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Staff Predictions: Florida State vs. Louisville

Will the Seminoles start 0-4 for first time since 1974?

By FrankDNole, NoleThruandThru, Tommy Mire, Trey Rowland, CoachAB, LastNoleofKrypton, Jon Marchant, brianpellerin, Juan Montalvo III, and Perry Kostidakis Updated
COLLEGE FOOTBALL: SEP 05 Notre Dame at Florida State Photo by David Rosenblum/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

The Florida State Seminoles will play the Louisville Cardinals at Doak Campbell Stadium in Tallahassee Saturday afternoon at 3:30 p.m., and once again the Noles’ will be the underdogs.

Your Tomahawk Nation Staff, as they do every week before a game, have broken down the film, charted every play-by-play snap, performed A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) virtual simulations of the individual man-to-man matchups [by position], compiled, sorted, and analyzed all of the data, and have come to the conclusion that the Noles should indeed be the dogs in this game once again.

Florida State Seminoles vs. Louisville Cardinals:

Pre-Game Coverage from Tomahawk Nation

After looking over all of this FREE pregame content, please read what your Tomahawk Nation prognosticators predict how this Saturday’s showdown will go, and then share your opinions and your thoughts about this game.

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NoleThruandThru: I’ve planted my flag on the “youth movement” hill and I’m not budging. There are still a few older guys who are giving their best so I’m not advocating for freshmen to start at every position, but if you’re trying to sell playing time to your 2022 class, you’d better start showing that 2021 kids who are doing things the right way are seeing the field.

I’m not getting my hopes too high, but I really want to see names like Kevin Knowles, Omarion Cooper, Hunter Washington, Shyheim Brown, Pat Payton, and George Wilson start working their ways heavier into the rotation. On offense, let’s see more of Chubba Purdy, Jackson West, Bryan Robinson (working his way back from injury), Josh Burrell (who may be dealing with an injury), Malik McClain, Darion Williamson, Corey Wren, and Jakhi Douglas.

Start investing experience and reps in the guys who are either physically ready or close to it, because those are the guys who will help dictate the future of the program. This is a lost season and you need to find out who can help you, so let the younger guys recruited by this staff (and the guys who are still salvageable from previous regimes) work through their inexperience and build towards next season. If it’s a situation where an upperclassman and an underclassman are both playing through mistakes, I’m investing in the one who has a higher ceiling and more eligibility 10 times out of 10.

Rant over. Now, on to Saturday. I’m very confident that FSU will show the recruits visiting for the game just how badly their services are needed.

Louisville 38, FSU 17

Trey Rowland: I’m at the point now in the Florida State season where I need to actually see the ’Noles win a game before I can predict a victory on this venerable website. Real scientific stuff, I know.

Louisville definitely has some warts, but compared to them, FSU is Robert The Bruce’s leprosy-stricken dad from Braveheart. Can the Seminoles win? Can they overcome adversity? Will they actually play a decent game of football for the first time since Week 1?

Maybe, but I can’t see it yet.

Word to John Cena.

Louisville 31, FSU 20

Tommy: “Under pressure.” Pressure will be a key part for Florida State to pull off the win on both sides of the ball. Apply pressure from the defensive line and prevent pressure from the opponent. Win your one on ones, especially offensively, and contain Malik Cunningham to make the Cardinals one-dimensional. Your linebackers are going to need to be on point because I think that's where Louisville will attack regardless if they can break contain. If the offense can get into a rhythm and build momentum they should be able to put enough points on the board. Don’t shoot yourself in the foot and take the win.

Florida State 21, Louisville 28

FrankDNole: This will finally be the game where the defense, offense, and special teams, all come together and play an efficient and full game.

I expect the defense will frustrate the Cardinal offense most of the game and the offense will do just enough to give the Noles their first win of the season. There will dancing in The Doak and I’ll be dancing my butt off over at the Senior Center.

Florida State Seminoles 38 - Louisville Cardinals 31

CoachAB: Will this be the week the Noles get on the board? Let me save you the suspense. Nope. If you’ve been listening to the Triple Option lately, you’ve heard me mention accountability issues and talent issues. Well those things don’t just disappear mid season when your team is 0-3.

FSU will fight their tails off in front of a smallish crowd but it just doesn’t have the horses to win shootouts. Malik Cunningham, Louisville’s QB, is a weapon in the run game that FSU will have to account for play in and play out. This sadly means more solo deep shot opportunities for a defense that is good at giving them up.

Ville 42, FSU 17

LastNoleOfKrypton:

In all honesty, there’s no reason for FSU to win this game; like AB said forget FSU’s physical deficiencies; the mental deficiencies don’t disappear overnight and until I see fresh faces on the field those same guys will continue to make the same mistakes that they’ve made through three tenures now but......I’m a fan of speaking what you want into existence so here goes:

Louisville can’t tackle and Mike is going to run the ball and play keep away from Malik Cunningham and Louisville’s offense. Louisville will move the ball a bunch but they will turn it over because please God can something go right for FSU football for once.

FSU 34 UL 31

Juan Montalvo: Kentucky is a nice state.

It has bourbon. It has trees. It has a lot of green space. They like horses, which is cool, I guess. Lot of people like horses, so that's not that unique. Then again a lot of people like bourbon so that's not unique. Well, trees? I guess they've got those.

Florida State is surrounded by more bourbon trees and horses than the entire Lexington metropolitan area.

Noles destroy Stoops’ lads 41-0.

Jon Marchant:

I don’t believe this team will go winless. They’ll beat someone, probably even someone they shouldn’t. But after what they’ve shown the last couple weeks I just can’t pick them. Not until they prove it. Show us that team who went toe to toe with Notre Dame still exists. Show us some progress.

FSU 23, Louisville 38

Brian Pellerin:

At this rate, the best thing on the schedule for Florida State is the bye week. Chatting with you some of you in the comments of this week’s Seminole Wrap podcast, I’ve decided that’s the best chance for this team to regroup and try to find their footing, regain composure and be competitive again. Until then, they’ll have to make improvements from week-to-week and it’ll require a massive one to fix last week’s effort. I just can’t see that happening at this point.

FSU 17, Louisville 35

Perry Kostidakis:

Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down

Letting the days go by, water flowing underground

Into the blue again after the money’s gone

Once in a lifetime, water flowing underground

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was

Louisville 38, Florida State 21

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