{"id":13254,"date":"2025-10-21T01:24:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T01:24:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/13254\/"},"modified":"2025-10-21T01:24:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-21T01:24:07","slug":"how-fsu-let-one-magical-season-set-their-program-back-another-five-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/13254\/","title":{"rendered":"How FSU Let One Magical Season Set Their Program Back Another Five Years"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Safe to say FSU AD Michael Alford has buyers remorse.<\/p>\n<p>PublishedOctober 20, 2025 6:29 PM EDT\u2022UpdatedOctober 20, 2025 6:29 PM EDT<\/p>\n<p>FacebookTwitterEmailCopy Link<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Take yourself back to January 2024.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">The Florida State Seminoles are fresh off a 13-1 season, winning the ACC Championship and just narrowly missing the College Football Playoff.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Sure, they got their brains beaten in by Georgia in the Orange Bowl, but who cares!? Coach Mike Norvell has this thing trending in the right direction.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Their in-state rivals Miami and Florida are floundering in mediocrity, so it looks like the Seminoles will be the sultans of the Sunshine State for seasons to come.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Then (allegedly), Alabama came calling after legendary coach Nick Saban abruptly called it quits.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Florida State was faced with a decision, and for them, it was an easy one.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Of course, FSU wanted to extend Norvell and make him their coach for years to come; it was a no-brainer.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Flash forward less than 24 months after the massive extension locked Norvell in Tallahassee for eight more years, and it looks like AD Michael Alford is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outkick.com\/sports\/college-football-florida-state-auburn-coaching-norvell-freeze\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">experiencing the ultimate case of buyers remorse<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">The Seminoles are 5-14 since the start of the 2024 season and aren&#8217;t showing any signs of moving on from their current head coach.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">And they have this massive contract from two years ago to thank for their stint in college football purgatory.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">I can&#8217;t say I blame the boosters and athletic department for their reticence towards moving on from Norvell.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">That buyout number ($58 million according to OutKick&#8217;s Trey Wallace) coupled with the amount of greenbacks it would take to coax a new head coach to the Panhandle makes for a staggering sum, but Florida State has no one to blame but themselves.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">The signs were there: a lack of high school recruiting success (which, despite popular opinion, still matters in 2025), high rates of roster turnover and close calls against inferior opponents.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">Alford and co. made a panic purchase, and it may have cost a proud program like Florida State another half a decade of relevance.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">I don&#8217;t see a world where Norvell turns this thing around at Florida State.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">I didn&#8217;t see it in December 2024, after a 2-10 season and I damn sure don&#8217;t see it today.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">The transfer portal and another retread at offensive coordinator won&#8217;t save his career, and it won&#8217;t dig FSU out of the rut it is in currently.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align:left;\">The powers that be have made the bed in Northwest Florida, now the fans have to sleep in it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Safe to say FSU AD Michael Alford has buyers remorse. PublishedOctober 20, 2025 6:29 PM EDT\u2022UpdatedOctober 20, 2025&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13255,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[232,234,233],"class_list":["post-13254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13254\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}