To preface, this might very well be the most useless opponent preview I’ll do all season. The Seminoles have a new offensive coordinator and, most likely, every single offensive starter is going to be a new player (9 incoming transfers) from where they were last year.
In 2024, the Noles totally imploded, they scored an abominable 15.4 points per game, good for 4th worst in the entire FBS, with only Kent State, Houston, and Southern Miss having worse offensive outputs for the year. And, unfortunately
for us, there is nobody from that offense returning this season.
Instead, Gus Malzahn decided to hang up his head coaching gig at Central Florida to go back to being an offensive coordinator for the first time since 2011. Gus is well known among Alabama fans as the former Auburn head coach from 2013-2020, and the guy who pretty much made the Hurry-Up No-Huddle offense mainstream in the 2010s.
It’s an offensive scheme built from high school and is one that attacks defenses with brutal simplicity. The receivers spread wide, and the QB and RB will both relentlessly run the ball on inside trap plays and counters. Throw in plenty of wide receiver reverses and the occasional downfield shot pass, then run the plays at warp speed, and you have the core of the Malzahn offense. While this offense has lost some of the traction in had in college football after 2020, it’s still one that gave Nick Saban fits for over a decade, and a similar version was run by Vanderbilt last year that gave Alabama issues.
Whether Malzahn still has that kind of juice as a playcaller after so many years as head coach remains to be seen, but the Gus offense is still something that anyone should be wary of.
As far as personnel goes, QB Tommy Castellanos was brought in as a transfer from Boston College. He had originally played for Malzahn at UCF back in 2022, then spent the last two years in BC. He was a starter in 2023, racking up 1100 rushing yards in his first season while throwing for another 2200 (but also throwing 14 interceptions). In 2024, he began the season as a starter, but was ultimately benched halfway through the season. He’s a small, speedy player that will draw a lot of comparisons to Kyler Murray for his running style and size, but with only a fraction of Murray’s arm talent. Essentially, he’s a guy that can rack up a whole lot of scramble yards and be a pain to bring down, but doesn’t pose too much of a passing threat outside of scrambling around until someone gets open.
At running back, it looks like the carries will be split by Roydell Williams and Gavin Sawchuk. Roydell had a long career at Alabama and a decent final year with the Tide in 2023 before transferring to FSU a year ago. However, he only played a couple games early in the season before missing most of the year with an injury. The 6th year senior will be a steady, though not explosive, presence. Then there’s Sawchuk, who had an impressive year with Oklahoma in 2023 before falling down the depth chart and dealing with some nagging injuries last year. He has speed and potential as a big-play threat, but lacked vision and consistency with the Sooners.
For the receiving group, Duce Robinson transferred in from USC as a former 5-star recruit that was more of a highly-athletic tight end than a true wide receiver. He caught a few balls the last few years with the Trojans but hasn’t yet lived up to his top-ten recruiting hype. The Noles also brought in Squirrel White from Tennessee, a small, speedy player who had a nice 2023 with the Vols before seeing his role diminish in 2024.
On the offensive line, the Noles also brought in all new starters. LT Gunnar Hansen comes from Vanderbilt, LG Richie Leonard from Florida, center Luke Petitbon from Wake Forest, RG Adrian Medley from UCF, and RT Micah Pettus from Ole Miss. It’s a collection of veteran players with a whole lot of prior starting experience between them all. Petitbon in particular was an All-ACC player and one of the better pass blockers in college football.
Anyway, that’s a whole lot of words to say that we don’t totally know what this offense is going to be able to do. Expect Castellanos to get a whole lot of carries from the QB position, and most of the pass plays will be a scramble drill. Duce Robinson will get a few downfield sideline fade targets, and Squirrel White will get some screens or jet sweeps. Roydell and Sawchuck will also get plenty of carries, and will probably get their fair share of free yards when Malzahn calls rushing plays in passing situations.
The real question will be how their offensive line gels as a unit. Some of Malzahn’s best teams at Auburn had a collection of veteran offensive linemen that made a lot of subpar running backs look exceptional for a season, and if this mercenary crew can pull that off, it could make for a rather successful season for the Noles.
But that will HAVE to be the case. Castellanos will be annoying and make some frustrating scramble plays, but FSU won’t be able to build a functional offense off of just his passing game. So having that run game going will be key for them to take out other teams with a death-by-a-thousand-papercuts approach to running the ball and scrambling, until Robinson gets free down the sidelines for a free big play touchdown.
Unfortunately for Alabama, this is very similar to the strategy that Vanderbilt beat them with last year. So it will be something of an inflection game for Kane Wommack as he will have to prove that his defensive scheme isn’t inherently weak against this offensive approach.
I think the Noles ultimately score a little more than we’re comfortable with due to some broken play touchdowns – lets go with 24 points.
