College Football: #20 Virginia Tech Hokies v. #19 Florida State Seminoles

The 20th ranked Virginia Tech Hokies will take on the 19th ranked Seminoles in Florida State at 8 pm eastern on Labor Day for Week One of the College Football Season.

This primetime matchup between Virginia Tech and Florida State will feature the debut of Willie Taggart as the head coach of the Seminoles. These two closely ranked college football teams will showcase young quarterbacks, Redshirt Junior Deondre Francois for FSU and Redshirt Sophomore Josh Jackson for Virginia Tech leading their respective offenses.

Virginia Tech head coach Justin Fuente and defensive coordinator Bob Foster will try to throw off Francois on defense, as he might struggle initially as he may be rusty coming off his injury.

Both offenses should have success early and often throughout the game due to the lost talent from the 2018 NFL Draft for both teams at Doak Campbell Stadium in an ACC showdown.

Players to Watch and Keys to the Game

Florida State

Deondre Francois was named the starter over James Blackman as Francois was recovering from a season-ending knee injury that occurred last year but has the talent to lead Taggart’s offense. He threw for 3,350 yards with 20 touchdowns and seven interceptions in 2016.  His performance will be a key to the game for FSU as Francois could light it up or fold in a tough primetime matchup.

The run game for FSU will be one of the keys to the game as running backs Cam Akers (rushed 1,025 yards and seven touchdowns in 2017) and Jacques Patrick (rushed for 748 yards and seven touchdowns in 2017) will be the starting running back tandem along with the other talented running backs they have for depth.

The Florida State safeties and defensive line will be a position to watch in tonight’s game as they lost safety Derwin James in the NFL Draft in 2018. Both Stanford Samuels III and Hamsah Nasirildeen are listed as the starting safeties for the Seminole and will help defend the back of their defense.

Virginia Tech

Virginia Tech’s Josh Jackson is looking to progress from his freshman year last year as he has shown signs of hope to lead their offense further, throwing 2,991 yards with 20 touchdowns and nine interceptions in his first year as the starting quarterback for the Hokies.

If Jackson shows enough poise in a tough matchup, they could edge out the Seminoles if he out-duels Francois.

The Hokies lost more talent than the Seminoles in last years NFL Draft as their main lose was the Edmunds brothers at safety (Terrell Edmunds) and linebacker (Tremaine Edmunds) in the 2018 NFL Draft.

Linebackers Khalil Ladler, Rayshard Asby, and Dylan Rivers have their work cut out for them.

Divine Deablo and Reggie Floyd Jr. will have to step up as well as their young defensive core will have to harass Francois if the Hokies want a win at Florida State.

Prediction

I think the Virginia Tech Hokies lost too much talent compared to the Florida State Seminoles to walk away with a win in Doak Campbell Stadium. A new head coach, the return of quarterback Deondre Francois, and the emergence of the running game with Cam Akers may be too much to handle for the young Hokies defense to handle.

Jackson will probably have to be relied on to make plays himself as they did lose some key positions from the 2018 NFL Draft.

This should be a high scoring game as Florida State should start 1-0 as Willie Taggart gets his first win as the Florida State head coach.