Richt praises Hurricanes’ loud fans

CORAL GABLES – Before traveling to road games the Hurricanes — like every college football team — work on signals and non-verbal communication.

Turns out, sometimes non-verbal communication is key at home, too.

During the final drive of Miami’s 25-24 win over Georgia Tech on Saturday, the Hurricanes had to get creative with how they communicated. Fans who waited out a late-game rainstorm were frantically cheering as Miami made its way down the field.

Could something similar happen this week when eighthranked Miami hosts Syracuse, fresh off its upset of defending national champion Clemson?

“We’re looking forward to playing another game at home in front of our home crowd. I’m really pleased with our fan base,” UM coach Mark Richt said Tuesday. “They’ve been wonderful. We actually, at the end of the [Georgia Tech] game, had to go to our nonverbal cadence because we could hardly hear. They were so excited the way things were going at the end of the game, we couldn’t even hear our cadence. That’s a sign of people getting excited about our program. We’re thankful for that.” It appears two previously injured starters — receiver

Ahmmon Richards (hamstring) and safety Sheldrick Redwine (undisclosed upper extremity) — may play Saturday. After not practicing all of last week, both were on the field during the media viewing portion of Tuesday’s practice.

Next game: No. 8 Miami vs. Syracuse, Saturday, 3:30 p.m., ESPN