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Florida State Making Too Many Mistakes To Win National Championship

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By @writered21

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While it may not be right or proper to criticize a college football team that has won 28 straight games, you can do just that with the Florida State Seminoles. The bottom line is, Florida State has the talent and the depth to win the National Championship in 2014, but the Seminoles make far too many mistakes, especially on offense, to succeed against the best of the best in the upcoming college football playoffs.

Saturday’s game against arch-rival Florida in Tallahassee was another example of how the Seminoles keep winning in spite of themselves. Florida State did defeat Florida, 24-19, and the record will show that the Seminoles (12-0) have finished the regular season unbeaten, but that’s about where much of the credit should stop. Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston threw a career-high four interceptions, and every time it seemed the Seminoles had broken a big play, it was called back due to one of FSU’s eight penalties. Florida State was lucky Florida couldn’t get out of its own way, or the Seminoles could have been beaten handily on this day. As it was, Florida missed two field goals in the second half that would have given the Gators the lead.

These are shenanigans Winston and Florida State have gotten away with for much of the season. The Seminoles typically play like garbage in the first half and then their depth and talent takes over late and they win, sometimes in a fashion that is too close for comfort. And even today, Florida State’s performance won’t hurt the Seminoles, since Mississippi State‘s loss to Ole Miss will all but guarantee that Florida State remains in the top four when the new rankings are released by the selection committee on Tuesday night.

And what of Florida State’s wins anyway? FSU has only beaten three ranked teams (Notre Dame, Clemson and Louisville). The Notre Dame win doesn’t look good at all, given how the Fighting Irish have cratered late in the season. Louisville was nothing special this year, as evidenced by the Cardinals’ loss to Virginia. Clemson had a good year and beat South Carolina today, and FSU beat the Tigers in overtime without Winston, so full credit for that. FSU will meet Georgia Tech in the ACC Championship Game next week, with the Yellow Jackets fresh off a win at Georgia today.

FSU can’t afford its trademark slow start in that game — not with the way Georgia Tech can run the ball and chew up clock, shortening the game. If Winston is ineffective early on top of that limited time of possession, the Seminoles will be stuck in a hole from which they cannot emerge. But beyond that, imagine these Seminoles locked up with Alabama or Oregon in the playoffs. A slow start against the Ducks will get Florida State buried. Alabama could surgically destroy the Seminoles if Florida State isn’t on its game right form the start.

The conventional wisdom is that as the season went on, Florida State would flip the switch, play for a full 60 minutes, and everything would be fine. But as the season has gone on, the Seminoles have demonstrated no ability to do that. Yes, Florida State is unbeaten, but once the championship chase reaches its climax, a really good team is going to make these lethargic Seminoles sorry for not being ready to go all out.

Ed Morgans is an ACC Basketball Writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @writered21 and add him to your network on Google.

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