Florida State Buries Rival Florida, 45-24 : Nonconference: Third-ranked Seminoles will be rooting for Florida to beat Alabama in SEC title game.

It didn’t take long for Bobby Bowden to start lobbying after his No. 3 Florida State Seminoles defeated archrival Florida, 45-24, on Saturday.

“If you want one vs. one, you better get FSU and Miami. Anything else will be one vs. two,” Bowden said. “I doubt if anybody is playing better than us right now.”

The victory made Bowden the first major college coach to win 10 games in six consecutive seasons. He had shared the record with Alabama’s Bear Bryant and Oklahoma’s Bud Wilkinson.

Florida State’s only loss occurred Oct. 3 against top-ranked Miami. The Seminoles lost, 19-16, when Don Mowrey’s 39-yard field-goal attempt sailed wide as time ran out.

Florida State (10-1) won’t get a rematch with Miami in the Fiesta Bowl unless Florida (8-3) beats second-ranked Alabama this Saturday in the Southeastern Conference championship game.

After handing Florida a humiliating loss, Florida State now must root for Coach Steve Spurrier’s Gators.

“My only words to Steve were, ‘Beat Bama,’ ” Bowden said.

If Alabama beats Florida, Florida State will go to the Cotton or Orange Bowl. The Cotton Bowl would be a rematch against No. 4 Texas A&M;, which lost to Florida State, 10-2, in the Cotton last season.

Charlie Ward passed for 331 yards and ran for 70 Saturday as the Seminoles buried the Gators by scoring 38 points in the first half.

“This was the first time all year we’ve been that far out that early,” Spurrier said. “They just dominated every phase.”

Ward set a single-season total offense mark at Florida State with 3,151 yards--an average of 286.5 a game. Peter Tom Willis had 3,004 yards in 1989.

Florida State’s defense limited Florida to 41 yards rushing. Florida’s leading rusher, Errict Rhett, had zero yardage in nine carries.

“I was wanting Rhett to get the ball,” said Florida State linebacker Marvin Jones, who finished with a game-high 11 tackles. “I could taste him.”

Tamarick Vanover caught a seven-yard touchdown pass and set up two other scores with long kickoff returns as the Atlantic Coast Conference champions won their sixth consecutive game.

Florida State has averaged 61.3 points in the last three games since going almost exclusively to the shotgun offense.

Ward passed or ran for 147 yards in the first quarter as the Seminoles built a 17-7 lead. He scored one of his team’s three touchdowns during the second quarter as Florida State took a 38-17 lead--scoring more in a half than Florida had given up in a game this year.

“We wanted to score a lot of points early and make them quit, but they never quit,” said Ward, the ACC player of the year.

Spurrier kept quarterback Shane Matthews on the bench in the second half after the Seminoles scored on the opening drive of the third quarter to take a 45-17 lead. Matthews completed 15 of 30 passes for 175 yards and two touchdowns in the first half.

Florida State took a 14-0 lead in the opening 10 minutes on a 10-yard touchdown run by Sean Jackson and a seven-yard scoring pass from Ward to Vanover.

The Gators pulled to within 14-7 with 3:22 left in the first quarter on Matthews’ eight-yard scoring pass to Aubrey Hill.

But Vanover, who earlier in the season scored on kickoff returns of 96 and 94 yards, took the ensuing kickoff 80 yards to Florida’s nine, and Mowrey kicked a 26-yard field goal to give the Seminoles a 17-7 lead.

Tiger McMillon’s two-yard touchdown run two minutes into the second quarter put the Seminoles ahead, 24-7, but Matthews then connected with Charlie Dean on an eight-yard scoring pass to make the score 24-14.

Vanover returned the following kickoff 76 yards to the 24, and Ward ran into the end zone four plays later on a three-yard rollout as Florida State built a 31-14 lead.