WARCHANT WRAP | Recap of 27-24 Florida State loss vs SMU | FSU Football | Warchant TV

0:00We've seen a lot of crazy stuff in the stadium. Yeah, Cory Clark. A lot of good times too, Ira. A lot of good times. A lot of some bad times and some really crazy times. And this one's probably near the top of the list. If it's not number one, Florida State and SMU played Monday night football. We're supposed to start at 730. And it's day morning football. And a good point. It started up. It started up starting at 915 because of our power outage. We all sat here and we should have had a sing along. Maybe something like 99 miles of here or something. There was no PA. But we could have sang. Oh, you're right. You're right. The media. We could have come anyway. We sat here for about an hour and 45 minutes. They finally got started. The game doesn't end until 1230. It's closing in on 2am. And we're here. We're talking about Florida State. Losing to SMU 27 to 24. And the game that sounds really close. Yeah. But was not really close. It was only a close because SMU kept turning the ball over. Florida State took the ball away. It depends on your perspective. But they outgained at FSU by 260 yards. And really dominated Florida State and every phase except the turnovers.

1:00And they still pulled out with the win. They kick a field goal with 20 seconds left. I want to say it's a hard game to parse. But I don't know if it's hard game to parse. I mean, one team was way better than the other team. Yeah, that's the issue. It would have been one thing if you had turned it over four times. And they snuck out. They somehow wrestled away a win from you. They tried to give you the game. If they had played clean, you would have lost by four touchdowns. Right? They scored 40 something points. I mean, look, man, they put up almost 600 yards of offense. He threw for career high 430. Again, your secondary just gets absolutely torched in Ira. Every time a team completes a pass against this defense, it ain't like a dude making a play. Just going to make it a great play or quarterback making a throw. Typically, the dude's just wide open, just wide open. And then juxtapose that with the Florida State offense and its passing game. Ain't nobody open ever. And if there is, he doesn't see it. So that's the issue, right? As we move forward is there's a lot of issues. But I know Kevin Jennings is good. And SMU is going to put up a lot of points and a lot of yards against teams this year.

2:01But I don't know that your offense is going to do the same because that was rough. And just a reminder, this is the Warchant Wrap. Well, to you by Walkons Sports B-Stro. And Corey, the other day, I ate it walkons twice in one day. Oh, man. Lunch, all right. And dinner. OK. We'll get back to that a little bit. But go to Walkons, great food, great people, and locations all around this beautiful country. And certainly here in Florida. But yeah, Kevin Jennings is a eyes-man trophy candidate. He passed for 430 yards. I think he was 26 of 36. So this is a game that will look good on his resume. But as you said, went a lot of difficult throws. Now he did make one, and I think a 70-something-yard touchdown pass, where he's got an Asseldon Barker coming free on a blitz. As he's thrown it, he just throws it to a spot. They have the right call made. He makes a really good throw, just instinctive anticipatory throw into a spot. The guy catches it, breaks free touchdown. You almost can live with that. That's a play, man. It's a great player making a great play. He got hit, Barker. They timed it up almost perfectly. Barker's hitting him as he throws it on a third down.

3:04You can live with some of that. The layups, man. Just the absolute layups is what's the problem. But there's a lot of problems with this program right now. I'm 3 and 14 in their last 17 ACC games. 3 and 14. Well, and you talked about the four turnovers, and that could have been a four touchdown win. That's not always a case. Sometimes you turn over the ball, and it's not a situation where you could have scored, but two or three of their turnovers were going into score. Like they have an interception in the end zone. Yes, they're a perception. We're apparently the receiver ran the wrong route, which hey, other teams screw up too. That's always nice. And the parrotser tried to build a ball. He shouldn't have fielded. They have to work the full goal. They're going to make a play. That's a good play. I should Barker went and made a play. That's a turnover that's okay. You wouldn't make, you would created that turnover. The other one's, man. I feel like they just gave you. And look, man, I've been coming to games in this stadium for 40 something years. I mean, I know I look like I'm 29, but guys, I'm older than that. People are trying to the math done math. They didn't add up. I know. You thought I was born like 1997. But no, I've been coming here for a long time.

4:05I've never heard that many booze that loudly for that many occasions. And it was, man, the second down play calls were maddening. And I don't even know if they're play calls, man. We talked to Norvell after the game. It sure sounds like a lot. And that's why I asked Daniels. I should ask Norvell, but you did. I think there are POs where he's handing it off and he needs to throw it off. He said some of them were. Yeah, some of them were RPOs where they did not choose the P. They chose the R and you turn to second and two until a third and four and two upon. I mean, third and unmanageable, the whole game. Every third down was unmanageable. And so that's the issue is like they were booing you because your program is suck for over two years now. But they're also booing, what is this? Why is this kid your quarterback if you don't trust him to make throws at all? Yeah, and it was, you know, it's always hard to parse what the booze mean sometimes. Are they booing the players? Are they booing the coaches? Are they saying doose? Are they booing the whole situation? And I think you could have picked your choice. But a lot of the booze tonight, we're not, I don't think they were big picture booze,

5:07at least at the start. I think they were, hey, man, how come every time it's second and one or second and two or second and four, second and five, you run the ball and it becomes third and long. Every single time. You know who does that better? Army. Army runs that offense a lot better than Florida State does. Army turns second and a five into first and 10s. All game. And they were stating that. And there were a few positions where it was clearly obvious where Mike Norvelle just didn't trust Ashton. And he goes, well, all right, maybe there are peos and Ashton's choosing now too, but on the night, you end up running the ball 45 times. You only pass it 23 times. He only completes 12 of them. Yeah. So you have 12 completions against 45 runs. Do says five catches and two games for 75 yards. This is a guy that's supposed to be an NFL traffic and will be and is one of the best receivers in the country. Five for 75 and two games, I think are his stats, man. That's what, what, why did you bring him back? Why is Ashton the quarterback? If this is the offense you're going to run. If you don't trust Ashton to throw the ball, why do you even have do some Dansey here? Why'd you spend the money?

6:07Yeah, and I think that's the issue is it's, we don't know what the assignments are. We don't know how Ashton grades out. We don't know if all those decisions are there. We got an A plus. I'm saying an individual plays. We don't know exactly what was called. Right. I got what he had. But 125 passing yards isn't good enough. And so I asked 40 were on a screen pass on a third down scramble. So I asked him, is there any thought? And clearly it's not all his, yeah, it's clearly it's not all Ashton's fault. The past protection was bad. The offensive line struggled. They made a huge change. Maybe with the game they moved the right guard to right tackle. Perhaps Nate passed, moved into right tackle and moved somebody in, else in a guard to try to shore things up because they're struggling. But Ashton either is not seeing receivers when they're open or he's not, he can't throw it. He can't make the throws. Right. But you do have no idea. You do have no idea. It's not ideal. Yeah, it is not. You have Malachai Marshall, you have Kevin Sparry on the bench. I don't know if any of them are better. I'm guessing they're not.

7:08We're not a practice so we can't say. But there has to be something better than throwing for 125. Here's my thought, I already told you this in the press box. But when the game was still a game, I think it was tied when I said this. But it's just the way the game felt, man. This isn't a real college offense in 2026 to have a quarterback that you don't trust to throw the ball at all. You have better receivers than SMU. What would Kevin Jennings do with Danzy and Doos, man? And Bugs, Bugs, like that. And Bugs made some plays. So you have that and you can't throw. So I think the only way, and we'll go big picture here, man, because obviously with the booze like that, 3 and 14 and 17 games, you got Alabama coming up. Probably not going to go well in Tuscaloosa. We'll see. We'll see. This didn't look like an offense. It's going to travel. I don't know. Maybe not. And I don't know if the defenses were going to play great on the road either. But you let Ashen Daniels wear that game. You let him wear it. He starts. You're going to probably get down. You might get down big. Maybe you bring in a backup in that game just when the game's out of reach. If it gets there, you might also win the game. And this is all dumb and moot.

8:09But then you're, if you're going to make a change and say, this kid's just not seen it the way I have to have somebody see it. You have to make the change before central Arkansas. The in maybe Malachi Marshall is something. And he turns the season around and turns Norvelle's fortunes around. I it's not that I was upset with the way Daniels played. He wasn't good. I'm not judging him on this game alone. I'm judging that it appears his coach doesn't even trust him to make these throws. And if that's the case, then what are we doing here? Try somebody else out and see how he sees it. We spent a lot of time talking about Ashton Daniels, but there's so many other things to talk about. We touched on something. Also kid too, by the way, when he was asked about the booing. Perfect answer man. But that God, that kid's an awesome kid. I just wish he was an awesome kid. The but defensively we touched on some of the miscues. Still busted assignments. Yes. Still a third down conversions first touchdown guy got the wrong wrong signal and just that bus just takes one guy to get the signal wrong. Yeah, 10 guys can be doing the right corner. Professor, you ever had any that? Does SMU ever have just a busted coverage ever?

9:13But also situational things you end up having to burn a time out late in the game because you don't have you have 10 guys on the field for special teams. That's the second or third time now in two games where you have a multiple. You've had not enough guys to use that time out to late in the game, Ira. And so late in the game when it's a tie game in SMU's driving where you if you had another time out or two changes the whole complexion of what SMU does. You might and they may have thrown you also may get the ball back with. You would also get it at least with 40 more seconds. You got it with 25 seconds left. You get it with a minute five left. If you don't have to burn a time out because you've got 10 guys on the field on special teams. I thought the special teams was good overall. You won that battle. That's a huge time out. That's a huge time out. We do have to give shout out to Daniel Hughes begrudgingly maybe by your part because last week I kind of made fun of the first punny had that was intentional. Yeah. And then tonight good at it man. He had another one of those funky puns which led to it. I thought SMU's return guys were very cavalier with the way they were turning those. And it burned them. Florese gets the turn. What do you do?

10:13What do you do? I've mad. Is it like a chip and run a bump and run. That's how Daniel Hughes is putting those. The bump and roll like a seven iron. Yeah, six seven iron. Yeah, six seven iron just shoot it. Yeah, man. Daniel Hughes knows what he's doing. So it worked out. Pantakowski again was nails on his well. He made one kick. He almost made another one. But he did make the other one. But it was they got off side. So yeah, man. And I thought Kromall, look man, the little things we talk about having to call a time out when you only have 10 guys on a punt return. What in the world is doose doing on Kromall's long run? A long run. It's a 70 yard run. So it becomes a 50 yard run because doose he does touch him. Now he touches him like this in the back. I think I was flying like this. He's in the back. The guy goes flying. Like why are you doing that? You're not that isn't having any impact on the play. And it was just an odd decision to make and it cost his team. Kromall was tackled at the 10. The hold was at 20. The ball went back to the 30. So that's a 20 yard penalty. Just little things, man. Yeah, and he still Kromall finished with 115 yards on 22 carries. Workforce or workhorse, workman like performance. Very impressive in terms of just how hard he ran.

11:16But I'll tell you that one big concern I have at coming out of this game besides the play and the game. You only have one big one. One that we haven't talked about. Okay, good. Is I'm curious about the health of this team right now because man, this was a physical game. They had a bunch of guys on defense leave. They end up having to play a bunch of young guys in the secondary at different times. Maybe because of performance, but also because of injuries. But you already didn't have, you already didn't have Darrell this year. Blake Nicholson or KJ Kirkland in this game. And then during the game, Chris Jones left for a little while. You saw a linebacker. A little ball. A little ballie. Kaleble of Ollie. Yeah. For a while. You had some DBs in defensive alignment. Also, shake the ball. Kromall already in Charles Lester on the, what was probably the biggest play of the game when it was 24 all in SMU had a third and 11. They converted when a guy was wide open, 15 yards downfield. And Kromarty Jr. right? Yeah. So just Kromarty and Charles Lester were both in the game. For the only time all game were on that play. That's I think that's how beat up they are in the secondary and on the defense as a whole. But yeah, man, it's a, is there any way you can drive the team bus into like the trans, the transformer at Bryant, Danny Stadium and just knock out the power there?

12:19I don't really have like a team suist. I don't know. No, no, I'm just, I guess it does have to be a team bus. I don't know. No, yeah, like the equipment bus, the trailer with all the equipment just drive into a transformer knock out the power grid. Yeah. So there was actually a, there was a window where they thought they may not play this game tonight. Yeah. They were actually talking about playing it tomorrow. SMU, look, you're not the only ones with two night minimums. SMU's had two nights in hotel. Yeah. They were going to stay tomorrow. So they could have played the game tomorrow. Well, by today by the time you, well, today already. It is today already. What are we doing? They ended up getting the game in and just a wild night. Wild crazy night. Eat the gumbo and walk on. It's really good. I'm not joking. I've had it a bunch of times. It's awesome. That is, that is, that is probably my favorite thing. The buddhan, I like, you know, I like the buddhan, but the gumbo is really good too. I, you weren't here with a head into my two meals in one day. No. I'm just kidding. Go ahead. So I had the burger for lunch, which is awesome. They go out on a, we don't see a ledge there with a, you, you ate a burger and you

13:21got for that. Well, here's the thing. They're burgers are phenomenal. Right. And they have a bunch of them. I did not touch that one, but I had a regular hamburger, which is delicious. They make one of, I think my money, maybe the best burger in town. Also, and then for dinner, I had the blackjack chicken sandwich. Okay. Big bread day. It's all right. I didn't eat all the bread. You can now, you can carve up every now and again. But if we, even if you're going to get dessert, they, first of all, they have great appetizers also and then dessert. They've got the doughnut bread, I guess it's called with some crispy cream. Crispy cream, yeah, it's great stuff, man. Their desserts are really good. And for my walk on of the week, I'm going to go with Shevon Smith. He made it. Yeah, he was a walk on. He ended up getting drafted. Really, really good player. Like started for two years and Mickey Andrews second year. He could help tonight. 95, 90, yeah, man. Oh, good grief. Anyway, but walk on says great, man. Walk on says great. This football team, it's going to get better right? I will see, but they in 12 days are going to play another football game. I think we're going to cover it. I think Alabama look horrible. They can be got. They can be got.

14:21Iroh. They were number 13 in the country coming this season. They might be a little bit higher after their week one performance. But why putting coverage of Warchand.com. Their quarterback is got to be suiling himself after watching the film of these first two games, right? He's not going to know what to do. Sorry, guys. Hey, the season's not over for real. They can turn around. We've seen it, right? There's still one in one. That's definitely going to be one of the stories. The lines to watch because the last couple seasons, this team has not responded well to losses. I did shred of credit, a little bit of credit. I did think they competed for the most part, even when things were wrong poorly. SMU did turn the ball over, but there was some competition. They didn't fold. It may have looked like it on some of those plays defensively, but I don't think they've quit in this game. So we'll see if they don't go forward. As we've got to wrap it up, but this this fan base didn't quit. I know they booed. I get it. They were booing in the third quarter, but a lot of people were here. Nobody was full. Nobody blames the booing at all. It's also the fact that you made them wait an hour and a half on a school night.

15:21The game ended after midnight on a school day, a school morning, and they still showed up and they still showed up. This program will be back at some point, hopefully sooner rather than later. It's because of that kind of passion, right? Right? Right, right. Right, right. Right, right. No, great fan base. A lot of them were still here at the end of the morning when it was over. For Azlan and Corey and the rest of us at WarChant.com, this is Irish Ophos. Coming up from Doe Campbell Stadium and we'll talk to you next time.