Emotional roulette

Watching Florida State's trouncing of Miami, it was hard to believe this was the same Hurricanes team I saw in person seven days earlier.

Not that the Seminoles weren't the better team; they were. The confounding thing was the way it happened.

A week earlier, Miami's defensive showing at Clemson was marked by vicious hits and an aggressor's mentality. One of the defining sequences of the game, as we noted last week, came when three Hurricanes defensive backs issued pulverizing hits on Andre Ellington (twice) and Terrance Ashe on three consecutive plays.

Saturday night, it was as if the Hurricanes left that mentality at Death Valley. They missed tackles. They took bad angles. They seemed to play scared.

Maybe it was just because Florida State was better. Maybe it was because the Seminoles took the early momentum to send a shell-shocked vibe through the Hurricanes' sideline.

I tend to think it was more than that. I tend to think Miami, after winning by 28 at Pitt and by nine at Clemson, came back to South Florida feeling way too good about itself. And meanwhile, the Seminoles were hungry and edgy. On both sides of the ball, Florida State was far nastier and more physical.

This emotional roller coaster -- or emotional roulette, if you will -- has to be the source of a lot of lost sleep for coaches. When wins and losses are staked on the brains and whims of 18- to 22-year-olds, it's hard to ever really feel good about things.

We've seen this stuff at Clemson, of course. The loss to Miami largely was attributed to the six turnovers and the three gift touchdowns presented by the defense. Hard to win any game with that many mistakes.

But I didn't see the emotional edge in the Tigers that I saw two weeks earlier at Auburn. It might not have been the chief reason Clemson lost that game, but it absolutely played a role. And why this team, after an open date, wasn't able to duplicate that emotional edge is baffling.

Does that fall on the coaches? Surely they bear some responsibility, and maybe a better job could've been done of assuring this team didn't feel too good about itself after losing at Auburn.

But I'm starting to believe it's something that's becoming harder and harder to coach.

In last week's preparations for Florida State, did Randy Shannon slack off and fail to get a handle on his team's mental state going into that game? Doubt it.

How about Alabama? The Crimson Tide has by far the most demanding, paranoid, perfectionist coach out there.

When he actually cracked a smile following last year's BCS title triumph over Texas, it was breaking news. How about after his team demolished Clemson in the 2008 opener? In the press conference afterward, a reporter asked him what that win meant for the transformation of the program, and how it could bode well for the rest of the season, bla, bla, bla. Saban basically cussed the guy out.

And yet...

Saban's machine looked a bit flat for Arkansas before surviving for a close win. A week after that, they were geared up to the max in a home pummeling of Florida. A week after that, South Carolina had a clear emotional edge in dealing Alabama its first regular-season loss since 2007.

We need to be careful not to be too simplistic here. Just because a team loses a game doesn't mean it came out flat. And just because a team wins a game doesn't mean it was on an emotional high.

But after watching Clemson against Auburn and Miami, and Miami against Clemson and Florida State, I'm pretty much convinced this game of emotional roulette is very real -- and very tough for coaches to win.

On to some Thursday linkage...

Man, is coaching at Miami a tough job. If you look bad, there's an enormous peanut gallery of former Hurricane greats who are ready to fire away.

In this Miami Herald blog post (scroll down), a number of luminaries rip Randy Shannon to shreds for various reasons.

Melvin Bratton:

"You can blame the coach, you can blame the players. To me, it's a state of emergency right now. Everybody needs to take control, take a step back and say 'What can I do better? Is it the coaching? Is it the weight room? Do guys need to spend more time studying, dissecting plays? I don't have the answer.

"But what I don't see is any urgency. I don't see that fight. And that is inexcusable."

"I'm not saying these kids are soft," Bratton said. "But somebody needs to step up on offense and defense and be a leader. I don't see that on the sideline. You watch the game and keep waiting for somebody on the defensive side to go to the offensive side of the ball and say 'What the hell are you all doing?' Jerome Brown and those guys, when we screwed up, he would go check [Vinny] Testaverde, myself, [Alonzo] Highsmith. If we saw the defensive backs giving up long plays, we'd go to the defensive backs and say 'What the hell are you doing dog? Tighten your [expletive] up.' These guys don't hold each other accountable."

Michael Irvin:

"This program could use more thugs."

Leon Searcy:

"All this throwing up The U has nothing to do with these kids now," Searcy said. "It has to do with the guys who back in the day that got the University of Miami the reputation for whooping ass every Saturday. These kids don't have that same mentality. They don't have anybody talking to them about the tradition of the University of Miami. They don't have any old guys coming back. When I played at the University of Miami, the older guys had access to the field while we were playing. If we weren't getting it done, you got freaking Cortez Kennedy right there in the defensive huddle telling you what you're not doing. If the linebackers weren't getting it done, you had Winston Moss telling linebackers what to do. If they weren't getting it done in the secondary, Bennie Blades was saying 'Hey man you aren't coming off the edge.'

"That kind of access on the field where not only your coach is telling you something, but guys who have been to the NFL that you'll listen to are saying it too, that resonates. You're a running back. How are you not going to listen to Melvin Bratton, one of the best all-time running backs and fullbacks at the University of Miami. If you're a defensive tackle, how are you not going to listen to Russell Maryland? All that access to the game was a huge plus. It's not there anymore."

And more Bratton:

"Look at Sam Shields starting [for the Green Bay Packers]. Look at Bruce Johnson. Randy Phillips. Tavares Gooden. These kids didn't get drafted," Bratton said. "Let's be real. This is the NFL. There are only 53 people that can be on a roster. These kids at the University of Miami were part time starters, didn't make any All-American lists. But they can go to the league and dominate? Something is wrong. I don't know if it's coaching or if its scheme. But how can you go to the next level and start on opening day? Somebody isn't getting the best out of these kids.

"You want to have chemistry and allow the players on the field to be who they are. The Ray Ray Armstrongs of the world, when he came in there, the reason he wanted to go to Miami was because he fit the Miami mentality, Sean Taylor-type mentality, knock the [expletive] out of you. You can't pigeon hole those kids. You got to let them go.

"It's not like they don't have it in them. Go to the innercity. Go watch those Pop Warner and Little League football games. You got parents fighting, kids fighting. They know football is their way out. You go to the University of Miami now, it's like a country club."

I'd bet money that, if Shannon were shown the door, these former greats would seriously advocate Luther Campbell take over the program.

People say they want their offensive linemen to be nastier, but I don't think this is what they have in mind:

Virginia Tech's Greg Nosal had his pinky finger ripped off last week against Central Michigan.

Nosal was at the center of an odd scene on the field at Lane Stadium during halftime. A group of trainers wandered around staring at the ground, squinting and searching for something.

Back in the locker room, Nosal lay on a table having his left hand examined. He had jammed it into another player's face mask during Virginia Tech's final possession of the second quarter and thought he suffered a bad cut.

Upon looking at his bloody pinky finger, the team's medical staff became somewhat frantic as they asked Nosal where, exactly, his injury had occurred on the field. He didn't understand why that really mattered, but they kept asking.

"Why do they want to know?" he wondered. "Did my finger fall off?"

Well, not all of it. But roughly a half-inch chunk of skin and tissue became separated from Nosal's finger. He didn't know that immediately because he was wearing a glove - inside of which the nub was eventually discovered.

So, just how good is Florida State?

Though the Seminoles are playing as well as they have in a long time, it's fair to wonder how good Florida State really is midway through the first season of the Jimbo Fisher era. The '97 team that beat Miami 47-0, the 2000 team that won each of its final six regular season games by at least 23 points – those teams didn't have to fight for respect.

This Florida State team does, especially given the 47-17 defeat it suffered at Oklahoma is barely a month old.

"We haven't achieved anything yet," Seminoles quarterback Christian Ponder said here on Monday. "We're sitting at 5-1 right now and we're not going to the ACC championship yet. We won a couple games, four games, five games – I mean, it's not that big of a deal.

"In our minds, yeah we're going somewhere right now but we haven't achieved anything yet."

Speaking of Florida State, love the way Jimbo Fisher has incorporated Lonnie Pryor as the fullback when the 'Noles go to I-formation.

“Very complete football player,” Jimbo said. “He’s one of the best one I’ve been around, especially for a guy that’s not a dominant size guy. He plays good leverage and toughness and understands.

“The guys does a ton of things. … Great special teams guy, can run it, can block, can catch, we’ve put him in the one back as a fullback. And he’ll continue to get bigger. He’s got two more years to grow.

Christian Ponder echoed Jimbo’s feelings.

“He’s an unsung hero if you watch him block,” Christian said. “He’s making so many blocks that are allowing guys to get so many yards.

“He’s a team first guy and when he’s not getting the ball he’s playing unbelievably well and when he’s getting the ball he’s playing unbelievably well.”

The Seminoles are seeking big-money donors to fund a new indoor practice facility.

Da'Quan Bowers is coming into his own.

Had this exchange with Kevin Steele earlier this week. He was marveling at Bowers' second sack Saturday at North Carolina.

Steele: "It was textbook technique and it was sheer speed and power," Clemson's defensive coordinator said. "When you can stick your hand in a man's chest that weighs 300 pounds with one hand, one hand, and you can carry him seven yards to the quarterback's lap, reach around him and grab the quarterback, you are a man."

Me: "I don't think anyone thought he was a woman before."

Steele: "I mean, a man man.

And in College Park, Jamarr Robinson says: "I'll be back."



LW