Florida State is about to hang a kicker's number in the rafters, and honestly, it's earned. Brett McMurphy reported that the Seminoles will retire Sebastian Janikowski's No. 38 during the season opener against New Mexico State on Aug. 29.
Former Florida State All-American kicker Sebastian Janikowski will have his No. 38 jersey retired during Seminoles’ season opener on Aug. 29 vs. New Mexico State
For anyone who didn't watch college football in the late '90s, this isn't a courtesy retirement. Janikowski won the Lou Groza Award as the nation's top kicker in both 1998 and 1999, becoming the first player to win it twice, and he was the guy booting field goals for a program that was steamrolling everyone.
The peak came in the 1999 national title run, when Janikowski hit the game-winning field goal against Clemson and helped FSU beat Virginia Tech in the Sugar Bowl to close out an undefeated season. He finished that year 23-of-30 on field goals with a perfect mark on extra points.
That kind of production at kicker doesn't usually translate to draft stock, but Janikowski broke the mold there too. The Raiders took him 17th overall in the 2000 NFL Draft, the highest a kicker had been drafted in decades — a testament to how dominant he'd been in Tallahassee.
He went on to become the Raiders' all-time leading scorer over a nearly two-decade career, and in 2011 he tied the then-NFL record with a 63-yard field goal against Denver. None of that happens without the foundation he built at Florida State, which is exactly why No. 38 is about to become the rarest kind of number in Doak Campbell Stadium.
New Mexico State probably didn't expect to be the backdrop for a program icon's biggest non-playing moment of the year, but that's the slot they drew. Expect a full pregame ceremony before kickoff on Aug. 29, with Janikowski back in Tallahassee to watch his number go up for good.