(Second Half)

1st   0- 0  Opp, 37, field goal failed, 6:18 
      3- 0  Derek Schmidt, 23, field goal, 2:28 
2nd  10- 0  Herb Gainer, 39, pass from Chip Ferguson (Derek Schmidt, kick), 2:31 
     13- 0  Derek Schmidt, 39, field goal, 0:02 
3rd  13- 3  Opp, 33, field goal, 9:46 
     20- 3  Cletis Jones, 3, run (Derek Schmidt, kick), 6:02 
     27- 3  Herb Gainer, 19, pass from Chip Ferguson (Derek Schmidt, kick), 4:57 
     27-10  Opp, 29, pass (kick), 2:52 
     27-17  Opp, 12, pass (kick), 1:19 
4th  27-17  Derek Schmidt, 46, field goal blocked, 14:41
     34-17  Chip Ferguson, 1, run (Derek Schmidt, kick), 10:43
     34-23  Opp, 31, pass (pass failed), 0:10 


TEAM STATISTICS

                       FSU OPP
First downs             31      23
Rushes-yards        41-231  35-106
Passing                338     263
Att-Comp-Int       43-20-2 44-22-2
Total Yards         84-569  79-369
Punt Returns          3-25    3-37
Kickoff Returns       4-68    5-89
Interception Ret.     2-45     1-0
Fumble Returns         0-0     2-0
Punts               4-47.5  7-35.9
Sacks By-Yds           2-8    2-13
Fumbles-Lost           3-2     1-0
Penalties-Yds        9-110    3-27
3rd Down Conversions  6-16    6-18
Time of Posession    28:11   31:49
Attendance                  79,417

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

Rushing
Tony Smith                  24- 201
Cletis Jones                 6-  18
Victor Floyd                 2-   8
Keith Ross                   2-   7
Chip Ferguson                6-  -4

Receiving
Herb Gainer                  7- 148
Randy White                  4-  87
Pat Carter                   5-  81
Pete Panton                  1-  10
Tony Smith                   2-   8
John Brown                   1-   4

Passing
Chip Ferguson               43-20-1-338

Punt Return
Deion Sanders                3-  25

Kickoff Return
Keith Ross                   4-  68

Punting
Louis Berry                  4- 190

                        |---------Tackles---------| |---Sacks---| |---Pass Def---| |-Fumbles-| Blkd
DEFENSIVE STATISTICS     UT   AT  Total   ForLoss     No - Yards  Int-Yds BrUp QBH Rcv-Yds  FF Kick Saf
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul McGowan             11    5    16   2.0-            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Martin Mayhew             7    2     9      .            .           .      1    .    .      .   .   .
Stan Shiver               6    1     7   1.0-            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Deion Sanders             5    1     6      .            .          1- 29   5    .    .      .   .   .
Fred Jones                4    2     6      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Garth Jax                 2    3     5      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Greg Newell               3    2     5      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Darryl Gray               4    .     4   1.0-  3.0    1.0-  3.0      .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Todd Stroud               .    4     4      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Gerald Nichols            2    .     2   2.0-            .           .      1    .    .      .   .   .
Felton Hayes              1    1     2      .            .           .      1    .    .      .   .   .
Ed Clark                  1    1     2      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Tracy Sanders             .    1     1      .            .          1- 21   1    .    .      .   .   .
Isaac Williams            .    1     1      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Stanley Scott             1    .     1   1.0-  5.0    1.0-  5.0      .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Terry Warren              .    1     1      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Jesse Solomon             .    1     1      .            .           .      1    .    .      .   .   .
Bill Richardson           .    1     1      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Eric Stiehl               1    .     1      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
David Palmer              1    .     1      .            .           .      .    .    .      .   .   .
Eric Williams             .    .     .      .            .           .      .    .    .      1   .   .

Feel free to comment and make your best case.

If you missed it: http://howboutthemnoles.wordpress.com/2012/05/03/its-time-for-fsu-to-leave-the-acc/

There seems to be a growing belief among Seminole Nation that it’s time to leave the ACC for another conference. Yesterday, it was announced that FSU had a $2.4 million shortfall on its 2012-2013 athletic budget. This is embarrassing and only further shows why FSU needs to leave the ACC.

The ACC is just not invested in football. This was obvious when they added Pitt and Syracuse. They turned down West Virginia’s application, much to alleged chagrin of FSU and Clemson. The ACC is run by the Tobacco Road schools, with a UNC alum as it’s commissioner. This is a league that caters to it’s blue-blood basketball schools, but not to the football schools who actually bring the most money for the conference.  For example, the SEC does a perfect job of scheduling it’s marquee games. Last year they scheduled a bye week for both LSU and Alabama before they played each other. For FSU, the ACC scheduled the Clemson game directly after the game with Oklahoma. What did they do to Clemson? They scheduled them to play FSU after their game with Auburn, the defending champions. This year, they schedule FSU to play Clemson in the 4th week of the schedule? The only marquee games the ACC seems to care about are the bi-annual match ups between UNC and Duke in basketball.

Recent events suggesting a 4-team playoff would also be disastrous for FSU if it stayed in the ACC. The current proposal would have the four best teams in the country going to a final-four format to determine the national championship. What this will inevitably lead to is a final-four dominated by the SEC, Big Ten, and to a lesser extent, the Big 12/Pac-12. These conferences are the most politically powerful in college football and will influence who gets which spots. What’s to stop a 11-1 UGA team from getting to the final-four over a 11-1 FSU team due to the Noles belonging to a weaker conference? A playoff without automatic qualifiers for conference champions will lead to the ACC getting weaker, and the stronger conferences packing their teams to the final-four. Not having the ACC conference champion qualifying for a final-four spot means A LOT less revenue coming in to FSU and other ACC teams. In turn, the financial gap between SEC teams and FSU will only grow, leaving us in the dust.

Though many of us would like to jump to the SEC, there are several reasons why it probably will never happen. For one, there’s the much talked about “alliance” between UF, UGA, and South Carolina, where they would each vote against adding a university that resides in their home state. UF, as we all know, has throughout its history tried to stymie FSU’S growth. When FSU started its football team in the late 1940s, it was UF that fought to control FSU’s athletic program, calling it the “Tallahassee Branch of the University of Florida”. No joke, you can read more it here,  (http://nolefan.org/summary/fsu_uf.html) . SEC teams are content to use the “they’re in the ACC” argument against us to recruits as it’s really the only advantage they really have over us. Despite this, FSU has been recruiting like gangbusters with Jimbo Fisher at the helm, so why would the SEC give up this advantage and let us in? The SEC has made it clear that they will only expand to increase their TV footprint. This means they will not go to the state of Florida to add another team.

The only conference that seems like a legitimate option for FSU is the Big 12. This would have been unthinkable at this point last year, but the Big 12 did a reasonably good job saving the conference. They added TCU and West Virginia, which is of course a more impressive coup than the ACC’s annexation of Pitt and Syracuse. I know some are concerned about travel expenses, and this is a valid argument. FSU has to travel to Boston College, Maryland, and will soon have to travel to Syracuse and Pitt. These are not exactly nearby areas. In theory, this would be the new Big 12:

West Division: Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Baylor, TCU, Texas Tech, (another team)

East: FSU, Clemson, West Virginia, Iowa State, Kansas State, Kansas, Louisville

In this hypothetical situation, FSU would travel to several places that are just as close if not closer than several places in the ACC. Remember, that a big problem for FSU is the fact that ACC fan bases just do not travel well, and leave empty seats for Doak Campbell Stadium. Is it not pretty much a guarantee that the fan bases of West Virginia, Louisville, and other Big 12 teams like Texas and Oklahoma, would bring way more people to Tallahassee than ACC teams? Would that lineup not surely bring more FSU fans to the stadium? I think so. Another argument against going to another conference would be the $20 million FSU would have to pay to leave the ACC. This would be a major stumbling block, but I think it could be done if the amount to leave were split between FSU and the Big 12 (out of future earnings). FSU would be making a lot more money from a re-negotiated Big 12 conference deal with ESPN (as would probably happen if FSU/Clemson and others were added), which would help in paying off the ACC. Today it was reported that the Big 12 hired Stanford AD Bob Bowlsby as their new commissioner, who is said to be an intelligent leader and a football guy through and through. While the Big 12 is bracing itself for this new college football landscape, the ACC’s insularity and lack of vision will be its downfall.

QB Gary Huff in 1972.

Gary Huff was FSU’s starting QB in the early 1970s under head coach Larry Jones. He was an All-American and led the nation in the TD passes in both 1971 and 1972. He played in the first ever Fiesta Bowl, throwing for 347 yards

Year Award
1971  Associated Press - All-American - Honorable Mention
      United Press International - All-American - Honorable Mention
1972  Churchman's - 1st Team All-American
      Football Writers Association - 1st Team All-American
      Gridiron - 1st Team All-American
      College & Pro Football Weekly - 1st Team All-American
      Time Magazine - 1st Team All-American
      Football News - 2nd Team All-American
      United Press International - 2nd Team All-American
      Associated Press - All-American - Honorable Mention

It only took two years, but by the end of the 1977 football season, Bobby Bowden had won over the Seminole faithful with victories over Auburn, Virginia Tech, and, most importantly, a spanking of in-state rivals Florida. WFSU-TV’s J. Leigh Rubinas talked with the coach about the difficulties of coaching and being a family man, the kinds of players he was looking to build a program with, and what it takes to keep fans happy with the man coaching their team. Little could Seminole fans have dreamed at this early stage about what Bowden would accomplish at FSU. But here the man is before the National Championships, the Heisman Trophies, the streaks, or even a single gray hair upon his head. Enjoy.

Jeff Luc was the #1 ILB recruit in the country in 2010.

- Football players Darious Cummings and Jeff Luc have decided to leave the program and transfer. Cummings is a very nice young man and a hard worker, but he was never going to receive significant playing time as the DT position at FSU is loaded. Jeff Luc was arguably one of the most important FSU recruits in a long time. Luc and Lamarcus Joyner’s commitment to FSU in the early days of the Jimbo Fisher era created an incredible momentum that pushed the Noles’ recruiting class into the top-10 on Signing Day 2010. Luc’s FSU career never lived up to his lofty ranking due to injuries and other LB’s passing him on the depth chart. I wish them both well on their future endeavors. As I like to say…Once a Nole, always a Nole.

- FSU Baseball’s OF James Ramsey was named a finalist for the Lowe’s Senior Class Award. You can vote for him here: http://www.seniorclassaward.com/vote/baseball_2012

-  Heisman Trophy winner Charlie Ward will do an autograph signing at the Governor Square Mall’s Garnet and Gold Store in Tallahassee today from 3:00-4:30 p.m. Tonight, the Tallahassee Quarterback Club will be honoring Ward with a “Roast and Toast”, featuring many of his former teammates from his FSU and NBA playing days.

- FSU Softball signed a JUCO pitcher from TCC (and Australia!) named Emily Smethurst. For her sophomore season, she went 10-3 on the season with a 1.24 ERA and held opposing hitters to a .188 batting average.

- The ACC Champion Indoor volleyball team announced the signing of one of the best recruiting classes in the country yesterday. This was big as we lose four seniors off of last year’s incredible Final Four run.

- Today begins the NFL Draft. Don’t expect any Noles to be taken until at least the 3rd round.

What's your idea for an FSU-themed College GameDay commercial?

During college football season, ESPN tends to air College GameDay commercials pretty frequently. I’ve always been envious that they haven’t really featured FSU in any of them so I definitely perked up when I read that College GameDay would be holding a vote to see where they would film a commercial.

From ESPN.com:

Want to see your school in a “College GameDay” commercial? Well, here’s your chance to make that happen. 

For the first time ever, ESPN will film a “College GameDay” commercial on a campus selected by fans. Starting today and running through May 2, fans can vote once per day for their university at GameDayVote.com via computers, smartphones or using Facebook (facebook.com/collegegameday). Fans can keep track of the leading schools throughout the promotion and share the contest with friends on various social platforms to drive votes for their university. 

More than 120 FBS football programs will be included in the promotion. The commercial will be filmed this summer on the selected campus with real students and begin airing in the fall to promote the 2012 season of “College GameDay” Built by The Home Depot. 

My idea for a FSU-themed College GameDay commercial:

You have Kirk Herbstreit, Chris Fowler, and Desmond Howard on Langford Green staring at the Unconquered statue. They banter about the statue a bit, saying it’s imposing but that it’s only a statue. They hear a noise and quickly turn around. There they see Lee Corso in the middle of Langford Green with his Seminole headgear, standing right next to Osceola and Renegade. Corso yells out something to the effect of “o yeah, want something really imposing?”. He then tells Osceola to charge (like he does right before kick-off) and the GameDay crew runs away (audio of the war chant comes on).

If FSU were to win, my guess is they definitely would involve Osceola in some way.

EDIT: Seems as though ESPN has taken down the College GameDay poll due to people runnings bots to increase votes. Well played, FSU fans.

Heaven on Earth

This is one of the best pictures I’ve ever seen of Doak Campbell Stadium. Courtesy of FSU football player Jacobbi McDaniel (@Jacobbi55Apollo).

Nice to see the great support from E.J.’s high school.

E.J. Levenberry, a 6’3, 226lb four-star LB from Woodbridge, Virginia committed to FSU over Michigan today. This was a close race, as Levenberry favored both FSU and Michigan at different points of his recruitment. It is thought by many that FSU’s highly rated Criminal Justice program might have given the Seminoles the edge here. He becomes the Noles’ 9th commit, and 2nd from outside the state of Florida. He had also received offers from LSU, Oklahoma, UF, and Ohio State, among others.

Here’s how the three major recruiting services rated Levenberry:

ESPN: 4* (Rating: 80)

Rivals: 4* (Rating: 6.0)

247 Sports: 4* (Rating: 91)