Florida State’s coaching search is already taking shape, and the list starts with a familiar name at the top.
After a 3-5 start to 2026, the Seminoles reportedly moved on from Mike Norvell. The buyout is said to be in the $46 million to $50 million range, but the 10-22 stretch since the strong 2023 season left Florida State with little appetite to wait it out.
So who comes next? There are a handful of names that fit, and each one would ripple beyond Tallahassee.
Jimbo Fisher has to be in the conversation. He was the last coach to lead Florida State to a title, and his run in Tallahassee was a big one: 83-23 before he left for Texas A&M.
Fisher’s time in College Station ended with one of the largest buyouts in college football history after a 45-25 record there. He hasn’t coached since late 2023, but at 61, he’s still young enough to jump back in.
He’s not currently linked to another opening, and he already knows how to win at FSU. He may be waiting for the right call.
Deion Sanders would have been a cleaner fit two years ago. He’s an FSU alum, and at that point he looked like a coach on the rise who could handle the NIL game.
That picture has changed. He’s 5-14 since no longer having the best player in college football on both sides of the ball, and his health scare didn’t help matters.
His roster churn has also raised eyebrows in NIL circles. Colorado may not mind if the Sanders era winds down, and because his staff leans so heavily pro, one of his assistants could be a natural next option in Boulder.
Mark Stoops brings a different kind of case. He was a standout defensive coordinator at Florida State before taking his first head coaching job at Kentucky.
The overall record there, 72-80, doesn’t jump off the page, but he did more with less than most. Kentucky reached eight straight bowl games under him and won 10 games in a season for the first time since 1977.
After being let go by Kentucky at the end of 2025, Stoops has been working as a special assistant at Texas. He could also be a less expensive option, and his FSU ties are obvious.
Texas would not feel his departure immediately.
Mario Diaz also has Seminoles roots. He began his coaching career at Florida State and has built a résumé by getting results without a ton to work with.
His 21-15 record at Miami was solid, if not spectacular, and plenty of coaches have had a harder time in Coral Gables. At Duke, he’s 23-11 and has shown he can operate in the ACC while recruiting at a high level.
The question is money. Duke, fresh off the Darian Mensah portal fiasco, might be willing to match Florida State’s offer, which is an awkward reality for a program trying to climb out of a $46 million to $50 million hole.
Kenny Dillingham rounds out the group. He coached at Florida State as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in 2020 and 2021, and he’s now 25-20 at Arizona State.
At 36, he’s younger than most of the names in this mix and may be ready for a bigger stage after a 2024 College Football Playoff berth. Arizona State would likely look west for its next coach, perhaps offensive coordinator Marcus Arroyo.
In Other News...
Florida States Reset Just Got Even More Painful After Norvell
Florida States coaching reset picked up another jolt this week as the program moved on from defensive coordinator Tony White and safeties coach Evan Cooper in the wake of Mike Norvells dismissal. The changes are part of a broader overhaul after a frustrating 2026 season that has kept the Seminoles searching for answers, with the recent loss to Clemson only adding to the sense that the slide had become too much to ignore.
Rick Stockstill will guide the team as interim head coach for the rest of the season, but the bigger story is how quickly the staff has been stripped down around him. For a program trying to steady itself after a run of losses, the departures on defense only deepen the uncertainty and leave more questions about what the Seminoles will look like once the season finally ends. [Read more 🡒]
Mike Norvell Sounds Off On What Cost FSU Against Clemson
Mike Norvell did not need much time after Florida States loss to Clemson to zero in on what went wrong. The Seminoles head coach pointed to turnovers, poor field position and special teams mistakes as the kinds of self-inflicted problems that can swing a game against a quality opponent, even when the effort is there. He said he appreciated the way his team kept battling late, but the frustration was clear because the standard in a matchup like that has to be cleaner execution from start to finish.
For Florida State, the bigger concern is that the issues Norvell identified are the ones that tend to linger if they are not corrected quickly. He also touched on injuries, individual performances and the teams mindset moving forward, all part of the postgame inventory that comes after a loss with missed chances attached to it. The Seminoles now have to turn that disappointment into something more useful, because the margin for error in games like this is usually too small to survive repeated mistakes. [Read more 🡒]
Florida States Defensive Reset Just Claimed Another Assistant
Florida States defensive overhaul picked up another jolt this week, with safeties coach Evan Cooper and defensive coordinator Tony White both dismissed from the staff amid a 3-5 season. Cooper had come to Tallahassee ahead of the 2025 campaign after coaching at Nebraska in 2023, part of a staff built to steady a defense that had shown flashes even as the unit struggled to find consistency.
The move leaves the Seminoles continuing to sort through a reset on that side of the ball, with the coaching changes underscoring how much has gone wrong during the season. Even with some individual defensive successes along the way, Florida State never got the collective results it needed, and the latest staff shakeup only adds to the uncertainty surrounding what comes next. [Read more 🡒]