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Yesterday’s Poll Results
Today’s Poll
How does the FSU-Florida game go this year?
🏹 Welcome to The Chief Brief! 🏹
Good morning, Seminole! Today's a lighter slate than yesterday's marathon, but there's still plenty worth your coffee: a basketball alumni reunion weekend, a deep scouting look at linebacker Chris Jones, a full breakdown of the FSU-Florida rivalry game, and the next batch of our fan-voted greatest games countdown.
📋 In Today's Chief Brief:
🏀 FSU Basketball's Alumni Reunion Weekend 🏀 - NBA pros came home to run it back with the current roster.
🧠 Chris Jones Film Breakdown 🧠 - The hype is real, but so is the swing skill to watch.
🐊 2026 Schedule Preview: Florida Gators 🐊 - A rivalry game with two programs heading opposite directions.
🏆 FSU's Best-Ever Games: 20-11 🏆 - The countdown continues.
🏟️ Inside the Dunlap Football Center: The Full Tour 🏟️ - Alford's hour-long walkthrough, room by room.
📝 Sunday Notebook 📝 - A new 2028 offer and a 2027 target who landed in Tallahassee.
Let's dive in. 🍢
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Florida State men's basketball welcomed back a long list of NBA and international pros this weekend for two days of pickup games, meals, and mentorship with the 2026-27 roster.
🌟 Who Showed Up
Spurs guard Devin Vassell, Terance Mann, Patrick Williams, and Trent Forrest headlined the group, joined by Mfiondu Kabengele, RaiQuan Gray, and Sardaar Calhoun, who reportedly still lit it up from three.
Head coach Luke Loucks organized the reunion, which included pickup games Friday and Saturday, a Friday night gathering at Loucks' house, and lunch together on Saturday.
🏀 What It Meant
On Friday, the alumni group beat the current roster by seven points in a 20-minute scrimmage. Saturday's setup mixed pros and current players onto the same teams for over an hour of competitive full and half-court runs.
Loucks said the goal was less about the score and more about connecting a mostly new roster, aside from returners AJ Swinton and Jalen Crawford, with the program's culture and family.
Why It Matters: With 100 days until tip-off, this is exactly the kind of buy-in Loucks needs from a roster full of newcomers. Getting bumped by NBA-level talent in July builds habits that show up in ACC play come January. 🍢
FSU's defense ranked just 79th nationally in adjusted EPA/play last season, and fixing the linebacker room was central to the offseason overhaul. A film study of new addition Chris Jones shows why the staff is excited, and where the swing skill still needs work.
💪 What Shows Up on Tape
Jones, who flipped to FSU 10 days after committing to Ole Miss, posted 135 tackles, 9.5 tackles for loss, and 3.5 sacks at Southern Miss last season. On film, he shows a real knack for finding the ball carrier, efficient pursuit angles, and a quick first step that lets him wedge through blockers.
He projects as the green-dot linebacker relaying calls for defensive coordinator Tony White, a significant responsibility for a Sun Belt transfer stepping into the ACC.
⚠️ The Swing Skill
Jones' coverage instincts are the clear weakness. He can look lost in zone drops and finished last season with a 16.7 percent missed tackle rate, a number tied partly to shorter length than his listed 6-foot-1 frame.
He projects better as a blitzer than a zone defender, which could push White to scheme around him rather than ask him to consistently drop into space.
Why It Matters: Jones should be a tackling machine against the run from day one, but how much White trusts him in coverage will shape the ceiling of FSU's whole defense. That's one of the top storylines to track once pads come on. 🍢
FSU closes the regular season against Florida on November 27, and this year's meeting comes with the Seminoles under real pressure while the Gators are rebuilding under a well-regarded first-year coach.
🔄 A Program Going Different Directions
Florida hired Jon Sumrall, who went 42-11 at Tulane and Troy and reached a conference title game every season, pairing him with a $2 million offensive coordinator in Buster Faulkner and former NFL executive Dave Caldwell as general manager.
FSU, meanwhile, is 7-17 over the last two seasons with a coach who has largely survived because of a difficult buyout. Florida doesn't need to be great this year. It just needs to look more organized than FSU, and that alone should worry Seminole fans.
🎯 Players to Watch
Running back Jadan Baugh ran for 266 yards against FSU last season and remains the engine of Florida's offense. If he controls the game, everything gets harder for the Seminoles.
Receiver Dallas Wilson flashed as a freshman (12 catches, 174 yards, three touchdowns) in limited action, while linebacker Myles Graham gives Florida a disruptive piece capable of ending long FSU drives.
📅 The Full 2026 Schedule
FSU opens August 29 against New Mexico State, then plays SMU, at Alabama, Central Arkansas, Virginia, at Louisville, at Miami, Clemson, at Boston College, at Pitt, NC State, and closes at home against Florida on November 27.
Why It Matters: The realistic outlook has Florida favored in Tallahassee, and a third straight loss in this rivalry would turn up the volume on every question surrounding Norvell's future. FSU has a path to flipping the result, but it starts with the Seminoles proving they're not the more chaotic program on the field. 🍢
The fan-voted countdown of Florida State's 50 greatest games continues, with this week's batch featuring two wins over Miami, an ACC Championship built on defense alone, and a Sugar Bowl saved by a Deion Sanders interception.
🎬 A Few Highlights From the List
No. 20, the 2005 "Miami Muff," saw FSU survive on nine sacks and a botched Miami field goal snap to finally end a six-game losing streak to the Hurricanes.
No. 16, the 2021 "fourth-and-14" win over Miami, snapped FSU's four-game skid in the rivalry and gave Mike Norvell's rebuild its first signature moment.
No. 15, the 2023 ACC Championship, saw a defense that held Louisville to 188 total yards carry a true freshman quarterback making his first career start to a 13-0 finish.
Why It Matters: This list is a reminder of just how much history FSU has to draw on, and how often defense, not offensive fireworks, delivered the moments fans still talk about decades later. The countdown wraps up next week with the top 10. 🍢
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We touched on the Dunlap Football Center's size yesterday, but Athletic Director Michael Alford gave media a full one-hour walkthrough of the building FSU's players will use for the first time this training camp, and the details go well beyond square footage.
🏆 First Impressions Matter
The building's entry features FSU's three national championship trophies and three Heisman trophies, a moment Alford said is designed to grab a recruit's attention the second they walk in.
The bottom floor houses a new weight room, locker room, and training facility with hot and cold tubs, cold massage chairs, and underwater treadmills for injury rehab.
🖥️ Built for Teaching
The team meeting room now seats 235, a major upgrade from the old Moore Athletics Center space where players and coaches sometimes sat on the floor.
FSU added two virtual reality rooms, including one the width of an actual football field, where the defense can walk through an upcoming opponent's full offense play by play.
🎮 The Extras
Beyond football operations, the building includes an arcade-style entertainment room and a barber shop. Equipment operations assistant AD Jason Baisden said he'd put the facility up against NFL buildings.
Why It Matters: Alford's tour makes clear this wasn't just a bigger building, it was designed room by room to fix real problems, from cramped staff offices to a meeting room players couldn't all fit into. That's the kind of infrastructure FSU is betting will help it close on both recruits and stability. 🍢
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📝 Sunday Notebook 📝
Florida State extended a scholarship offer to four-star 2028 cornerback Ca'Ron Williams out of Santa Margarita Catholic (Calif.) this week. Williams holds nearly 30 offers and has already visited LSU, Ohio State, and Texas, though he's never been to Tallahassee.
Georgia's own 2027 recruiting class breakdown flagged four-star defensive back Ta'Shawn Poole as one of several targets the Bulldogs missed on, with Poole instead committing to Florida State.
Why It Matters: Neither move changes anything for this fall, but both are reminders that the coaching staff's recruiting pipeline keeps working even during a chaotic on-field stretch. 🍢
And that's a wrap!
Thanks for reading today's edition, Seminole! It was a quieter Sunday on the news front, but between a hoops alumni reunion, a QB-adjacent linebacker breakdown, and a full look at the Florida rivalry, there's still plenty to chew on before camp opens Wednesday.
Go Noles,
– The Chief
