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Christmas Wish Lists: Florida State needs the Kung-Fu Grip

Coaches Vs. Cancer Classic - Brigham Young v Florida State

NEW YORK, NY - NOVEMBER 16: Brandon Davies #0 of the Brigham Young Cougars goes to the basket as Kiel Turpin #11 of the Florida State Seminoles defends during their first round game of the Coaches Vs. Cancer Classic at the Barclays Center on November 16, 2012 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. (Photo by Alex Trautwig/Getty Images)

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Over the course of the next two weeks, College Basketball Talk will be detailing what some of the country’s best, most intriguing, and thoroughly enigmatic teams need. It’s the spirit of the holidays. We’re in a giving mood.

What do other teams have on their Christmas Wish Lists? Click here to find out.

Gotta have it list-topper: Interior defense

It seems absurd to say that Florida State lacks defense. If there’s one thing a Seminoles fan could count on throughout the Leonard Hamilton era, it’s that the team could lock down, even on nights when the ball wasn’t finding the nets. Last season, FSU finished 15th defensively, and the two years before that, they were No. 1 in back to back seasons. What’s changed? Opponents are now shooting nearly 48 percent inside, a figure unheard of in recent seasons in Tallahassee. The ‘Noles clearly miss former Air Force Staff Sergeant Bernard James, who averaged more than two blocked shots per game for his career as a Seminole, but he was hardly the only one doing the job right; Xavier Gibson also helped form the wall inside in past seasons. This year, Kiel Turpin, Michael Ojo and Boris Bojanovsky -- all legit seven-footers -- have combined to prove conclusively that sheer size without positioning and technique amounts to very little.

Stocking Stuffer: Windex

Nobody’s cleaning the glass any more, and that’s killing these guys. The only player who seems to have the knack so far is 6'8" junior Terrance Shannon, and the fouls are starting to mount up on him as he claws for each board. Shannon had a 15/10 double-double against St. Joe’s this season before he copped a DQ, and he had four-foul evenings against South Alabama, BYU, Mercer and Florida. Even if Shannon could do it all without getting into foul trouble, why should he have to? Someone else -- if not several someone elses -- needs to put in some elbow grease at window-cleaning time.

Planning on re-gifting: Haste

I know I’m getting some dirty looks now. Yes, I am saying that Florida State needs to slow the heck down. They’ve never been burners under Hamilton, but right now, they’re playing much faster than they did in past seasons when they excelled. This year’s team is hitting a pace of 72 possessions per 40 minutes. According to Basketball State, that’s above the national average and the ACC average so far. That’s causing their turnovers to go up, and their scoring to go down. FSU was built to be a bear, not a cheetah.

Clearly, everything on this wish list is tied together. The ‘Noles offense and defense are predicated on a slower pace and great rebounding, things that happen organically when there’s a big man in the middle who knows his business. The team is suffering because there’s no reliable post presence on either end of the floor. Assists are down, and the ball is going up faster and from farther away, because there’s no impetus to pound it inside right now. If they can’t handle the likes of South Alabama and Mercer, imagine what Mason Plumlee will do to them.

Florida State has big men, so they don’t need any more 7-foot-plus boxes under the tree. Maybe just an accessories package; something that replicates the old G.I. James kung-fu grip.

Eric Angevine is the editor of Storming the Floor. He tweets @stfhoops.