Florida State routinely shot itself in the foot in the first half with poor field position and a struggling offense, but came away on the winning end of an unthinkable 28-24 score at Cardinal Stadium on Saturday afternoon.
Louisville scored first after a shanked punt from Logan Tyler allowed the Cardinals to punch it in from 36 yards out. The Seminoles responded with an efficient 7-play, 75-yard drive that knotted it up at seven a piece.
But FSU’s defense then began to struggle. Despite forcing three punts, the secondary was routinely picked on by quarterback Jawon Pass. Louisville scored two more times to make it 21-7, with the 21 points being the most scored against FBS competition for the Cardinals in 2018. Meanwhile, the FSU offense could not get in a rhythm and entered halftime down 21-7.
It was largely the same story in the second half. The defense kept letting receivers run free down the field, but Pass could not connect. The offense insisted on trying to run inside, but the results copied over from the first two quarter. FSU finally found a spark when quarterback Deondre Francois hit Tamorrion Terry for a 55-yard touchdown pass late in the third quarter.
Louisville came right back down and chipped in a field goal to make it 24-14. After a couple of penalties slowed them down, FSU went to Tre’ McKitty down the sidelines for a beautiful score that tightened the margin to 24-21.
After a stopped Louisville drive, FSU had a chance to try and take the lead or tie it up. It failed to do so and Louisville got the ball back with hopes of running out the clock. Pass then threw an inexplicable interception in the FSU red zone with under two minutes to play and the Seminoles were given life once more. On a third down near midfield, Francois connected with Nyqwan Murray, who slipped a tackle and ran all the way for a 58-yard touchdown.
The defense held on to a 28-24 win with a Stanford Samuels III interception to end it.
A reaction podcast with analysis will be posted shortly.
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