10 college football coaches with the best chance of winning first national championship next
By John Buhler
6. Mike Norvell has the best shot of anyone without one over in the ACC
I hate to say it, but Mike Norvell had the team to do it last year. If not for Jordan Travis' broken leg, we may have seen the Florida State Seminoles win their first national championship in a decade, as well as their first in the College Football Playoff era. Norvell has Seminoles football all the way back, possibly in a better spot than what Jimbo Fisher had it during the first year of the BCS back in 2013.
If any team is capable of going on a run out of the ACC next year, it has to be Florida State. While I feel that their league's champion will be good enough to merit a top-four seed, an ACC champion in 2024 will actually be something like the eighth-best team in the country. The good news is I think the eighth-best team is about the worst team that can semi-realistically have a shot a winning it all now.
Again, getting that first-round bye to the quarterfinals will be paramount for Norvell's Seminoles team to do this. However, they are going to need to beat in all likelihood three Big Ten or SEC teams in succession to pull it off. I think in time Norvell will win a national championship at Florida State. It remains to be seen if it will be as a member of the ACC, as a national independent or in a new league.
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