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Time To Do The Hokie Pokie

Tonight at 7:30 pm your Miami Hurricanes will face their biggest test of the young season so far: a Friday night ACC matchup at Hard Rock Stadium against a Virginia Tech team with whom Miami shares a long history. It’s a challenge, of course, the Hurricanes are embracing; another chance to continue improving and showing the work they’ve put in over the course of the last nine months.

“We have an opportunity to open conference play against one of our storied rivals,” head coach Mario Cristobal said. “Can’t say enough about them. I think we’ve seen on tape these guys are as talented as anybody we’ve faced and then some. … This is a team that returns 20, I believe, of 22 starters from last year’s team, one of the favorites to not only win the conference, but to be in the College Football Playoff. They’re loaded. They’re a loaded football team and the quarterback is an extremely explosive, dangerous, accurate player, a great leader. They’re big, massive up front. Great running game, explosive receivers. Looking forward to a great matchup.”

Added defensive back Meesh Powell, “It’s big. Coach Cristobal talks about it all the time: this is the biggest game because it’s the next game. I think going against a type of team like Virginia Tech, it’s going to be really physical, so we’ve got to bring our style of play to the table. And I think just overall, just setting the tone really for all the ACC teams to know the type of team we’re going to be, so that the next team that has to watch film and [sees] how we play Virginia Tech will know they’re going to have to look out for us.”

Through non-conference play during the first month of the season, the Hurricanes (4-0) have shown they’re among the nation’s best.

With ACC Preseason Player of the Year Cam Ward under center, Miami is averaging 605.0 yards per game, a number that ranks second nationally behind only Mississippi. Ward has completed 72 percent of his passes and has thrown for an average of 359.8 yards per game, which ranks second among FBS quarterbacks. He is the first signal caller in Miami history to start his Hurricanes career with four straight 300-plus yard performances and his 14 touchdown passes lead the nation. As a whole offensively, Miami leads the nation in third-down conversion percentage (64.3) and its average of 52.3 points per game is third nationally among FBS programs.

Its defense has been impressive, too, with Miami holding two of its opponents – FAMU and Ball State – out of the end zone and limiting opponents to just 232.8 total yards per game and 64.8 rushing yards per game, which rank 10th and sixth, respectively, among FBS programs.

Now, with their ACC opener on tap, the Hurricanes say they’re determined to hold on to that mindset and the edge that has pushed them through their first four games as they seek to earn another win and work toward their ultimate goal, one game at a time.

“I think the guys have adopted that mantra. It kind of goes back to what they decided a while back. They felt like they’ve had enough, they’ve had enough of all the stuff here for a couple of decades. And even though some of them weren’t from here or didn’t know much about it, they learned it,” Cristobal said. “And I think they’ve also realized that positive anger is that energy that burns clean. It just keeps going…it’s an endless supply of juice. It’s real. There’s no gimmicks to it. There’s watching that film, knowing there’s a standard and we haven’t achieved it yet and that there’s room to grow, but we feel like we can achieve it, so, full throttle, foot on the gas.”

PREDICTION: Canes Poke The Hokies by the score of 41-20.

Ward For President? We'll Settle For Heisman!

Miami Hurricanes senior Cam Ward was named ACC Quarterback of the Week, the league office announced Monday afternoon.

In the Hurricanes’ dominant 50-15 victory over USF, Ward continued his historic start to his Miami career.

The West Columbia, Texas, native completed 24 of 34 passes for 404 yards and three touchdowns, becoming one of just 13 NCAA players — at any level — all-time to surpass 15,000 career passing yards.

Since the Hurricanes joined the league prior to the 2004 campaign, Ward is the first ACC quarterback with at least 300 passing yards and three passing touchdowns in each of their first four games of the season.

The 6-foot-2, 223-pound standout is also the first Miami student-athlete to begin a campaign with four consecutive 300-yard passing performances.

Ward has helped the Hurricanes record 209 points this year, the most through four contests in program history.

Behind Ward, Miami has mounted 50 points in three straight games for the first time ever.

Earlier Monday, Ward was also tabbed to the Davey O’Brien Award’s Greek 8 for Week Four. He previously earned ACC Quarterback of the Week honors on Sept. 3.

The seventh-ranked Hurricanes begin their ACC slate against Virginia Tech at Hard Rock Stadium Friday. Kickoff is schedule for 7:30 p.m. on ESPN.

Bulls Will Be First Real Test For Hurricanes

Your Miami Hurricanes could have slept walked through their first three games of the 2024 season and still have won. That all changes this week when they travel to Tampa to face the quickly improving University of South Florida.

In case you were not paying attention, USF gave Alabama all they could handle for the entire first half before the Crimson Tide rolled away with the game in the second half. With Miami's notorious ever. so. slow. starts, this could make this game way too exciting, and much too close, for UM fans early on.

So in week four we will find out if your Miami Hurricanes are a well oiled, properly coached and highly montivated team or not. 

No sleeping at the wheel boys or you could find your current "dream season" destroyed by an in State little brother.

Sure, we know that we slayed the Gators in Gainesville, and we respect you for that. But the question in front of us now is can you run with the Bulls? Time will tell and we certainly hope you have your eyes wide open going into Tampa.

Canes Are Having A Ball

Not long after the Hurricanes posted a 47-point win over Florida A&M in last week’s home opener at Hard Rock Stadium, Xavier Restrepo faced a question.

After adding a slew of talented players to their roster in the offseason and opening with two big wins over in-state opponents, it was more than likely that the Hurricanes would find themselves ranked among the nation’s top 10 teams before they played their next game.

Would that matter to Miami’s coaches and players, Restrepo was asked.

The veteran wide receiver’s answer was blunt.

“It doesn’t matter,” Restrepo responded. “I mean, we’re just thinking about going 1-0 and we’ve got Ball State next week. That’s all we’re focused on.”

Through their first two games of the season, the Hurricanes – now ranked at No. 10 in the AP Top 25 poll – have outscored their opponents 97-26.

They’ve averaged 539 yards per game to their opponents’ 225.5, and more than a few individuals – from quarterback Cam Ward to defensive lineman Tyler Baron – have brought home a slew of honors, ranging from spots on preseason watch lists to ACC Player of the Week recognition.

There are eyes on the Hurricanes (2-0) and they are definitely generating plenty of buzz, but as they prepare to host Ball State on Saturday afternoon at Hard Rock Stadium, coaches and players say they’re doing their best to drown out all the noise, no matter how positive it may be.

“We’re not even close to playing our best football,” said Ward, who through two games has completed 75 percent of his passes and thrown for 689 yards and six touchdowns. “If you go back and really watch the tape from the first game, I would say there was a minimum of 10 bad plays. … And from this last game, the biggest takeaway was with the fourth downs. That’s just us not doing the little things, so that’s something we’ve got to clean up. I mean, we say we want to win games, but you know, if we don’t clean up the little stuff now, it can hurt us in the back end. So, we’re getting better at that. We got better this week at working those situations and working the right concepts that we’re supposed to dun. But we’re going to continue to chop wood at it and just keep playing ball.”

Added Miami head coach Mario Cristobal, “Every team has good football players and if you don’t really believe that and you don’t really train like that, there’s going to come a Saturday or Friday or Thursday where [you’re] going to be disappointed, you know? For us, the best thing that we do, the very best thing that we do, is the way we practice; the way we practice and prepare. And the best thing that we have going for us – it’s led by the team – the best thing that we’ve got going for us is our culture. It allows us to be just very blunt and real and right to the point and get to business. … We made it very clear from the beginning: there are no easy games on our schedule and whoever thinks that way, you’re going to be disappointed one day. So, stay hungry, stay driven. The most important game of the year is at 3:30 on Saturday and we’re looking forward to it.”

That game on Saturday will feature an opponent in Ball State that is coming off a 42-34 season-opening win over Missouri State.

The Cardinals (1-0) will be bidding for their first win over a top 10 team in program history and are looking to start the season with two straight wins for the first time since 2013.

Canes Remove Fangs From Rattlers

Here are some key storylines, numbers of note and quotes from Miami’s 56-9 win over Florida A&M, a win that helped the Hurricanes move up two spots to #10 in this week’s Associated Press Top 25 and to #12 in the coaches poll.

The Recap

Another week, another fast start for the Hurricanes.

After scoring on six of their first eight possessions against Florida last week, Miami needed just six plays to score its first touchdown of the year at Hard Rock Stadium – even though FAMU had the ball to open the game.

Linebacker Wesley Bissainthe picked off Rattlers’ quarterback Daniel Richardson on FAMU’s first drive and two plays later, the Hurricanes capitalized.

Miami quarterback Cam Ward – who earned a plethora of honors after his 385-yard performance against Florida – made his first throw at Hard Rock Stadium count, connecting with Elijah Arroyo on a 17-yard scoring strike that gave Miami the early lead.

The Hurricanes wouldn’t look back after that.

Miami added two more touchdowns in the first half, with Ward having a hand in both.

Midway through the first quarter, Ward connected with wide receiver Xavier Restrepo for a 50-yard touchdown and early in the second, Ward found running back Chris Johnson, Jr. for a 9-yard touchdown.

Ward finished the day competing 20 of 26 passes for 304 yards with three touchdowns, while Restrepo had four catches for a game-high 104 yards.

In the second half, Miami’s deep running backs room showed its ability to produce with Mark Fletcher Jr., Damien Martinez and Jordan Lyle scoring on touchdown runs of 4, 33, and 1-yards respectively.

The Hurricanes defense did a solid job in Saturday’s win, keeping the Rattlers out of the end zone and holding FAMU to a total of just 190 yards, including just 52 rushing yards.

“Fast start and then offensively, got in a little bit of a rut there. [We] made some careless errors. We’ve got to coach and play that part better, but a really good response in the second half, albeit some of the penalties, the post-half penalties, which we have to be better at,” Hurricanes head coach Mario Cristobal said. “All in all, it was good to play a lot of players tonight. Certainly, a lot of young guys got action and actually played at a high level, particularly the defensive line. They seemed to get relentless pressure on the quarterback and do a good job stopping the run. Good to see those freshman linebackers get in there and get a couple interceptions, as well. All in all, we handled our business and [there are] lots of areas to get better at.”

Numbers to Know

18 – Number of consecutive home openers the Hurricanes have now won. That’s the longest such streak in program history.

3 – Sacks registered by defensive lineman Tyler Baron against FAMU. According to the Associated Press, Baron is the eighth Hurricane to notch three sacks in a game over the last 20 seasons.

10 – Spot now owned by Restrepo on Miami’s all-time career receiving yards list. With his 104-yard performance against FAMU, Restrepo now has 1,933 career receiving yards. He passed Andre Johnson (1,831) and Allen Hurns (1,891) on the career list and has now notched eight 100-yard performances during his Hurricanes career.

308 – Total points scored by kicker Andy Borregales during his Miami career after the senior converted on a field goal and five extra points against FAMU. Borregales has now passed Greg Cox for fifth on Miami’s all-time points scored list.

12 – Number of Hurricanes who caught at least one pass in Saturday’s win. It marks the second straight week more than 10 players have caught a pass in game action. Last week against Florida, 11 different Hurricanes registered at least one catch.

Game Day: UM vs FAMU

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Start Spreading The News

Sure, I know, it was only one game.

And yes, I know it is a long season.

But for one glorious game, the first game of the 2024 season on the road at the Swamp, and against their hated rival the Florida Gators, the Miami Hurricanes dominated from start to finish in the most impressive manner possible.

When it was over the Florida fans hung their heads in shame and disgust at the 41-17 final score. And that is just the way Miami fans like it!

In the process it was firmly established that the Hurricanes have found themselves a new stud at starting quarteback in transfer Cam Ward. He showed that he could very possibly be the best QB at Miami since Kenny Dorsey wore #11 in Coral Gables.

Ward, who wears #1, was simply magnificent as he displayed why he was the number one target in the NCAA transfer portal during the offseaon. He threw for three touchdowns and 385 yards, which is a new first game UM record. He had several timely scambles for 33 more yards to help keep the Gators defense off balance. His only misque was the the one interception on the day by tring to force the ball into a tighly covered receiver.

Ward was not the only transfer portal product to shime on this sunny day in Gainesville. New running back Adrian Martinez who transfered from Oregon State, also had a producitve day running for 65 yards on 15 carries. The Canes rushed for a combined 144 yards and averaged 7.7 yards per play in ammassing 529 total yards on the day. Miami ran 69 plays to Florida's 54 and led in time of possession 34:30 to 25:30 minutes.

Standout wide receiver Xavier Restrepo led Miami with 7 catches for 112 yards and one TD while oft injured TE Elijah Arroyo showed flashes of becoming a huge threat in the middle with his athleticism and talent. He had 4 catches for 89 yards and looked ready to take on a larger role in Miami's offense this season. Sophmore Isaiah Horton added 4 cathches for 70 yards and Jacolby George added a touchdown. But it was TE Cam McCormick, who apparently has played more years of college football (nine) than J Lo has engagement rings (6), scored the first TD of the game for the Hurricanes.

The UM defense also boasts several high profile portal transfer this season as well. The Canes lost edge rusher Ruben Bain during the first defensive series of the game but the defense showed great depth and played superbly all four quarters, holding Florida to 17 points, with seven of those coming off turnovers.The Hurricanes has eight tackles for loss, two sacks and held the Gators to 261 total yards and only 122 passing yards. Mishael Powell had an interception which he returned for 67 yards.

Special teams also played well in spite of one missed field goal. Andres Borregales was 2/3 on the day and consistently pushed his kickoffs deep into and often out of the end zone. Punter Dylan Joyce punted just twice during the game and averaged 48.5 yards per kick.

Coordinators Shannon Dawson and Lance Guidry made head coach Mario Cristobal look good with excellent play calling. They subsituted liberally throughout the game with no real difference in performance. On defense 22 players recorded a tackle and on offense 10 players caught a pass while 5 ran the ball during the game.

Time will tell but it finally appears that Cristobal now has the coaches and most importantly the talent necessary to compete for an ACC Title and compete for a spot in the newly expanded college football playoff in 2024.

So start spreading the news.

These 2024 Miami Hurricanes can play.