship.
To his credit he was very patient with me, while continuing to assure me Washington has too much offense to lose.
He was right. I was wrong.

This has been a good game.

FSU 82 GT 71 The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly


The Good

FSU starts off the new year in the win column improving its record to 7-6, 1-1 spurred by a much better team effort that was seen earlier this season such as in the games in Daytona. GT has been waiting since January, 2016 to win in Tallahassee. After tonight the Yellow Jackets are still waiting. Tech led once ... 3-0. It was all Florida State from then on leading by as many as 17 points in the first half. Tech closed the gap to 8 points twice in the second period. But FSU's defense stiffened and held Tech off. This was a win the team needed.

Key in the win offensively anyway was the play of the bench scoring 42 points to just 16 for the Jackets. Everybody who played scored something for Florida State. As Leonard Hamilton said in post game tonight the team "shared the ball and moved the ball". Even when Tech picked up its tempo and was making its run at the lead, the Seminole offense was clicking shooting an astounding 64% from the floor in the second half.

Leading the team in scoring was Chandler Jackson with a career high 14 points. Jamir Watkins added 11, all in the second half, and Darin Green scored 10.

Also key in the win was a stifling defense in the first half, FSU's quick to the ball defense held Tech to 27% from the floor and 1-14 (that's 7% for those of you keeping score at home) from the arc..

Notable plays of the game: Jackson's driving lay up from the left, 37-22, and then stealing the inbound pass. Jalen Warley driving in the lane is tripped. Falling, Warley flips the ball up and in, 62-49. Not to make light of Tech's Charles Kelly falling into the end line seats and getting shaken up enough to have to substitute for him, but that allowed Hamilton to pick Tech's worst FT shooter, Tafara Gaspara who is 54% from the stripe. He lived up to that percentage and then some missing both. Primo Spears' alley oop pass to Cameron Corhen for the slam dunk, 26-17. Corhen with the offensive putback at the intermission buzzer staying with the play when Tech appeared to give up when the shot clock went off two seconds earlier. Warley keeping Tech at bay sinking two critical FTs with 38 seconds left, 78-69. The baseball inbound pass from Jackson to a wide open Warley and the layup, 80-69. Baba Miller displaying his pro potential with the driving lay up in an instant from the right wing for the slam.


The Bad

On Miller's slam, he was fouled on the play and looked to make it the conventional three point play. He missed however. A 43% shooter from the stripe obviously needs some work.

As Hamilton mentioned, ball movement was very good. One play early in the second half highlighted that as players without the ball were moving. The ball was moving. Everything was going well on the possession. Except until the ball ended up in Warley's hands with just seconds left on the shot clock. The result was Warley's shot being stuffed.

De'Ante Green and his lone three point attempt. BTW, he was wiiiiiide open. You know why he was wiiiiiiide open? He was 1-9 now 1-10 from the arc. If he is wondering why no one is guarding him out there, that's why. Either make them or post up. I vote for the post up.

Microcosms of good and bad in this game. Mostly good, but .... twice timing on the lob from Spears to Justin Gainey resulted in a turnover and twice passes to the sideline had the receiver with a foot on the line. Turnover or should I say turnovers? One of those occurred with just five seconds expended on the shot clock. Patience Grasshopper. Patience.


The Ugly

FSU's defense clamped down at the arc as mentioned earlier. In the early minutes of the second half, Tech essentially forgot all about the arc and went to dribble penetration creating an 8-0 run. And then FSU goes to a zone for two consecutive possessions. The result was two straight threes from the Jackets, End of the zone defense at that point.

Warley fouling a 3 point shooter (Kelly) with just 4.6 seconds left in the game????? He should not have been within 5 feet of him at that point. Time plus scoreboard. Always a good measurement of dictating your defense.


Up Next

The other Tech comes to Tallahassee on Saturday for a 4 PM tip to be shown on the ACCN. When we last saw the 9-4, 1-1 Hokies, they were busily being hammered by Wake Forest at Wake Forest 86-63. Not the performance they were looking for I am sure. This should be a very focused Virginia Tech team FSU faces especially with an entire week to prepare. VT is led by Lynn Hunter (16 ppg), Hunter Catoor (14 ppg), and Sean Padulla (12 ppg) the last two seemingly having been at Virginia Tech now for 8 years (not really).

I’ve seen a few posts here from members suggesting we may be a 2-4 loss team. Where are all those losses coming from. My guess with DJU, MJJ and a few nice portal additions we should be favored to win the conference.

Biggest threats are ND away, um at home and clemmy at home. ND away is the only one that is really worrisome to me, and that is a non-conference game. fu is also at home, and they are hemorrhaging talent with no end in sight. UNC … no Drake Maye, and we’ve owned them even when rebuilding.

Our biggest issue would be if DJU goes down, and I think Brock’s development is accelerating to manage that.

I think we go 12-1 or 13-0 again. Possibly 11-2 with an unexpected loss, but still ACC champs.

After a brief dive into conference play last month at North Carolina, the Florida State men's basketball team dives into the deep end of ACC play Wednesday night vs. Georgia Tech. The Seminoles (6-6, 0-1) host the Yellow Jackets (8-4, 1-0) Wednesday at 7 p.m. (ACC Network) at the Tucker Civic Center for their home ACC opener. It's the first of 19 consecutive conference games to close out the regular season for the Seminoles and the fifth game of FSU's current seven-game homestand.

For FSU, it's a chance to bounce back after their two-game winning streak was snapped last Saturday in a 78-75 home loss to Lipscomb. Sophomore forward Cam Corhen returned to action in that game after missing the previous five games due to injury, but the Seminoles allowed Lipscomb to shoot 11 of 23 from outside the arc, building a big early lead and holding off a late FSU comeback to pull off the upset and send the Seminoles back to .500 on the season.

Senior Darin Green Jr. enters Wednesday’s game against Georgia Tech ranked seventh nationally among current players with 332 career 3-point shots made. He and Joseph Girard III of Clemson are both ranked in the top seven nationally among current players. Girard has made 335 career 3-point shots.

LOOK FOR FLORIDA STATE TO...
...Defeat Georgia Tech and win its sixth consecutive home game against the Yellow Jackets. The Seminoles have defeated Georgia Tech in each game at the Donald L. Tucker since an 88-77 win on January 24, 2018
...Defeat Georgia Tech and win its ACC home opener against the Yellow Jackets for the third consecutive time when the two teams played in the Seminoles’ ACC home opener. The Seminoles defeated the Yellow Jackets to open their home conference schedule in 2019 and 2020 (2019-20, December 31, 2019, 70-58), (2020-21, December 15, 2020, 74-61).

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GO NOLES!!!

From an excellent article in the athletic, I am cutting and pasting an incredible bit of information that is not general knowledge, but rather the bench mark of the “eye test”

This was the first year that a super team lost to a developmental team. This may be the turn of a movement in college football now, where FSU is near the forefront with stable coaching and relationship buoy recruiting, which was lost during the COVID years due to lack of visits and travel.

The super teams always, always, always beat the developmental teams at the end of the year.

Well, Michigan just proved it’s not always.

The 2023 Alabama team boasts the second-most talented roster — on paper — in the modern recruiting era (dating back to 2002). The average scholarship player on this team was a top-100 recruit coming out of high school. That is an absurd statistic. Even if half of the signees didn’t pan out, Alabama would still have 40-ish players who lived up to their recruiting hype and would be among the best players at their position in the country. That’s basically an entire two-deep. It’s unfathomable how many good players are on this team.

For those that have seen Kam Davis play, what former Noles RB’s does he resemble? Warrick Dunn, Devonte Freeman, Antone Smith, Lorenzo Booker?

Hit the portal yesterday. @Fishbits Any change FSU makes another run at him?

FSU defensive end Gilber Edmond is transferring out of the program just one season after joining the Seminoles from South Carolina.

In a discussion with my eye doctor today and he indicated that a lot of players have agents helping them get better deals with other schools. I thought it was prohibited to sign deals with agents while in college. Maybe I’m wrong…anybody know about this?

Throughtout the season, I did a comparison of how many 4 and 5 star prospects participated in the game compared to how many played for the opponent. That 2023 team went 13-0 while being outmanned in the LSU, Clemson, Miami, Florida and Louisville games

So how does in look for next year?

By my count, FSU had two 5 star prospect on the 2023 last year (Akeem Dent and Hykeem Williams) and 21 four-star prospects. Of those 4 stars, 12 were freshmen or redshirt freshmen and only a few played a substantial amout (Hussey, Hikeem, D. Hill, Armella) so the Noles got a lot done with good evaluaions of three star players.

The Seminoles will have more five stars than last year with three (Williams, DJU and Marvin Jones) and 31 four stars for a total of 34 so if you measure a roster by star count the numbers are trending in the right direction.

The addition of DJU at quarterback and Marvin Jones at defensive end help to satisfy position needs, which is of paramount importance. I'd like to see FSU add another player at the following positions through the portal or later signing period: DE, DT, LB, OL and maybe TE, RB and receiver if he is a deep threat. By the look of their transfer portal hey are bringing in those positions on visits.

Well, whaddya know? Both undefeated Michigan and Washington beat one-loss Alabama and one-loss Texas. Perhaps it really does mean something when you win all your games.

I see there are a lot of knowledgeable folks and maybe some attorneys on this forum. Anybody tracking the status of the Florida AG’s civil investigative demand subpoena of the CFP LLC for antitrust? Her stated dates were Dec. 26 to begin answering with a final deadline of Jan. 11. Seems like discovery from that preceding civil action might be useful to another state entity’s civil case.

After winning the Dodd Trophy last week, FSU coach Mike Norvell was named one of five finalists for the Munger Coach of the Year award today.

Jerry…..I’m assuming there are a very limited number of companies who write those injury insurance policies. Have you ever seen the language in those short term policies and do you have any knowledge of the cost of coverage?

It wasn't long ago there were some serious questions about FSU's wide receiver recruiting. The Seminoles have signed seven blue-chip, high-school wide receivers over the last two classes, flipping that narrative on its head.

We just don't have the offensive line to compete with teams like Michigan and Alabama. These teams have absolute hogs up front, and we just don't. We don't move people up front. That's ultimately why JT got injured, because we couldn't even get movement against lowly North Alabama. If we had a solid offensive line, JT never would have been running in that game. We have to make major changes up front to compete for a championship. Our strategy of getting all these former 2 star recruit transfers from small schools is not working. We need to recruit and develop grown ass men on the offensive line. NIL needs to pony up the big bucks for these big kids who are physically developed. All these 3 star projects and transfers aren't going to cut it. Miami has been kicking our ass in recruiting on both sides of the line of scrimmage. They're in a better position to compete for championships than we are going forward. We need to pony up the big bucks for recruits, and coach Storms needs to give these kids more food and more steroids. Alabama's offensive line is obviously on a shit load of steroids. If we're not willing to do that, then we can't compete. What we have been doing is not working. Changes have to be made. Landing Solomon Thomas would be huge, he's exactly the type of kid we have been lacking. We need to be prepared for a bidding war over him. We have to commit serious money to these type of kids if we want to compete with Alabama. If we can't spend the money to hold on to these type of recruits, then we can forget about competing for championships, and forget about beating Miami anymore too, because they have been stacking top end talent on both sides of the line of scrimmage. There is going to come a point where we just don't have the horses up front to beat Miami anymore, and that might be sooner than you think. It might be next year.

Not sure how I feel about this. Yes, big ratings are what's driving the demand for FSU to get its entrance into a P2 conference, but, that was one steaming mound for that many people to be watching...

Early line says Michigan by 4.5.
Agree?

Nice showing today with a current and soon-to-be member both washing out in the semis...They showed us!

It just means more.