Can Florida State bounce back from its disastrous 2024 season?
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Andrea Adelson
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — When Mike Norvell evaluated what happened last season at Florida State, he took a long, hard look at himself.
The same processes that worked so well in building the Seminoles into an ACC champion had now failed him. His evaluations from the transfer portal did not translate into immediate success. He could not find a way to connect with a team still smarting from a College Football Playoff snub the previous season, one that lacked chemistry, synergy and leadership.
He admitted his body language throughout the season “sucked.” He allowed his emotions to overcome his belief in staying positive no matter the circumstances. Perhaps hardest to accept of all, for the first time in his career, his teams lacked a defining edge.
All of that resulted in a team that went from 13-1 in 2023 to 2-10 in 2024, making Florida State the first Power 4 team in the AP poll era (since 1936) to have an 11-win dropoff. But Norvell now has a second chance to rebuild his team, a chance not offered to many other coaches in similar situations. Southern Miss, for example, fired coach Ellis Johnson in 2012 after an 0-12 season followed a 12-2 year under Larry Fedora.
Norvell has had the backing of those inside the Florida State administration and board of trustees from the moment he arrived in 2020. In their view, Norvell has brought a steady hand to a program that was reeling before his arrival.
While those outside the program have questioned his job security for most of his six-year tenure, those inside the program have never wavered from their commitment to him.
Even now. So Norvell got to work, making sweeping changes over the past four months to make Florida State look like an ACC champion again — revamping his own approach to coaching, his staff and his use of the transfer portal.
“I know what it looks like to win the ACC,” Norvell said during a sit-down interview in his office. “I know what it’s going to take to make sure we achieve that here in the very near future. I had to look at, ‘Am I doing the best job of connecting with our football team to uphold that elite standard and expectation that we have?’ Obviously, it comes down to a lot of changes that I made.”
The biggest change started with a phone call.
FLORIDA STATE LAST won a national championship in 2013, beating Auburn 34-31 on a touchdown pass from Jameis Winston to Kelvin Benjamin with 13 seconds left in the game. The coach on the opposite sideline, just seconds away from hoisting the trophy himself? Gus Malzahn.
He points out that fun fact sitting behind his desk, still sparse after just a few months on the job. Coaches live nomadic lives, but what are the odds Malzahn would one day be sitting inside the offensive coordinator’s office at Florida State after spending the previous 13 years as a head coach?
In truth, he would not be, if not for Norvell.
Last November, Norvell announced he was firing offensive coordinator Alex Atkins, defensive coordinator Adam Fuller and receivers coach Ron Dugans. The following week, Norvell called Malzahn — one of his coaching mentors — to ask for his thoughts about another candidate to fill the offensive coordinator job. The two formed an immediate connection in 2007 at Tulsa, when Norvell was a graduate assistant and Malzahn the offensive coordinator, and had grown close over the years. As the two spoke, Norvell asked a most unexpected question:
“Unless you want to do it?”
Malzahn was in his fourth season at UCF, and the job had started to take a toll. UCF sat at 4-6 and needed to win out just to make a bowl game. The fan base had started to grow restless, and speculation swirled in Orlando about his job security after two straight losing seasons. He had grown restless, too. So he gave an unexpected response to the unexpected question.
“How would that work?” Malzahn asked Norvell.
Malzahn, a former high school coach, found the idea of going back to his roots calling plays and working more closely with players more appealing the more he thought about it. Working for Norvell was a huge plus, and so was going to a school where it was possible to win a national championship.
Plus, he and his wife, Kristi, would be closer to their grandchildren in Alabama — a huge selling point considering what his family had recently been through. Kristi nearly died three years ago following an infection that left her hospitalized for weeks.
After weeks of conversation, Malzahn decided to go for it. He stepped down as UCF coach in December to help Norvell get Florida State headed in the right direction.
“I wouldn’t have done this for just anybody,” Malzahn says of Norvell, whom he describes as a “getter-doner.”
“He’s a worker, he’s driven, he’s got a gift for this. He’s really smart, he’s really good with people. There’s ‘getter-doners’ in this business, and there’s just coaches. There’s very few ‘getter-doners.’ In my experience in 20 years of college coaching, he’s a ‘getter-doner.'”
For a defensive coordinator, Norvell went the opposite direction — with a coach he had never previously worked with but made an impression on him nonetheless. Tony White had spent time as Syracuse defensive coordinator from 2000-22, scheming against Norvell, before moving on to Nebraska the past two seasons.
All told, his defenses have ranked in the Top 25 each of the past four seasons and over that same span, have held opponents to fewer than 100 yards rushing in 25 games. What really stood out to Norvell was not only the aggressiveness with which White’s defenses played, but their relentless in never taking any plays off. That’s what he wanted for Florida State.
“I think fixing the chemistry part No. 1, and then giving them confidence to go out there and do it,” White said. “I know we’re going to make mistakes here and there, but we can overcome that with aggression and physicality and effort. That piece right there, whether they were trying to play too perfect, whatever it may have been, just being able to turn them loose and get them to a point where, it’s like, ‘Hey, this is Florida State.'”
SINCE HIS ARRIVAL at Florida State, Norvell has relied heavily on the portal to build his roster. Of the 10 Seminoles drafted in 2024, for example, nine came to Florida State as transfers.
Florida State had a portal class ranked in the top 10 headed into 2024. But those rankings were based largely on the way many players were rated out of high school. Florida State had previous recruiting relationships with big-name players such as LSU receiver Jalen Brown, Alabama receiver Malik Benson and Georgia defensive end Marvin Jones Jr. But they, and many others signed in 2024, did not have much in the way of on-field production after serving as backups.
Norvell opted for a different approach to the players signed for 2025.
“In all reality, I probably tied more decisions last year trying to fill guys that we lost with what I thought was great potential, but maybe hadn’t had that right type of production,” Norvell said. “It did not play well for us in those moments of truth, where we needed to have a play.
“I wanted production this year,” Norvell said. “I wasn’t going to rely on potential.”
Take the offensive line, a key target for improvement. Malzahn made sure to bring along offensive line coach Herb Hand from UCF. The two have worked together at four different schools and know exactly what they wanted: Physicality and experience.
The top four linemen, Luke Petitbon, Micah Pettus, Gunnar Hansen and Adrian Medley (who played for Hand and Malzahn at UCF), signed and have combined for 105 career starts. At receiver, compare the difference. Last year, Florida State signed two receivers with a combined six starts in Jalen Brown and Malik Benson. This year, Squirrel White and Duce Robinson played in a combined 61 games.
At quarterback, Florida State went into the portal again hoping for better results. The Seminoles signed Boston College transfer quarterback Thomas Castellanos, who played for Malzahn at UCF as a freshman in 2022.
Castellanos started in 2023 and 2024 and had two of the best games of his career playing against the Seminoles — with 579 total yards, 5 touchdowns and 1 interception — performances Norvell points to when asked about what appealed to him about the quarterback.
Malzahn has had his greatest success when he has had a dual-threat quarterback like Castellanos — and the same can be said for Norvell and Florida State when Jordan Travis was the starter.
Already, Norvell and Malzahn said they have seen Castellanos take on a leadership role in offseason workouts. You can feel his personality, wanting to help support, encourage, challenge teammates,” Norvell said. “That’s something we’re seeing big-picture across this team.”
Developing that leadership is huge on the list of priorities this offseason. For Norvell, so is holding his players more accountable — particularly when it comes to playing with the edge that he felt was missing from last season.
When he talks about what it means to play with an edge, Norvell grows animated.
“You talk about the alphas, the leaders, the guys who are going to take hold and bring that desperation to be successful, that edge,” Norvell said. “It’s my job to make sure that I’m holding everybody accountable to that standard.”
Norvell said he made it clear to his returning players when they came back in January and began their offseason workouts: “You’re going to be a part of this, pouring everything you have into it, or you’re not.”
So far, he says he has seen results — younger players and transfers from last season taking bigger leadership roles, meshing with the 31 freshmen or transfers who just arrived and will join them from spring practice. But Norvell knows all the talk between now and the season opener against Alabama on Aug. 30 will amount to nothing if there are no lessons learned from what happened a year ago.
“I’m not wasting last year,” Norvell said. “Guys that went through this last year, for them to be aware of it and to take action is what is critically important. It’s one of the reasons why I am excited about what’s ahead.”
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Legacy Motor Club on Wednesday sued the broker who helped negotiate its purchase of a charter from Rick Ware Racing, accusing him of tortious interference for now trying to buy Ware’s NASCAR team.
Legacy alleged in its filing in North Carolina Superior Court that T.J. Puchyr, acting as a consultant for the Cup Series team owned by seven-time NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson, violated the state Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices Act by using “insider knowledge and position of trust to interfere with Legacy’s Agreement with RWR.”
Legacy also accused Puchyr of making public personal attacks against Johnson when he announced last month his plans to purchase Ware’s race team.
The dispute began not long after Legacy entered into agreement for Johnson and his partners at Knighthead Capital Management to purchase one of Ware’s two charters. Legacy says the deal is for next season, when it plans to expand to three full-time Cup cars.
RWR maintains the deal was for 2027 because it already is under contract with RFK Racing to lease that organization a charter next season. Ware says he didn’t read the contract closely when he signed it to note that it read 2026, and that honoring the RFK contract and selling a second charter to Legacy next year would put the NASCAR team out of business.
Legacy in April sued Ware, but as that fight is playing out, it claims Puchyr struck a deal to buy RWR. Puchyr is a cofounder of Spire Motorsports and now acts as a motorsports consultant.
“Mr. Puchyr was well aware of the parties’ dispute. He knew of the charter purchase agreement between Legacy and RWR that he helped broker,” the suit contends. “Despite Mr. Puchyr’s insider knowledge of the contract, his obligations under his consulting agreement with Legacy, Legacy’s contractual right to a charter … Mr. Puchyr recently announced that he intends to purchase both of RWR’s charters for himself.”
The latest filing is part of two active lawsuits surrounding charters, which are at the heart of NASCAR’s business model. Having one is vital to a team’s survival.
23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports are locked into a prolonged suit with NASCAR over antitrust allegations against the most popular motorsports series in the United States. 23XI, co-owned by retired NBA great Michael Jordan, and Front Row, owned by entrepreneur Bob Jenkins, last September refused to sign the charter agreements offered by NASCAR after more than two years of contentious negotiations on extensions.
The two were the only holdouts out of 15 organizations to refuse the extensions. They instead sued and are awaiting a federal judge’s decision on if they will be stripped of their six combined charters as the case heads toward a Dec. 1 trial date.
NASCAR has said it has asked multiple times for settlement proposals but heard nothing. NASCAR also has no intention of renegotiating the charter agreements held by 30 other teams.
Johnson, despite his own legal fight, said last weekend that he supported a settlement in the antitrust case.
“I would love to see a settlement of some kind,” Johnson said. “I really don’t think that getting into a knock-down, drag-out lawsuit is good for anybody.”
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Jorge Castillo
ATLANTA — The 2025 MLB All-Star Game featured the two best pitchers in the world on the mound to start for their respective leagues and the two best position players in the opposing lineups. It included the first automatic ball-strike system challenges in All-Star Game history, a rousing six-run comeback, a memorable appearance for a future first-ballot Hall of Famer and a beautiful tribute to the late Hank Aaron just miles from where he surpassed Babe Ruth on the career home run list.
But the exhibition, a remarkable show played at Truist Park on a muggy Tuesday night, will be remembered for how it ended.
When it was over, nearly four hours after the first pitch, the National League outlasted the American League behind Philadelphia Phillies slugger Kyle Schwarber in an unprecedented Home Run Derby-style swing-off, with a 4-3 homer edge after the score was tied at 6-6 through nine innings.
Schwarber pulverized three home runs on three swings in the swing-off after going 0-for-2 with a walk during the nine innings, becoming the first position player to win All-Star Game MVP without recording a hit in the game.
The American League leads the National League in the All-Star Game, with a record of 48 wins, 44 losses and 2 ties.
Officially, the result, just the Senior Circuit’s second victory in the past 12 matchups, didn’t have a winning or losing pitcher of record. Unofficially, it was one of the most enthralling endings to any marquee baseball game, exhibition or not.
“It’s like wiffle ball in the backyard,” AL manager Aaron Boone said.
The tiebreaker, a baseball version of a hockey shootout, was established in 2022. On Monday, both managers — Boone and the NL’s Dave Roberts — were required to submit their list of participants and alternates to MLB should the game need the swing-off after nine innings. Knowing starters usually shower and leave the ballpark well before the end of the game, the managers opted for reserves.
The exercise again appeared to be unnecessary once the NL took a 6-0 lead — fueled by New York Mets first baseman Pete Alonso‘s three-run homer — into the seventh inning. But the AL scored four runs in the seventh and tied the game when down to its last out in the ninth to send the 95th All-Star Game to the swing-off.
“Dave asked yesterday, ‘If there’s a tie, would you do it?'” said Schwarber, the only member of the Phillies who participated in this year’s All-Star festivities. “I said, ‘Absolutely,’ not thinking that we were going to end up in a tie when you say yes. And then as the game’s going, you’re looking at the score, you’re not really thinking the game’s going to end in a tie.”
But even that process prompted brief confusion. Roberts originally selected Schwarber, Arizona Diamondbacks third baseman Eugenio Suarez and Alonso, a two-time Home Run Derby champion. But Suarez, who was hit on his left hand by a pitch in the eighth inning, was scratched after being announced and replaced by Miami Marlins outfielder Kyle Stowers.
Boone countered with Athletics designated hitter Brent Rooker, Seattle Mariners outfielder Randy Arozarena and Tampa Bay Rays first baseman Jonathan Aranda.
Los Angeles Dodgers third-base coach Dino Ebel threw for the NL. New York Yankees first-base coach Travis Chapman assumed the pressure-packed duty for the AL.
Finally, the rules: Each player was granted three swings and an unlimited number of pitches to take them.
Rooker, the only participant to also take part in Monday’s Home Run Derby, led off with two homers. Stowers followed with one. Arozarena then extended the AL’s lead to 3-1, setting the stage for Schwarber.
Schwarber, a man seemingly built to smash baseballs over the wall, has never won a Home Run Derby. He lost in the finals in 2018 and failed to advance out of the first round in 2022; he hasn’t entered another one since. On Tuesday, however, he did not falter.
The three-time All-Star, after building some drama with a delayed emergence from the NL dugout, crushed three home runs, drawing louder and louder reactions with each one. The first was a 428-foot laser that traveled 107 mph to straightaway center. Next, he cracked a 461-foot, 109 mph moon shot to right field. He finished the spree with a 382-foot dinger, dropping down to one knee as the ball soared into the right-field seats and eliciting a rambunctious reaction from his temporary teammates.
“I think the first swing was kind of the big one,” Schwarber said. “I was just really trying to hit a line drive versus trying to hit the home run. Usually, that tends to work out, especially in games.”
The pressure shifted to Aranda. Needing one homer to tie, Aranda lifted a fly ball to the warning track before clanking a ball off the top of the brick wall in right field. His last swing produced a weak fly ball to left field, giving the NL the win at eight minutes to midnight.
“First time in history we got to do this,” Roberts said, “and I think it played pretty well tonight.”
By then, the early talk of the night was old news.
This year’s exhibition was the first game at the major league level outside of spring training to feature the automated ball-strike system, an expected precursor to MLB implementing the arrangement for all games beginning next season.
The rules on Tuesday were the same as the ABS challenge rules introduced during spring training. Each team received two challenges for the game. Only the pitcher, catcher or batter could request a challenge, and the request needed to be immediate without help from the dugout or other players on the field.
Five pitches were challenged Tuesday. The first was an 0-2 changeup that AL starter Tarik Skubal threw to San Diego Padres third baseman Manny Machado that plate umpire Dan Iassogna called a ball in the first inning. Skubal and his catcher, Cal Raleigh of the Mariners, didn’t agree and challenged the pitch to make history. The call was overturned, ending Machado’s at-bat with a strikeout.
“I wasn’t even going to use them,” Skubal said. “But I felt like that was a strike, and you want that in an 0-2 count.”
Skubal became the first Detroit Tigers pitcher to start an All-Star Game since Max Scherzer in 2013. Opposite him was the other Cy Young favorite.
A year after starting the All-Star Game for the NL with 11 career outings on his résumé, Pittsburgh Pirates sensation Paul Skenes received the nod again to become the 10th pitcher to start consecutive All-Star Games and the first to accomplish the feat in his first two seasons. Last year, in Texas, Skenes walked one batter in his scoreless inning, a blip that he said “pissed me off” and pushed him to attack hitters for his All-Star Game encore.
“I was throwing every pitch as hard as I could,” Skenes said, “hoping that it landed in the strike zone.”
The result: two strikeouts on 100 mph fastballs to Tigers teammates Gleyber Torres and Riley Greene to open the contest. Skenes admittedly reached back seeking to strike out the side, but Yankees slugger Aaron Judge grounded out on another 100 mph pitch to conclude Skenes’ night.
“That’s what the All-Star Game’s for,” Skenes said. “Every hitter’s trying to hit a home run. We’re trying to strike everybody out.”
In a fitting transition, 11-time All-Star Clayton Kershaw relieved Skenes, 14 years his junior, in the second inning.
Raleigh, Tuesday’s Home Run Derby champion, welcomed the Dodgers’ Kershaw with a 101.9 mph line drive that Chicago Cubs left-fielder Kyle Tucker snagged with a sliding catch. Kershaw then struck out the Toronto Blue Jays‘ Vladimir Guerrero Jr. looking at an 87 mph slider on his sixth pitch, prompting Roberts to emerge from the NL dugout to take the ball from Kershaw and end what could have been the final All-Star Game appearance of his Hall of Fame career.
A legend selection for the game by commissioner Rob Manfred, Kershaw delivered a pregame speech in the NL clubhouse.
“We have the best All-Star Game of any sport,” said Kershaw, who on July 2 became the 20th pitcher to record 3,000 career strikeouts. “We do have the best product. So to be here, to realize your responsibility in the sport, is important. And we have Shohei [Ohtani] here. We have Aaron Judge here. We have all these guys that represent the game really, really well, so we get to showcase that and be part of that is important. I just said I was super honored to be a part of it.”
In the end, Kershaw was part of something never seen before.
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