No. 3 Canes Focused on Virginia, Not Rankings
By David Villavicencio
HurricaneSports.com
CORAL GABLES, Fla. – There is lots of College Football Playoff chatter surrounding the Miami Hurricanes.
Fresh off a dominant 41-8 victory over then-No. 3 Notre Dame, the Canes (9-0, 6-0 ACC) are ranked No. 3 in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. Miami also sits second in both the Associated Press Poll and Amway Coaches Poll and has a date with No. 2 Clemson in the ACC Championship Game on Dec. 2 in Charlotte.
But ask around the Greentree Practice Fields on the University of Miami campus and you won’t hear much talk about rankings or conference championships just yet. The Hurricanes are focused on this weekend’s noon meeting with Virginia (6-4, 3-3 ACC) at Hard Rock Stadium.
“I just don’t think it really matters because you still have to beat Virginia,” Miami defensive coordinator Manny Diaz said. “You’re playing for where you’re going to be at the end of the year and that’s really all that matters. To me the fact they have rankings during the season is for a matter of argument and discussion because it doesn’t serve a purpose, right? The solo attention of our football team is trying to find a way to improve off of how we played last week and we’re really not thinking past Virginia.”
The Cavaliers come to Miami bowl eligible for the first time since 2011 and feature talented players on both sides of the ball. Quarterback Kurt Benkert is fourth in the ACC with 2,492 passing yards and has thrown 14 touchdowns on the season. Wide receiver Olamide Zaccheaus has caught 70 passes for 727 yards and four scores while running back Jordan Ellis has 766 rushing yards and six touchdowns on the ground.
“Virginia prevents you from ever being comfortable defensively because they’re always presenting you with a different personnel group, a different formation, a different pre-snap motion, a shift, so it’s a team you absolutely have to pay attention to, you have to make sure your focused and locked in because you can get beat before the snap,” Diaz said. “They’ve got variety in the run game, inside runs and outside runs. We have a lot of respect for their quarterback because we saw first-hand in our game last year that guy took some shots and delivered some strikes against our defense with some older DBs a year ago. It’ll start like anything for us, it’ll start up front. We have to do a great job of trying to limit the run game and try to make them one-dimensional. Same thing we try to do every week.”
Defensively, the Cavaliers have the ACC leader in tackles in all-conference linebacker Micah Kiser (106), while veteran safety Quin Blanding is second in the ACC with 96 stops. Virginia’s defense has done a good job of taking the ball from opponents, tallying 12 interceptions on the season. The defensive success is no surprise to Miami’s defensive coordinator, as he has great respect for UVA head coach Bronco Mendenhall and his defensive acumen.
“When I think of Bronco I think of an outstanding defensive coach,” Diaz said. “I’ve always admired watching what he does schematically and the way his guys play defensively. That’s what I think you can see in Virginia. Their defense is starting to take on his personality and becoming a real pain for offenses to go against.”
While the Hurricanes are one of the hottest teams in college football, they are not looking ahead to the postseason. The consensus around the locker room is to continue with the formula that has gotten the Canes where they are.
“We’re just trying to get better every week,” linebacker Michael Pinckney said. “We just come out every week, we can’t take anyone lightly. We got great things ahead. I just feel like we have to come out this weekend and take Virginia no lighter than we took Notre Dame.”
Defensive lineman Joe Jackson echoed Pinckney’s thoughts. The sophomore knows success only brings more pressure because opponents will want to knock off the teams that are on top.
“We can’t fall off because we just beat two really good teams,” Jackson said. “Our mindset has to be the same because even though we just won, every team’s a threat now, everybody’s looking to knock us off. And that one loss could change our whole season a lot. We just have to keep the same mindset and fight them hard just like we fight everyone else.”
“We’re going to play pissed off regardless,” junior defensive back Jaquan Johnson said. “That’s how we play, that’s our standard, that’s how we compete.”
Miami’s success has not changed the mindset of the players and coaches. The Hurricanes entered the 2017 season with big goals and they get hungrier to achieve their goals with every victory.
“Nothing has changed from last week to this week,” wide receiver Braxton Berrios said. “If you go in the locker room, if you go in the meeting room, the preparation is the same and everybody’s attitude is the same. It doesn’t matter if we’re playing an undefeated team or a team that doesn’t have any wins, everything is going to be the same with this team and I’ve really seen that be consistent throughout this year. No matter who our opponent was, no matter if it was home or away, this or that, senior night or not, our preparation has been the same. We try not to listen to whatever it is, if it gets brought to our attention, you hear it and maybe you use it for motivation, but we try not to listen to whatever it is that is being said out there, so I think this team will be able to handle it.”
Offensive coordinator Thomas Brown and the rest of Miami’s coaches have been emphasizing the need to stay on task all week. While the Hurricanes have played consecutive primetime games against ranked opponents, this weekend’s game is at noon against an unranked Virginia squad. But that does not mean that Miami’s effort and execution should be any different.
“We just got to keep our foot on those guys and understand that there is no let down – I don’t care who we play,” Brown said. “The atmosphere is going to be different, it’s not going to be 8 p.m. and in primetime. This is a very talented football team that’s going to come in with every mindset to try and beat us. We saw what happened a few weeks ago when we didn’t show up to play and it’s kind of a tell from a different team from the last two weeks to three weeks ago. We have to do a good job and make sure that we take care of business, no matter who we play – show up and play Miami football – every snap, down after down for the entire game.”
