Luke Loucks is still learning to be a college basketball head coach, a task made even more challenging during a difficult season that’s seen Florida State come up just short in matchups as often as the Seminoles have been blown out.
Loucks finally found the breakthrough in an upset victory over Miami on Tuesday against fellow rookie head coach Jai Lucas. The Seminoles were 12.5-point underdogs and came in winless in ACC play against a Miami team ranked as a No. 9 seed in Joe Lunardi’s latest bracketology.
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However, FSU brought the fight to the Hurricanes, turned UM over 14 times, and played with better desperation, according to Lucas, to provide Florida State its first quad one win on the road since Wake Forest on February 12, 2025.
“You can learn a lot from losing. At times, you can learn a lot more from losing than winning.” Loucks said after the victory on Tuesday, “We had a tough schedule, we did that for a reason. I wanted a barometer of how far we have to go as a program. We’re going to keep building this program the right way.”
The head man believes in brutal honesty in front of the media, a philosophy many coaches have abandoned, providing a refreshing taste for the reporters — such as this quote that he said to the local Tallahassee media after FSU’s one-point loss to Wake Forest.
“We’re close to breaking through. If you know basketball and have watched us through the season, you know when we fight, we are a pretty good team. When we play hard, we are a pretty good team. When we defend, we are a pretty good team.”
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“When we don’t, we get the breaks beat off us.”
The Seminoles, with a lack of administrative support and NIL funding, still have a mountain to climb to become competitive in the college basketball landscape. This season has not been easy by any stretch and has been worse than many expected, featuring two separate five-game losing streaks littered with blowouts and demoralizing moments that could have easily allowed a struggling team to fully crater.
But Loucks refused to let go of the rope, and his team responded to him, a sign that the head coach has a pulse on his program and can lead it to light.
After losing to NC State at home by 44 points on January 10, the largest margin of victory for an ACC team in conference history, the season seemed officially lost. Loucks ripped his team after it, saying that “our players did not play with the level of effort and competitive spirit that we need.” In the three games since then, the Seminoles have combined to force 33 turnovers and grabbed more offensive rebounds in two of those contests while being severely undersized.
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The energy has shifted.
Loucks is also not afraid to call out individual players in front of the press. Florida State landed one transfer who played high-major basketball last season, Chauncey Wiggins from Clemson. After the loss to UMass, the head coach did not mince words after the senior forward scored three points against the Minutemen.
“Chauncey’s been at a pretty big program at Clemson, but I need more from Chauncey. That’s why his minutes were down. He played 17 minutes and had one rebound. It’s not just Chauncey, and we’ll show them on film, the ball is right in front of them, and you have to go attack the ball.”
Since that game, Wiggins has scored double-digit points in six of his last nine, including 22 against Duke and eight points in the second half against Miami.
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That constructive criticism hits differently when, simultaneously, Loucks is making sure to coach up and empower his players. When Robert McCray V committed 11 turnovers in the loss to the Demon Deacons, the first-year head coach provided a calm touch to the situation and reiterated his belief in RM5, proven by drawing up the final play of the game for him. Even though he missed the shot, on Tuesday, McCray V rewarded Loucks’ trust by sinking the final two free throws against UM with 1.7 seconds left in a tied game to hand Florida State its first conference win of the year.
Another strength that Loucks has shown over the course of his first year leading a program is his willingness to change and adapt, rather than being blinded by a single approach. In the game against the Hurricanes, Loucks shifted his offensive philosophy. FSU wants to run-and-gun and jack up threes, but that has often led to bad shots and offensive dry spells. So, on Tuesday, the Noles shot only 17 threes, by far a season low and 15 less than their average of 32, and attacked inside. Forty-three of the 65 Seminole points came in the paint or at the free-throw line, resulting in a 50% field-goal percentage inside the arc.
One win against Miami does not mean the Seminole program is back. Florida State is still three games under .500 with a record of 8-11 and will miss the NCAA tournament, barring a miracle in the ACC tournament, for the fifth-straight year. But the 25-26 season was always going to be about progress and process, not results, and Loucks appears to be setting a foundation that can be built on for years to come.
