FAMU football coach James Colzie III to 'see where we are' during Rattlers' bye week
Florida A&M football is positioned well during its bye week, says head coach James Colzie III.
The Rattlers hold a 2-1 record, the best amongst Southwestern Athletic Conference teams, and ranked 22nd in the Football Championship Subdivision’s Coaches Poll.
FAMU last played on Saturday at Miami, the 12th-best Football Bowl Subdivision team in the latest US LBM Coaches Poll. The Hurricanes towered over the Rattlers 56-9 at Hard Rock Stadium.
FAMU’s bye week is followed by another road game against an FBS team, Troy, on Sept. 21 for a Week 4 matchup.
Troy (0-2), which lost 38-17 to Memphis in Week 2, plays at Iowa this Saturday.
“Overall, I’m excited and blessed to be in this opportunity. There were a lot of prognosticators that felt we wouldn’t be 2-1,” Colzie said in the SWAC’s weekly coaches Zoom conference on Monday.
“Excited to just get back, correct, evaluate, and see where we are as a football team moving forward,” Colzie added about the bye week. “We’ll concentrate on getting ourselves healthy and ready for Troy next week.”
FAMU is nationally ranked and is atop its conference through three games.
But the Rattlers are far from where they aspire to be as they aim to repeat as Black College Football National Champions.
Colzie noted his FAMU team’s issues with ball security and lack of causing turnovers.
The Rattlers offense has fumbled six times in three games, losing three. Additionally, it threw its first three interceptions of the season against Miami last Saturday.
On defense, FAMU hasn’t yet forced a turnover this season. Though stats are skewed from the Miami game, the FAMU’s ‘Dark Cloud Defense’ isn’t near the top of FCS total defense rankings like past years, placing at 66th through three contests.
“Record-wise, it’s where I want it to be. But there are some things as a football team, I think we can still be doing better,” Colzie said. “We’re on the minus side in the turnover margin. That’s not something that, standard-wise, is what we want to be. So, for us, just bettering ourselves structurally as a team.”
Colzie plans to check his team’s temperature at this week’s practices.
As a first-year head coach, he wants to continue to build connections with his set of Rattlers.
However, he will also test their resiliency.
“Just continuing to learn my guys,” Colzie said.
“We’re using this week to truly find out what makes our players tick. We understand each player on our football team needed a different type of way to learn and understand the material.”
FAMU Rattlers football coach James Colzie III's observations, Troy Trojans outlook
Colzie asked for FAMU football to face adversity to start the season.
The Rattlers coach got his wish, and FAMU scored comeback victories against Norfolk State in Week 0 and South Carolina State in the following game.
Colzie credits his team’s responsiveness to FAMU’s practice script, which reserves a period for situational football.
“We’ve been able to handle ourselves going through some adverse situations and overcoming them,” Colzie said. “I think working situations throughout training camp and the week has been beneficial to us because we’ve been successful.”
Miami snapped FAMU football’s 13-game winning streak last Saturday. The streak reached back to last season under former Rattlers head coach Willie Simmons.
FAMU isn’t focusing on Troy yet. But the Rattlers plan to start a new streak by knocking off the FBS Sun Belt Conference’s Trojans.
The Rattlers began their bye-week routine on Sunday. FAMU had Monday off.
“We want to have the opportunity to start a new streak. The standard we’ve set for ourselves throughout my time here and with Coach Simmons being the head coach previous years, we don’t lose many games,” Colzie said.
“Guys did a great job [Sunday] as we went through film. We have our off day [Monday], but our coaching staff has spent some time with them to get to know them better so we can get ourselves going in the right direction.”
Florida A&M Rattlers 2024 Football Schedule
Sept. 21 at Troy, 7 p.m. Eastern Time, ESPN+
Sept. 28 vs. Alabama A&M, 6 p.m., ESPN+
Oct. 5 at Alabama State, 3 p.m. Eastern Time, ESPN+
Oct. 19 at Jackson State, 3:30 p.m. Eastern Time, ESPN Network
Oct. 26 vs. Southern, 7 p.m., ESPN Network
Nov. 2 vs. Texas Southern (HOMECOMING), 4 p.m., ESPN+
Nov. 9 at Prairie View A&M, 3 p.m. Eastern Time, ESPN+
Nov. 16 vs. Mississippi Valley State, 1 p.m., HBCU GO
Nov. 23 vs. Bethune-Cookman in Florida Classic, Orlando*, 3:30 p.m., ESPN Network
Nov. 30: FCS Playoffs Begin
Dec. 7: SWAC Championship, LOCATION/TEAMS TBA, ESPN2
Dec. 14: Celebration Bowl, Atlanta*, TEAMS TBA, 12 p.m., ABC
BOLD = SWAC
* = Neutral Site
Gerald Thomas, III covers Florida A&M University Athletics for the Tallahassee Democrat. Contact him via email at gdthomas@tallahassee.com or on the app formerly known as Twitter @3peatgee.
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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FAMU football coach James Colzie on first 3 games, bye week objectives
