10/11/2023 football Edit

3-3-5 Syracuse defense presents unique challenge for FSU led by its creator

Curt Weiler • TheOsceola

Senior Writer

This won't be the first time Florida State has faced Syracuse's unique 3-3-5 defense.

In fact, it will the third time that Mike Norvell and the Seminoles have faced off against the Orange since they implemented the defense ahead of the 2020 season.

But this season will be quite a bit different. Because this time, when the Seminoles face Syracuse on Saturday at noon (ABC), they'll be going up against new Syracuse defensive coordinator Rocky Long, the man widely known for putting the 3-3-5 defense on the map.

“Rocky is the inventor of this defense, man," FSU offensive coordinator Alex Atkins said. "He established it so everybody else does a good job, but he is not a carbon. He is the originator. He understands the problems, and he knows how there's nothing you really can show him that he hadn't seen or had an answer for."

Long has been in college football coaching since 1978 and spent 20 years as an FBS head coach at New Mexico (1998-2008) and San Diego State (2011-19). He began creating his 3-3-5 defense when he was the defensive coordinator at Oregon State over 30 years ago in the early 1990s.

Tony White, who worked under Long at SDSU, actually brought the 3-3-5 defense to Syracuse when he took over as defensive coordinator in 2020. But when White left to take the same position at Nebraska, Syracuse head coach Dino Babers brought Long onto his staff to replace him.

The 3-3-5 defense uses just three defensive linemen, three linebackers and five defensive backs. It helps Syracuse negate the problem it can have relative to many of its ACC opponents of recruiting and developing high-level defensive linemen.

And with only three players near the line of scrimmage on a play-by-play basis, it creates the opportunity for the Orange to bring additional pressure from a variety of positions and areas all over the field, a unique challenge that opposing quarterbacks must be aware of each time they snap the ball.

"You're not going to see a team that brings more variations of pressures. Just the different looks from three down to four down to — they can blitz everybody on the field at some point. You have to be great with your eyes. You have to be great with your technique..." Norvell said. "We've got to work and have a great week of film study, try to continue to find things that can help our guys play as fast as possible. But then there are going to be a lot of things of how do you respond to the variations as they do them."

Long has had a great deal of success doing exactly those sorts of things through the first six games of his time at Syracuse.

Entering this weekend's game, the Orange have 47 tackles for loss, the most in the ACC and tied for ninth out of 133 FBS teams. Their 18 sacks are second-most in the ACC and tied for 14th nationally. What makes those TFL numbers even more impressive is that it's not coming from a single source. 13 Syracuse defenders have two or more TFLs this season and no one has more than linebacker Marlowe Wax's 5.5.

And while they played a fairly soft non-conference schedule, that's not where those numbers were padded. Syracuse had a season-high 13 tackles for loss in its 31-14 home loss to Clemson two weeks ago.

"They’re top 10 in the country in tackles for loss because they can confer so many twists and different pressures and keep you on your edge," Atkins said. "They want to dictate to you what they want you to do and we've got to find that balance of not putting our guys in a bad situation, but also not taking ourselves from what we do well."

All of that isn't to say that the Syracuse defense is unassailable. The Orange have allowed 31-plus points in both of their first two ACC games against Clemson and UNC and lost both of them by 17 or more points. Just last season, FSU won 38-3 at Syracuse.

But still, the Orange present some hurdles few other teams do as the Seminoles look to extend their 11-game streaks of wins and games in which they have scored 30-plus points.

"It's still dictating what you want to do. We still want to be who we are, and do what we do. We just want to make sure we're not putting our kids in a bad situation based upon what they do on defense..." Atkins said. "It's gonna be a unique challenge, but we've got to make sure we have our identity on display also."