FSU has attained ‘NewBlood’ status in the ACC

By Chuck Walsh

Florida State Sports Information

 You see it emblazoned on their facemasks.  You hear it when they take to the court.  You read it on their social media posts.

Like any good mantra, the coaches and players live, speak and embrace it all of the time. It’s everywhere. The national media has adopted the phrase. It just might end up being the Webster Dictionary’s newest entry.

 NewBlood.

 It’s the term coined by Florida State assistant coach Charlton “CY” Young to describe the ascent by the Seminole men’s basketball team into the hierarchy of the college basketball world. The defending ACC Champions have displayed the consistency and the staying power to have their name spoken definitively among the BlueBloods who have put their stamp on the sport since James Naismith first shot a ball through a peach basket more than 100 years ago.

 Historically speaking, there are six BlueBloods: Kentucky, North Carolina, Indiana, Duke, UCLA and Kansas.

The NewBlood Seminoles play host to the University of Central Florida at the Donald L. Tucker Center.  

The term NewBlood was actually born during a recruiting visit by Young and head coach Leonard Hamilton in 2017.

 While they were in the home of an official visit with one of the top five players in the nation, Young could feel the recruit’s emotions trending to one of the nation’s BlueBlood teams.

 “For so many years, the term “BlueBlood” has controlled the minds of high school players as well as high school and AAU coaches,” said Young.  “Coach Hamilton and I were in a players’ home, and we both felt that Florida State was the best fit for this young man, and that he was the best fit for Florida State. 

“I said to the player, ‘everybody is going to tell you to go play for BlueBlood program.  I said, come play for Florida State, we are a NewBlood program.’ ”

When the two coaches walked out of the recruits’ home that night, Hamilton knew Young was on to something big.

Though the term became mostly dormant following that recruiting visit, it became an integral part of the Seminoles’ program on a team run on the Duke University campus on the morning of Dec. 30, 2017.  As Young and strength and conditioning coach Mike Bradley led a group of Seminoles through the packed tent city of Krzyzewskiville and past the famed Cameron Indoor Stadium, he let out a yell that certainly woke up the sleeping Duke students and was loud enough for the entire college basketball world to hear.

BlueBloods? He Yelled.

NewBloods! Responded the group of Seminoles running in lockstep with the Seminoles now eighth-year assistant coach.

Since that run on the campus of one of the BlueBloods, the cry of NewBloods is as much a part of the Seminoles as their winning culture or desire to be one of the best teams in the best college basketball conference in the nation.  It has become a very emotional mantra for the Seminoles; one that serves as a rallying cry that carries them into every game. 

The term absolutely evokes emotion from the Seminole players.

“It means that we have established ourselves as a prominent program in college basketball,” said redshirt junior Malik Osborne.  “It means that we have earned the right to be considered to be among the top dogs in college basketball, and we’re going to fight to the end to protect what we have built.”

In the months following the Seminoles’ run through the Duke campus, the Seminoles advanced to within seconds of playing in just the second Final Four in school history. 

In the two full seasons since Young proclaimed the Seminoles as college basketball NewBlood, Florida State has a 56-13 record, one regular season ACC Championship, two top four ACC finishes and school records for overall wins in a season (29 in 2019) and ACC wins in a season (16 in 2020).

Hamilton is as excited today to lead the Seminoles to a national championship as he has ever been.

“We are motivated by the challenge of wanting to carve out your niche,” said Hamilton.  “We have decided to coin our phrase – NewBlood.  We are going to carve out our own distinction.  We are going to carve out our own path of success.  We cannot do anything about the 80-year head start the BlueBloods have on us.  We can do something moving forward to carve out our own niche, and we are motivated by that.

“I think our team has been knocking on the door.  We are right there.  We are knocking in the door.”

The national media has certainly taken notice of the NewBloods in Tallahassee.”

 “Florida State is officially an ACC power, a ‘NewBlood’ as Hamilton says, a program that has averaged 26 wins over the last four seasons while competing with Duke, Virginia and North Carolina atop the conference,” said Matthew Gutierrez of The Athletic. “Since 2018, FSU has appeared in an Elite Eight and Sweet 16, and the Seminoles were a projected No. 2 seed in the 2020 NCAA Tournament after winning the first ACC regular-season title in program history.”