Almost universally, it feels like all conversations about Florida State football for the upcoming season, whether online or with friends, range from apathy to anger. But the best part of the beginning of any campaign is that there can still be hope. So, with fall camp beginning around the corner and the week zero matchup against New Mexico State just over a month away, it made sense to try and infuse some positivity into the upcoming year.<\/p>\n
Duce Robinson feels like the perfect anecdote for the dark clouds swirling around the Florida State football program, and that is true even before he steps between the white lines. The son of a former FSU great, he makes it clear every time he talks about the Seminoles that his love for the school and the city of Tallahassee as a whole is evident. Throughout spring practice and even during ACC Media Days, Robinson seems like the unquestioned leader of the roster, alongside QB Ashton Daniels.<\/p>\n
As far as his ability on the field, the senior looks to build on his 1,000-yard campaign from a year ago, and there is no reason he should not be even more impactful. During his time in Charlotte at Media Days, Robinson talked about wanting to be moved all over the field, not just as an outside receiver, which should benefit him and the team by finding ways to get him the ball early and often. In the offseason, FSU built its offense around his skill set, putting speedy wide receivers around him, and a clear identity in the passing game will make Florida more efficient on offense.<\/p>\n
So often in the transfer portal era, the relationship with players feels transactional, but Robinson created a connection with the fan base, and it will be exciting to watch his draft stock rise throughout the year.<\/p>\n
There will be disagreements on this one, but at face value, the unit has the potential and the pieces to be one of the best on the roster.<\/p>\n
It starts with the return of the Desir brothers, who were one of the few bright spots from the 2025 season. With another year in a college weight program, Mandrell is now listed at 6\u20194\u201d 270 pounds, and his brother, Daryll, at 6\u20195\u201d 259 pounds \u2014 two monster d-linemen to set the edge in the first level of the 3-3-5. Seeing these two take another step in their sophomore season could be its own paragraph, but they also have depth behind them. Rylan Kennedy should give FSU a pass rush specialist they did not have a year ago, and, with a healthy Deamontae Diggs and Deante McCray, who can also play inside, the Seminoles should be able to mix and match without being overly reliant on one or two players. In the middle of the defense, Daniel Lyons returns for his redshirt-senior season and was listed by Dane Brugler as the 19th-best senior DT prospect in his preseason positional rankings article for The Athletic. Lyons should be spelled by Kevin Wynn, who begins his second year, and the redshirt freshman will have every chance to break out after losing weight in the offseason.<\/p>\n
At linebacker, the room has a solid mix of transfers and homegrown talent, led by returners Blake Nichelson and Omar Graham Jr., along with transfers Chris Jones and Mikai Gbayor. The transfers are especially interesting, as Jones was a tackling machine at Southern Miss with over 10 a game, and Gbayor spent time with Tony White at Nebraska.<\/p>\n
Besides the players, swapping out position coaches but keeping the same scheme should lead to improvement on the field. Ernie Sims takes over as LB coach for John Papuchis, and all Florida State fans want to see the former first-round pick succeed. Tony White also brought in Nick Williams to coach the edges, to split responsibility with Terrance Williams. With a second year in the 3-3-5 and returning players at each level to understand the scheme, the front seven (or six) should take a step forward from the inconsistent unit from a year ago.<\/p>\n
A year ago, when the train came off the tracks of the 2025 season, almost nobody knew what hit them. Florida State pulled off an incredible upset win over Alabama and, after two blowout wins over inferior competition, with a bye mixed in, was ranked as a top-10 team. Even after the four-game losing streak in October, FSU pulled off two blowout wins over Wake Forest and Virginia Tech, adding more inconsistency to the year. The administration was clearly confused and caught red-handed by the contrast between what the season looked like and what it turned into.<\/p>\n
Luckily for FSU fans, this season\u2019s schedule will provide early answers that leave no room for anyone to hide. In week one, the Seminoles face a veteran SMU team in a standalone game on Labor Day. Two weeks later, a trip to Tuscaloosa could send Mike Norvell\u2019s team to 1-2 before the calendar turns to October. The schedule does not lighten with road games against Louisville and Miami, which happen before FSU\u2019s bye week. Even though the Noles have two cupcakes mixed in, if and possibly when these games turn ugly, it will be impossible to pull the wool over everyone\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Almost universally, it feels like all conversations about Florida State football for the upcoming season, whether online or…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":352026,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29,3691,9836],"class_list":["post-352025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-florida-state-football","tag-florida-state-football-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352025","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=352025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352025\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/352026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}