Florida State Rush Offense vs Clemson Rush Defense
Florida State has run the ball well this season with at least 150 yards in each of their 5 contests. That is despite the fact that they haven’t leaned on the run game like was predicted before the season started due to the emergence of Jameis Winston at quarterback.  The Seminole rushing attack is averaging 6.01 yards per carry, which is 9th in the nation.  According to S&P+ advanced statistics, the Noles have the 7th best rushing attack in the nation.

The Noles are led on the ground by a trio of running backs that each bring a little something different to the table.  Devonta Freeman is the leader on the ground with 385 yards on a very impressive 7.1 yards per carry average.  Freeman has good speed and quickness that combines with excellent vision and patience. James Wilder Jr. is the bruiser of the bunch that loves contact. He has been limited the last several games with a shoulder injury, but is reportedly back to 100% at the perfect time.  Wilder has 214 yards on the year with a 5.9 yards per carry average.  The wildcard is Karlos Williams, a converted defensive back who burst on the scene and has sprinters speed combined with great size that gives him big play potential. Williams has 244 yards on the season with a 8.7 yards per carry average.  The offensive line has done a good job opening the holes for the backs and have been very disciplined in their play thus far.

Florida State will be facing an improved defensive front from Clemson.  The front four are not huge, but do have good size other than smaller defensive end Vic Beasley, who checks in at just 235 lbs.  The linebackers also have good size.  While there has been improvement in the Tigers front seven, they still have struggled some agasint the run giving up just under 3.94 yards per carry, 49th in the nation. Looking at the S&P+ advanced stats, Clemson has the 80th rush defense in the nation.  They gave up 222 yards on the ground to Georgia in the opener and surrendered 323 yards against Syracuse.   It’s important to also note, when looking at college rushing stats – they include sacks, which can alter the look of the stats and Clemson is among the leaders in the nation in sacks.  For instance, against Boston College, the Tigers gave up just 94 yards on 2.4 yards per carry.  However, they had 5 sacks for 42 yards.  When looking at the actual rushing that BC did, Clemson gave up 136 yards on 4.0 yards per carry.  Still a good job, but not as dominant as it first looks.  This can partially explain why the Clemson rushing defense is rated so low in advanced stats when not looking as bad in raw stats.

I expect the Seminoles to be able to run the ball against the Tigers at least splitting the difference between the averages at 5.0 yards per carry.

Matchup to Watch:  FSU LT Cameron Erving vs Clemson DE Vic Beasley
Beasley is Clemson’s best pass rusher, but he’s undersized.  Erving has struggled some with smaller, quicker players. If FSU can take advantage of Beasley’s lack of size, they could have success running behind Erving and Matias on the left side.

Advantage:  FSU

 

Florida State Pass Offense vs Clemson Pass Defense
The Clemson pass defense has been a mixed bag this season.  Taking a look at the S&P+ advanced stats, Clemson has the 27th best pass defense in the nation.  Looking at raw statistics that lines up, Clemson ranks fairly well giving up just 186.5 yards per game, 18th best in the nation, with a pass defense rating of 107.86,  21st in the nation.  They don’t fare as well in yards per attempt, however, giving up 6.7 yards per pass which is 42nd in the nation.  This points to their propensity to give up big plays.  They’ve given up 48 pass plays of 10+ yards including 10 passes of 30+ yards on the season, 81st in the nation.  The main culprit has been suspect safety play at times.  These issues were evident against Georiga, who averaged 16 yards per completion on the way to 323 yards passing.  In the game, Clemson gave up 30+ yard pass plays to 3 different Georgia receivers.  Against Boston College, it just about cost the Tigers the game when the gave up a 69 yard touchdown pass to allow the Eagles to take the lead midway through the 3rd quarter.

Where Clemson will give you fits in the passing game is through their pass rush.  The Tigers rank 2nd in the nation with 24 sacks on the year averaging 4.0 a game.  Leading the way is Vic Beasley who has 9.0 sacks on the season.  He is predominately an undersized speed guy, but has surprising strength.  One of the key matchups of the game will be Beasley going up against Florida State left tackle Cameron Erving.  Erving is an excellent athlete and has good feet, but Beasley will certainly be a challenge.  Eleven different Clemson players have at least 1 sack, so Clemson isn’t afraid to bring the blitz, but most of their pressure this year has been from Beasley. So far this year, Clemson has blitzed on just 18.9% of pass plays, which is the 3rd lowest total in the ACC.  For comparison, FSU has blitzed 34.5% of the time, 4th highest in the conference. (thank you to resident statistician CCnole for those numbers!)

As is the case with almost every team that Florida State goes up against, the Seminoles have an advantage when looking at the FSU receivers verses the opponent secondary.  This is the true against Clemson, too.  Georgia is the most similar passing team, quality wise, that Clemson has faced and the Dawgs were able to move the ball through the air very well.  The FSU trio of Rashad Greene, Kenny Shaw, and Kelvin Benjamin should have a good day as long as quarterback Jameis Winston is given time.  Winston, however, has even been remarkable when facing a blitz and does an excellent job of avoiding pressure while keeping his eyes down field and his options open.  Winston has an amazing stat line when facing a blitz this year:
32/45 (71.1%), 489 yards, 7 TD, 1 Int, 209.3 rating, 2 sacks

Overall, the Florida State passing attack has put up fantastic numbers.  The Seminoles rank 2nd in passing efficiency at 202.0 and yards per attempt at 11.3.  What’s impressive considering the yards per attempt is that Noles rank 5th in completion percentage at 70.4%.  Football Outsiders S&P+ ranks the Seminole passing attack as the 4th best in the nation.

Matchup to Watch: FSU WR Kenny Shaw vs Clemson Safeties
There is a good chance that Clemson will go to more nickel coverage when Florida State uses their 3 wide receiver sets, which should be a good part of the time.  If they’re able to Kenny Shaw matched up on the Clemson safeties, Shaw should be an excellent target for Jameis Winston. Shaw is an excellent route runner and has good speed and quickness.  The Clemson safeties have been the weak  spot of their secondary this year.

Advantage: FSU

 

Clemson Rush Offense vs Florida State Rush Defense
Clemson has been very consistent running the ball so far this year as they’ve rushed for between 156 and 197 yards in each contest.   Roderick McDowell has the bulk of the carries for Clemson this season with 385 yards on 4.9 yards per carry.  He’s a solid back, but hasn’t shown the playmaking ability that they had with Andre Ellington last year.  Quarterback Tajh Boyd has the 2nd most carries and yards on the team.  After removing sacks, Boyd has 53 carries for 192 yards.  He does an excellent job running on short yardage situations up the middle following his back.  Curiously, dynamic playmaker Sammy Watkins only has 3 carries on the season for 5 yards.  I expect that this will change against Florida State as Clemson used Watkins successfully early on against the Noles last year and FSU has shown a loss of contain on jet sweeps on a couple occasions this season..  Overall, Clemson is a solid but average rushing team ranking 84th in the nation with a 4.00 yards per carry average.  The S+P+ ranking for Clemson’s rush offense mirrors that with a ranking of 79.

Florida State’s run defense has been a mixed bag this year.  Statistically, they’ve been alright giving up 3.35 yards per carry, 23rd best in the nation, but they’ve struggled for stretches containing the edges and also giving up yards up the gut.  In S&P+ advanced stats, the Nole rush defense checks in at 38th best.  They have fared better against spread style teams, which Clemson is, than power running teams, though.  Through the first 4 games of the season, it could be argued that FSU was doing a lot of experimentation with personnel and formations, leading to some of the defensive issues.  Against Maryland, a similarly styled spread team, the Noles featured much less personnel changes and stuck primarily to a 3-3-5/4-2-5 formation.  I suspect we’ll see much of the same against Clemson.   Facing Maryland and Clemson are two completely different animals, though, and Florida State won’t be able to dominate the line of scrimmage like they did against the Terps.  They don’t have to dominate to be successful, though, they just need to contain the Clemson run game and try to keep the Clemson offense behind the chains.

Matchup to Watch: Clemson QB Tajh Boyd vs FSU Linebackers
If Florida State sticks to their alignment they used against Maryland’s spread attack, Terrance Smith and Telvin Smith will be the guys here.  Clemson runs a good amount of zone read looks with Tajh Boyd preferring to run between the tackles.  The FSU linebackers, Terrance Smith most likely in my mind, must do a good job at reading the play and filling the holes taking away Boyd’s ability to run the ball.  Clemson likes to use Boyd more in the rush attack in big games and neutralizing that aspect would be a benefit to the FSU defense.

Advantage: Push

 

Clemson Pass Offense vs Florida State Pass Defense
Clemson has two All-American candidates anchoring their passing game.  Quarterback Tajh Boyd is a Heisman hopeful and one of the most prolific passers in ACC history.  Boyd has a mastery of Chad Morris’s offense and makes very few mistakes.  For the season, he has only thrown 2 interceptions compared to 19 touchdowns and has a completion percentage of 68.8% Despite being a decent runner with the ball in his hands, Boyd is not as adept at scrambling, but does have a good sense of the pocket and is hard to bring down. Despite the fact that Clemson throws the ball over 38 times per game on average, Boyd is only sacked about twice per game.

On the receiving end of many of Boyd’s passes is Sammy Watkins, certainly among the top play makers in the nation.  Unlike last year, when the Tigers featured Watkins along with current NFL WR De’Andre Hopkins, Clemson doesn’t have a game breaking second wide receiver to lean on. That’s not to say that the WR unit doesn’t have talent, though.  Martavious Bryant is a physical specimen at 6’5″ 200 lbs and probably has some of the most raw ability on the field.  Into his junior year he hasn’t put it all together yet, but does have 17 catches for 316 yards.  On the opposite end of the spectrum is the undersized Adam Humphries at 5’11″ 190 lbs.  Humprhies is quick and has proven to be a solid receiver with 24 grabs for 319 yards.  Clemson ranks 10th in the nation passing for 341.7 yards per game and 8th in the nation with a 168.78 passer rating. Clemson has the 16th best passing attack in the nation according to S&P+ advanced statistics.

The Florida State pass defense has been one of the best in the nation thus far.  They rank 2nd in the nation in passing yards surrendered at 149.0 per game, 13th in yards per attempt at 5.8, and 22nd in passing efficiency defense at 108.05.  The S&P+ ranks Florida State’s pass defense as the 2nd best in the nation.   Their strength lies in the secondary where they have a cupboard full of big, athletic defensive backs that can play multiple roles and positions.  One of the keys to Florida State’s success in slowing down the Clemson offense last year was the physical play of the secondary against the Clemson wide receivers.  I would expect the Noles to again try and use this strategy to throw off the routes and timing of the Clemson passing game.  Florida State has not had a lot of success getting to the quarterback so far this season recording just 10 sacks on the season.  That doesn’t mean they haven’t effected the passing game with pressure, though. Although getting a sack is a preferred outcome, having the quarterback throw before he’s ready and forcing short throws can be just as important.  Against NC State, Clemson had their worst offensive performance of the season. This was in large part to the pressure they were able to put on Tajh Boyd.  The Wolfpack only recorded 2 sacks on the game, though.  The Noles have shown the ability to change what the offense wants to do with pressure, they must be able to do the same this weekend at Clemson.

Matchup to watch: Clemson RT Shaq Anthony vs FSU DE Mario Edwards
Shaq Anthony is in his first full year as a starter after starting 2 games in 2012. He’s a bit undersized at 280 lbs and is facing a DE about the same size as him. Anthony has been inconsistant this year and Edwards has started to come on stronger according to coaches. After missing a game with a hand injury, Edwards had a very good outing against Maryland and might give Anthony some problems.

Advantage: Clemson

 

Intangibles and Conclusion
The first and most obvious goes in the direction of Clemson and that is home field advantage in one of the most difficult places in the nation to play.  This is especially true on a big game Saturday night.  The Noles have overcome a big environment in primetime on the road against Pitt this year, but that was nothing like the trip to Death Valley will be.  Some will point to the fact that Jameis Winston is just a RS Freshman making his first start in this kind of atmosphere. Personally, I haven’t seen anything from Winston so far that would lead me to believe his youth will be a major factor.  Neither team has done anything particularly good or bad in the special teams department, so going in I don’t think you can point to something, but with the play makers on the field that is always a possibility that could have a massive outcome on the game.  Both teams have great offenses and good defenses.  Looking at their performances so far this year I can’t see either team shutting down the other, I think Florida State is better equipped to slow down Clemson’s offense than Clemson is equipped to slow down Florida State’s offense, though.
Score Prediction: FSU 41-30