Florida State lost to Clemson for the fourth straight year for the first time ever but this was the worst loss of them all and everyone should be embarrassed.
How the mighty have fallen.
That should be the title of the story documenting the fall of one of the best football programs of the last 30 years. Florida State ran the 90s under Bobby Bowden when they were annual contenders for the national title and a perennial Top 5 team. That success continued into the 21st century and saw a successful succession plan from Bowden to Jimbo Fisher who guided the team to the BCS National Championship against Auburn and had a Heisman Trophy winner at quarterback in Jameis Winston.
But the last few years have been a far cry from the types of teams Florida State have put on the field for the better part of the last 30 years. FSU lost three straight to ACC rival Clemson entering Saturday’s game that had the Seminoles as a 17-point underdog. Remember when this game was one of the biggest games of the year and held national championship implications? It was only three years ago. Now, it might not even qualify as a quality win for Clemson to boost their College Football Playoff resume.
Clemson beat Florida State 59-10 and as crazy as it might sound, it wasn’t even that close. This tied the worst loss in program history, matching the 49-point loss in 1973 when the Seminoles lost at Florida. If not for a garbage-time touchdown pass with four minutes and change left, it would have been the worst loss in program history.
There is no way to sugarcoat this loss. It was ugly. It was a clear sign of just how far this program has fallen so fast in recent years and how Clemson has replaced them as the best program in the conference. They have a long, long way to go to narrow the gap between them and Dabo Swinney’s program that should have another trip to the Playoff in store this year.
It’s even worse because this loss came against a rival program because the recruits who watched this game saw Florida State is not even remotely close to competing for division championships let alone conference and national titles. This is a team that might not even make a bowl game or have a winning record. FSU has the toughest remaining schedule according to ESPN with games against NC State and Florida among the notable challenges ahead.
I really feel bad for the fans of the program, because this was an embarrassment that the entire country saw. It’s one thing to struggle, and FSU fans knew this could be a challenging year, but I don’t think anyone thought it would be this bad. First-year head coach Willie Taggart looks completely in over his head, and despite some signs of improvement in recent weeks after a dreadful September, it’s back to the drawing board again, because this was the game that Florida State hit rock bottom.
Once you hit rock bottom, there’s no way it can get any worse, so I suppose, that’s a positive to take away, but is there enough confidence in Taggart to build this program back up and recruit elite athletes and then develop them into productive winning players? I have serious doubt about that.
It makes me wonder how many FSU wins wish Jimbo Fisher was still patrolling the sidelines in Doak Campbell Stadium instead of running him off and seeing him have Texas A&M ranked in the Top 25. Fisher’s last season got away him after the season-ending injury to Deondre Francois and he had a lot of players quit on him. But there’s no way they’d be this big of an embarrassment under his watch like Taggart has allowed.
Prepare for more dark days ahead for Florida State who may not recover from this embarrassing loss at all this year.