Mike Norvell has been riding a roller coaster of emotion over the past few seasons at Florida State.
In 2023, the Seminoles were 13-1 and should have been a College Football Playoff team. Quarterback Jordan Travis was a Heisman contender, and Norvell seemed to have FSU on the cusp of being “back.”
And then 2024 happened. The Seminoles went 2-10 with some terrible losses. They were the talk of the college football world, in a bad way, and now Norvell has been left to try to pick up the pieces.
There’s still a few months to go before the hits are once again for real, but in the here and now, Norvell says he’s proud of his program for attempting to get off the mat after being knocked down as hard as it was.
“I’m proud of this place, I’m proud of our program, and the work that we’re putting in and I’m excited about where it’s going,” Norvell recently said (h/t On SI). “It’s one of those things, you never get too high when you’re living high and obviously when you get knocked down it’s about how quick you can get up and continue to push moving forward. We are moving forward and I have great expectations for what’s in front of us. We’re going to work every day to go make that our reality.”
Norvell has made changes to his coaching staff — the new offensive coordinator is Gus Malzahn and Tony White is taking over the defense — and the Seminoles will likely roll with Boston College transfer Thomas Castellanos at quarterback.
Hope springs eternal in the spring in baseball and apparently the same can be said in Tallahassee as it relates to the football program, but talk is cheap in May.
Norvell can “rah rah” until he’s blue in the face but there were serious questions about his leadership last season in Tallahassee and he can’t afford to talk the talk without walking the walk in 2025.
Unfortunately, it’s not going to be easy right off the bat, either. The Seminoles start with Alabama and Miami is in Week 5. FSU could realistically have two losses by early October, but if last year showed us anything, even games against East Texas A&M, Kent State and Virginia can’t be seen as sure-bet wins.
Norvell is 33-27 in five seasons in Tallahassee but he’s only been bowl eligible twice. To be fair, 2022 and 2023 were both great seasons, but it’s also fair to wonder if 2021’s 5-7 record is more indicative of the Norvell era at FSU rather than 2023’s 13-1 campaign.
If Norvell suffers another losing season, that will certainly be the case, and he may not get another chance at FSU if things once again go south.
So be optimistic. Be proud of how the team looks in spring, but the only thing that really matters in college football is winning when it really matters.
Again, talk is cheap in May.
