Hurricanes aim to limit targeting penalties
When Miami Hurricanes senior safety Amari Carter was ejected for targeting on the first defensive play of Saturday night’s win over Virginia, it was his fourth such disqualification over the past two seasons and second in the first six games this year. He has also had twoother hits reviewed for targeting but over turned, not resulting in his ejection.
Carter is not the onlyone. Junior safety G ur van Hall and sophomore striker Keontra Smith have also been called for targeting. The three committed such penalties inthree successive halves of play earlier this season.
“It’s certainly something that we continue to address,” said UM defensive coordinator Blake Baker. “We can still be physical without targeting. I think some are malicious and some aren’t. … Something we’ll continue to harp on. I know [safeties coach Ephraim] Banda does a drill every single week, butwe really talk about tackling low and we just got to continue to harp on it.”
Said Banda, who doubles as co-defensive coordinator with Baker ,“I know that we’ re working really, really hard — and always have worked really, really hard— at targeting in the strike zone. We’re a shoulder-leverage tackling team that aims at attacking the thigh board of a man. In our tackling, there is nothing above the waistline, how we teach it, and we talk about the techniques.”
The Hurricanes have been put in a bind defensive ly when penalized for targeting. The disqualification involves an ejection for the remainder of the game and, if occurring in the second half of onegame, the first half of the following game.
Against Clemson, freshman Brian Balom had to play meaningful snaps at safety when Hall had to miss the first half and Carter was disqualified in that first quarter. On Saturday against Virginia, with Carte rejected and B al om one of Miami’s six surprise scratches that were unavailable, the Hurricanes had to go deeper into their roster once Hall hurt his ankle as Jalen Harrell sawthe field.
While Carter made helmet-to helmet contacton Virginia receiver Tavares Kelly, a St. Thomas Aquinas High alum, Banda felt it was a difficult position he was in, given how the already-short Kelly ducked his helmet, altering Carter’s target.
“When a receiver who catches the ball who’s 5-8 and then ducks, how do you make a human being respond that fast?” Banda inquired. “We could be better. I agree. Our head can be up. Our eyes can be higher on that play, but you still can’t make a human shrink that much and have another human shrink that much in that quick of time.”
Added Baker: “Really, the only thing Amari could’ve done differently is raised his head, lifted his eyes. Maybe that doesn’t get called as targeting.”
UM coach Manny Diaz has previously expressed a desire for NCAA football to follow the NBA format with flagrant fouls, having a Flagrant-1 and Flagrant-2 violation, where a player wouldn’t be disqualified for the lesser foul and intent can be factored in. Banda felt strongly that the ejections are getting out of hand.
“If it’s malicious, I understand completely. If he’s intending to throw the head or not trying to target low, I definitely feel like that’s a cause for a young man to be ejected for a game,” Banda said. “I don’t believe it should be ejected for the game if the young man is trying [to avoid maliciousness].
“I know Amari Carter is a good young man. I kno whe’s not trying to do that. Two, I don’t feel it’s fair to take a senior who has a limited amountof time to play football out of a game.
“Three, add 2020 to it. Everything that these young men have had to dot o get onto a football field from March through the summer, dealing with COVID, all the different things that they had to sacrifice to get onto a college football field, for themselves, for their family, for college football, for fans.
“I feel like that’s not the right thing to do — to take a kid off the field when he’s not doing it on purpose.”