Florida State has struggled offensively in Willie Taggart’s first season with the program, and the former quarterback is clearly taking responsibility for that with his team having dropped to below .500 on Saturday.
Prior to Saturday’s game against NC State, which ended up being a 47-28 loss, Taggart turned over playcalling duties to offensive coordinator Walt Bell. While the Seminoles could not find a way to beat No. 21-ranked NC State, Taggart was complimentary of the job Bell did.
“In the moment, I thought he did a good job,” the head coach said, per Curt Weiler and Wayne McGahee III of The Tallahassee Democrat. “We’ve got to execute, we’ve got to put our guys in a position to execute, but for the most part, I thought he did a good job, just, again, without watching the film or anything.”
Taggart had called plays himself in his seven seasons as a head coach prior to being hired at Florida State. However, the Seminoles had been averaging just 21.4 points per game heading into Saturday’s game, which ranked 108th out of 130 FBS teams. Taggart said he believes FSU is a “fragile football team” at the moment that needs him in other areas, so he decided to give up calling plays.
Though they lost 47-28, the Seminoles outgained the Wolfpack 445-417 in total yards. We recently saw a change with playcalling duties at another top program that has seemingly worked out thus far, so perhaps Florida State will enjoy the same success going forward. If they want to end up playing in a bowl game, they need to turn things around in a hurry.
