Historic defeat costs UM in polls, bowl destinations
When just a smattering of the words used around the country to describe a football game are “historic” and “destroyed” and “obliterate” and “annihilate” and “humiliate,” you had better hope your team is on the other end of the spectrum.
Unfortunately for the Miami Hurricanes (8-2,
7-2 Atlantic Coast Conference), those words were used to describe their performance against the North Carolina Tar Heels (8-3, 7-3) in their 62-26 loss Saturday to end the regular season at Hard Rock Stadium — the same place the Tar Heels could be playing Jan. 2 in the Capital One Orange Bowl.
So much for defending your turf.
By now if you’re a
Canes fan you know what you saw. It was almost as if someone flicked UM’s off switch once North Carolina proved with a fury that it was not only going to win this game, it was going to utterly embarrass the ninth-ranked home team in the process. Almost as if the Hurricanes collectively decided to shut it down instead of playing harder and focusing and going full bore come what may.
UM dropped 10 spots Sunday in the AP Top 25 Poll to No. 19, and 11 spots in the Amway Coaches Poll to No. 19.
“Something caught up to us tonight because I did not recognize the football team I saw on the field and I bear the responsibility for that,” Miami coach Manny Diaz said. “We do not have to be defined by this here, but we damn sure better learn a lesson from it.”
“We had some guys that weren’t all in and we paid the price for it,” senior receiver Mike Harley said.
“It was just a matter of not being locked in,” said senior defensive end Quincy Roche. “I don’t know where it started but it was completely unacceptable.”
And this from quarterback D’Eriq King, who completed 18 of 30 passes for 239 yards and two touchdowns, with one interception — and led Miami with 53 of 75 total team rushing yards (including the yards he lost after three sacks): “You’re supposed to expect to win, but you gotta play like it. You can’t just roll your helmets out, put your uniforms on thinking everything’s gonna be all good. Like I said, we got whooped in all phases of the game. We gotta learn from it and move on.” UM’s yardage total: 314. That’s about all you need to know, other than the Canes will officially learn their bowl destination when the final College Football Playoff rankings are released Dec. 20. Be assured it won’t be a New Year’s Six bowl after that performance, and that Miami, now ranked No. 10 in the College Football Playoff rankings, will learn how far it falls
and how far UNC rises when the next CFP rankings come out Tuesday night.
The Tar Heels will certainly pass UM in those rankings, which means they’ll likely go to the Jan. 2 Orange Bowl if Clemson defeats Notre Dame on Saturday in the ACC title game. If Notre Dame beats Clemson for the second time this season, then Clemson would likely go to the Orange Bowl and UNC and Miami would end up in either the Cheez-It Bowl Dec. 29 in Orlando or Gator Bowl
Jan. 2 in Jacksonville or Duke’s Mayo Bowl Dec. 30 in Charlotte or the Military Bowl Dec. 28 in Annapolis.
Though some upset Canes fans have already started “fire Manny Diaz” social media accounts, Diaz has brought UM from a 6-7 season last year to its 8-2 current status during a pandemic that had the Canes missing several important players affected by the coronavirus.
If UM can get it together and win its bowl game, which has been a considerable challenge for many
years, ending 9-2 would be a considerable achievement.
UM defensive coordinator Blake Baker is also feeling immense heat after Saturday’s defensive collapse. Diaz was fired as defensive coordinator by current UNC coach Mack Brown, when both coached at Texas, in September 2013 after Texas’ defense allowed 550 rushing yards to BYU. Diaz is close with Baker, and it remains to be seen what will happen.
“Obviously we did not make the adjustments during the course of the game on what they were doing to get it stopped,” Diaz said, blaming himself. “They were able to just continue to do the same two or three things over and over again.”
Toward the end of his postgame news conference, Diaz reminded reporters that “over the course of the season they’ve done a lot more right than wrong.”
●UM punter Lou Hedley, one of the best in the nation, confirmed Sunday on Instagram that he’ll be returning to Miami next season “for one last ride.”