Lang: On Florida State and the 'Unconquered Spirit'

I spent Friday night inside Ruby Diamond Concert Hall. Florida State’s finest musicians were holding a signature show — PRISM — their last performance of this semester.

Many of the performers, eight busloads in fact, were members of the FSU Marching Chiefs. Others were from the College of Music.

Sitting with my wife in the last row of center orchestra, what I heard that night struck me to my core. You really have to sit in that auditorium and watch these young people perform. They will steal the breath from your lungs. 

They’re remarkable.

The program concluded with Marching Chiefs sounds of the season. Abridged versions of their 2023 halftime performances paved the way for the grand finale: Hymn to the Garnet & the Gold and War Chant.

The exhaustion in these kids’ faces was impossible to ignore. Focusing on their art through perspiration and fatigue, you could feel their love and appreciation for Florida State. For what it means to be a Seminole.

I’m still in awe of them.

And as we all left the building, ears ringing and hearts full, the Marching Chiefs dodged raindrops and piled into idling buses on College Avenue. An overnight ride to Charlotte, and a performance for the ACC Championship on Saturday, was ahead of them.

As Sunday’s events unfolded, and the Alabama graphic wiped across the ESPN screen in the No. 4 slot, all I could think about was the spirit of those musicians and the sadness they must have felt on the long ride back to campus.

At least two of them even reached out to us during our live broadcast.

“On the road back from the (ACC Championship) and we are devastated,” wrote Michael Ward. “But we truly appreciate the season and the fans! Thank you all for supporting us the whole way, we love you all and of course Go ‘Noles!”

Wow.

This isn’t a column about being sad for the band. I’m devastated for the whole of this fanbase.

But just like those Marching Chiefs, a group of some 100 young men fought off the temptations of youth and external pressures that we cannot fully grasp to finish a perfect run at a conference championship.

13-0. Unconquered, indeed.

These players are equally remarkable. And the adversity they pushed past, their defiance to being overwhelmed by a body blow, is one of the most gratifying things I’ve seen covering Florida State athletics.

They make me proud to be what I am: A Seminole graduate.

And now, through no fault of their own, they are told they cannot see the mission to the end. That they’re not good enough.

It stinks like a drive through Gainesville in July.

There is an urge to throw your hands up in the air and say “what’s the point?” I feel it too.

But now is not the moment to let college football’s devolution into corporate lobbyism overwhelm us as a base.

This is the time we double down for those players, and those Marching Chiefs, who work so much harder than most of us did in our undergraduate years.

Whatever it means to you to show your “Unconquered Spirit” — it could be as simple as wearing your school gear more often or as large as a donation to Seminole Boosters or The Battle’s End — this is a moment that should unite us more than ever before.

Florida State was screwed by a committee of blowhards who caved to corporate pressure. I believe that wholeheartedly.

But that anger pales in comparison to what I saw, heard and felt inside my chest when I sat inside Ruby Diamond Friday night. And when I watched this defense put the fanbase on its back 24 hours later.

The pride in those young people’s faces says it all. That is the Unconquered Spirit that must win out in the end.

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