Nolecast: Checking in on FSU’s opponents

Bud Elliott and Ingram Smith return with another episode of the Nolecast, the No. 1 FSU podcast.

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Bud was without power for eight days, so this is the return episode. Florida State did not play during this time, so we discussed the college football world through the FSU lens, most notably looking at FSU’s opponents.

• NC State. Are they better than their record suggests? ... Is the 12-point line appropriate for this game? This isn’t a full preview (episode to come later), but it’s a shorter discussion.
• Wake Forest and Duke are both improved, perhaps significantly. Enough so that FSU will have to game plan for these road games. But can these Tobacco Road teams match FSU’s physicality? There is danger in extrapolating the impact of competence or proficiency against bad teams, as Wake and Duke have shown, and then applying it to facing a very talented team.
• A long discussion of Clemson and Louisville.
• What is the right way to defend the final play of the Florida v. Tennessee game?
• Florida’s sneaky bad run defense.