Mike Norvell shares update on Florida State coaching staff vacancies, timeline for hires

Florida State made waves when it fired both coordinators and its receivers coach amid a 1-9 start to the season. Now coach Mike Norvell begins the process of looking for their replacements.

He was asked how the process might go, given that Florida State still has two regular-season games remaining.

“Yeah you know, this last week was, I mean there was a lot working through it,” Norvell said. “And even throughout the course of this past weekend that was a lot of time that I poured into that, whether it was conversations, whether it was evaluation, whether it’s been a really good amount of interest in the positions. So just kind of sequencing through what could be the right fit in each of the roles.”

In other words, Norvell has already spent some time vetting potential candidates internally. He had a bit of a luxury to do that during the team’s bye week. Time constraints will make that tougher moving forward.

Still, the fifth-year Florida State coach is trying to cordon off some time to prepare for the future in that sense.

“There will be time that I have kind of sectioned off throughout the week that I’m going to be able to have the best balance that I can have,” Norvell said. “I want to pour everything that I have into these players and the opportunity for the week that’s ahead. But where there are moments and chances for me to focus on the coaching, whether it’s search or continuing to go through that process, obviously I’m going to be able to do that to the best of my abilities with that. And I think I’ve got a great structure to be able to make that happen.”

The Florida State head coach was asked more directly about a timeline, particularly whether he could hire someone before the regular season was over.

That sounds like it won’t happen.

“I’m probably going to, out of respect for all people in the regular season, we’re working through process,” Norvell said. “But like I said last week, ideally when the regular season ends you’d like to be able to have a really strong direction of where it’s going.

“There might be guys that could potentially continue to be playing where either announcements, agreements that are made, we’ll see if that’s potential options. There could be guys that assume roles really quick after the season ends. So that’s kind of, there’s still a lot of ebb and flow as decisions are made on who’s going to take those positions, and obviously all the conversations that surround that.”