Jimbo Fisher still went out of his way to nitpick Florida State as a coach is wont to do even after the most impressive wins, but the Seminoles coach was as pleased Saturday night as after any game this season.

“We just beat the damn Gators,” Fisher triumphantly said in the locker room after a 27-2 win over Florida that had fans exiting The Swamp well before Dalvin Cook dropped the hammer with a 29-yard touchdown with seconds left to cement one of the most lopsided FSU wins in the rivalry.

Fisher’s Seminoles beat Florida to claim the Sunshine State title for a third consecutive year with a sweep of the Hurricanes and Gators, but that euphoria fades in if it not hours. Recruiting begins the next day.

FSU ran its win streak to three with a demolition of rival Florida in The Swamp on Saturday. Kim Klement/USA TODAY Sports

What will keep Fisher smiling in the offseason -- and what remind recruits while reclining on their couches -- is the win Saturday finished off the best possible scenario for a rebuilding season. The Seminoles won 10 games, won the state, lost the Atlantic to only the No. 1 team in the country and are in line for a New Year’s Six bowl.

Most importantly, the Seminoles set themselves up for 2016, a season in which a national title is a realistic goal.

“We said this team had to climb a mountain and it’s become what I thought it could become,” Fisher said Saturday. “I’m as proud of this football team as any I’ve been around.”

Fisher wasn’t playing for 2016. He made that clear after the Clemson loss. It wasn’t as if 2015 was going to be a lost season. It was just a rebuilding year but one with the potential for 10 wins, a major bowl and an opportunity to keep selling recruits on a program whose expiration date did not coincide with Jameis Winston’s eligibility.

It prepared the Seminoles for 2016, and now Florida State will enter next season with its entire starting offense and 23 players on the two-deep offense returning. Joining the fold will be No. 2 prep quarterback Malik Henry, a January enrollee, and Deondre Francois, a freshman quarterback the staff is extremely high on after a redshirt season. And of course, starter Sean Maguire returns for a fifth year after rallying the offense in the second half of 2014. The Seminoles don’t win 10 games without Maguire’s resiliency on and off the field.

Defensively, the Noles return six starters and 14 players on the two-deep.

As of now, it looks as if the staff will remain intact so there should be continuity. That has not been the case under Fisher, who has had to continually shuffle coaches and even overhauled his staff before the 2013 season.

The Seminoles ended the season playing their best football, which was Fisher’s hope from the onset of preseason camp. There were too many new parts for Florida State to play with any cohesion early in the year. Throughout September and October, Fisher kept mentioning the team wasn’t where he wanted it to be but where he thought it would be. Coachspeak for the transitional pains the program was enduring. Losses seemed to be inevitable.

Maybe the losses were necessary. Fisher isn’t sure and I tend to agree that it’s borderline absurd to believe a 10-2 season is better than 12-0. But Florida State responded to the second loss and the collapse of any ACC championship hopes by rebounding with its best football of the season.

Fisher harped on his youthful team needing to build confidence, and the Seminoles will enter bowl practices and the offseason the most confident it has been since the Rose Bowl.

The best-case scenario for 2015 was a head start on 2016.