Before the season, I thought Florida State and Michigan were likely to end up playing each other in college football’s postseason. I just expected it to be in the Playoff. Instead, it’ll be in an Orange Bowl that might feature the most 2017 NFL talent of any pre-Championship bowl this season (8 p.m. ET Friday, ESPN).
Dalvin Cook vs. Jabrill Peppers might not be the battle that decides the Orange Bowl
Michigan and FSU are likely to send some big names to the NFL soon, but this game will also tell us a lot about the 2017 season.
When you get two annual title contenders, you have a showcase of big-time talent. This one’s loaded with great battles. Here are a few of them.
Jabrill Peppers is key to Michigan stopping Dalvin Cook.
Wonder why Michigan missed the Playoff? Losing to Ohio State was pretty important, but also look at the line for Iowa running back Akrum Wadley in the Hawkeyes’ upset win on Nov. 12. Wadley had 23 carries for 115 rushing yards, plus five receptions for 52 and a touchdown.
The little scatback gave Michigan fits and disrupted what would have otherwise been a boring win on the road. The rest of the Hawkeye offense was ineffectual against Michigan’s defense all night.
Iowa catches Peppers, Michigan’s Heisman finalist linebacker, in a tough spot, trying to fill a cutback lane after aligning so close to the line of scrimmage. Peppers actually arrives where he needs to be. But Wadley doesn’t need a lot of room to do a lot of damage.
Sometimes, Florida State also relies heavily on the athleticism of its running back. He’s even more explosive than Wadley. And like Iowa did, FSU will use a few different runs with lead blockers to unleash Cook, the most terrifying back in the country.
Florida State clearly made run blocking an offseason focus. The Noles have first-year starters at three line spots, including a couple who weren’t starting at the beginning of this season. But the offense has a diverse run game that it executes at a high level.
Michigan will present a different challenge than FSU has faced. The Wolverines are so big up front, and they won’t be afraid to deploy Peppers aggressively against the run.
So a tipping point could be how well Peppers identifies runs and closes space when the Seminoles try to spring Cook on lead runs. FSU is more than good enough to create openings and space for Cook. That will happen even against a front like Michigan’s, but the Wolverines will hope Peppers can be their trump card. NFL scouts will be watching closely.
Young quarterbacks Deondre Francois and Wilton Speight go head-to-head.
These are both “pro-style” squads that love to line up with a fullback and tight end and use lead runs packaged with play action. That works, because Jimbo Fisher and Jim Harbaugh are two of the best in the business at dominant passing attacks. Both can train great signal callers in a pro-style context.
Most teams with good quarterbacks in college will zero in on spread sets to give their QBs more targets and easier reads. But both Michigan and Florida State regularly work from the I-formation and try to establish the run first. It’s possible that in the future, both will lean more on the passing game. They could also mix in more spread sets, because both are led by first-year starters at quarterback with room to grow.
Florida State was starting to find its groove in the passing game down the stretch. A young offensive line improved in pass protection, and the Noles were able to get sophomore WR Auden Tate increasingly involved.
At 6’5 and 220 pounds, Tate is the kind of big target that can be a foundational piece to a more Jameis Winston-like offense in the future:
Tate is also a key piece for combating the Michigan secondary and its fondness for press coverage. Back-shoulder fades, like that long one against Boston College, are the ultimate deterrent to tight coverage if the offense can complete them. It turns out they are much easier to complete if the target is 6’5 and 220.
With good coverage safeties and a lockdown corner in Jourdan Lewis, Michigan is equipped to outnumber the Florida State running game. It can do that with Peppers acting as a free hitter and still be immune to matchup problems in the passing game. That’s unless Francois can regularly find Tate like he did against Boston College (six catches, 101 yards, two TDs).
Michigan fielded an elite defense and was in the Playoff conversation all year. That obscured that Michigan was clearly a year away on offense. Speight somewhat unexpectedly won the job in the fall. He had a mixed season that included a 3.9-yard-per-pass letdown at Iowa, in which Speight was injured, causing him to miss a week and have to grit out another one at Ohio State. In Columbus, Speight nearly dragged the Wolverines to victory, despite a lack of run-game support.
His supporting cast in the air is better than many realize, because Speight’s youth prevented it from being the primary feature of the offense. But Michigan has a pair of big-time, future pro targets that will take the field at receiver (Amara Darboh: 826 receiving yards, seven TDs) and tight end (Jake Butt: 518 receiving yards, four TDs).
The closest FSU has come to facing an offense like this is what it saw against Clemson. The Tigers, despite using some spread, are also a balanced team with a big tight end who spends a lot of time running vertical routes.
Michigan doesn’t utilize Butt in quite the same way with its passing game, but the Wolverines will flex him out wide and allow him to use his superior route-running skills. At 6’6 and 248 pounds, he’s an enticing target for Speight.
Much like the Wolverines trying to deal with Tate after a late-season surge and extra bowl practices with Francois, the Seminoles’ secondary isn’t necessarily ready to counter Speight-to-Butt in the middle of the field, either.
The major advantage for the Noles this year was supposed to be an All-American season from safety Derwin James, yet another pro prospect. But an early-season James injury left their defensive backfield vulnerable all year.
FSU’s run game against Michigan’s defense is the most obvious key matchup.
Cook-Peppers is the premier individual battle, both for fans and NFL scouts. It’ll be critical to how well Cook runs and the FSU offense moves.
But if you want a sense of what these teams might be like in 2017, look to the passing games led by Francois and Speight. If one of those emerging units proves to be further along than the other, that might be more than a signal for the future. It could tip the Orange Bowl, too.
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