It’s hard to imagine that the prodigal son of Miami Hurricanes football expected his first year in the Magic City to go as it did. On paper the Hurricanes won 5 games which doesn’t seem that bad. But they got bullied by Middle Tennessee at home in a 14 point loss. They lost to Duke by 24 at home as a 10 point favorite. Florida State, Clemson and a down Pitt destroyed them. Cristobal has all the time in the world to right the ship, and he certainly is doing things in the portal and on the recruiting trail, which does take some time, but the knock on Cristobal has always been the coaching, not the recruiting, and he did next to nothing to dispel those rumors in 2022, losing as a favorite 3 times and going 2-10 against the spread.
There was clearly a disconnect with the Miami offense. They had quite a bit of returning production and of course had Tyler Van Dyke back, but Josh Gattis, Mario Cristobal and the entire offensive personnel couldn’t get on the same page. The offense as a whole stalled significantly, especially when you compare the expectations vs teams within similar talent. The offensive line couldn’t get much push, the run game hit a few big plays and it was a testament to the running backs that when they did get a hole they did something with it, but getting them was rare.
Defensively, they did some really nice things. The defensive line was an absolute force. It was easily a top 25 defensive line in the country, and they clearly focused on creating negative plays. It did hurt their run defense slightly and put pressure on the back of this defense, but they ranked 3rd in the country in DL Havoc. The linebacking group was poor and the secondary struggled, allowing 14% of passes to grade as explosives which ranked 98th. They were far too disjointed and allowed far too many explosive plays, and as such, made a change at the coordinator spot.
Offense
It clearly didn’t workout between Josh Gattis and Cristobal, and Gattis elected for a change. Gattis has had a pretty odd career trajectory. Outside of one season with Harbaugh where he won the Broyles Award, it’s been a lot of really high expectations that just fall completely flat. Rumors from that random Michigan season were that Harbaugh took over more of the offensive game planning, and its starting to seem like there is some juice to those rumors.
Miami turned to Shannon Dawson, the former Houston offensive coordinator. Dawson spent lots of time under Dana Holgorsen. It isn’t the best hire by my metrics. His one year tenure at Kentucky got him fired and his offenses at Southern Miss did the same. Many of the offenses that Dawson joins decline in offensive metrics in the following seasons. There were rumors early in the season last year that Holgo decided to take play-calling duties back over from Dawson as it seemed like the Cougars were trying to jam a square peg into a round hole with their offense. He does match well with Cristobal who is an offensive line wizard, as Dawson’s experience is basically everywhere else. If I had to guess, this offense is going to want to focus on a power run game to open up play action and pass, which…doesn’t really work in college football. At this point you need air raid concepts to open up your run game and mis-matches. Look at UGA, Bama, Ohio State, and Clemson. Michigan is probably the only one who utilizes the power run and they haven’t gotten to the promise land yet.
The offense will have Tyler Van Dyke back, which is a win for the Canes. Van Dyke thought about testing the portal and there were rumors he’d end up in a lot of different places, but ultimately he stayed a Cane. You can’t fully ignore what happened to this Miami offense last year but we know what type of upside Van Dyke possesses.
He’ll be playing behind an offensive line that should be pretty solid. The Canes return left guard Jalen Rivers and then utilized the portal to fill two other starting spots with Javion Cohen and Matt Lee coming in from Alabama and UCF, respectively. Matt Lee was a consistent starter at center while Cohen has started 25 games in his career. They also could get back experienced LT Zion Nelson as well, who has battled a knee injury throughout a lot of spring. The right side of the line is where there are question marks. Superstar recruit Francis Mauigoa is probably power 5 ready on day 1 and will likely get one of the spots which leaves one spot up for a competition. Miami and Mario have recruited this spot well and they’ll likely rely on some young talent to rotate here.
The run game will feature experienced Henry Parris Jr. and Donald Chaney. Neither of these guys are so good that they can carry an offense, but they are nice pieces to have, but losing Jaylan Knighton may hurt more than most think. He was the most explosive of any of the running backs on the roster, but he was pretty volatile. This run game should go as far as the line will allow it, but there is a ceiling here.
And the same can be said for the receivers unfortunately. It’s pretty surprising that Miami didn’t land any of the top WR transfers in the portal as it’s the spot of the offense that can likely improve the most. Frank Ladson Jr is loaded with talent and has finally started to piece it together while Xavier Restrepo is a fine college receiver, but this room lacks upside and they lose their best pass catcher in Will Mallory. I suspect that Dawson will implement more spread concepts and if the spring game is any indication, they will be pushing the ball down the field more. TVD had 8 plays of more than 20 yards in his limited time, but they’d be able to do it much better with some serious deep threats. If there is one on the roster, it’s Colbie Young. Last season he led the team in average depth of target at 13 yards and yards per route ran at 1.75. I’d consider 2.1+ as serious explosiveness.
This offense should improve, given it’s hard to get worse with the talent they have, but I don’t love Dawson, and the skill position is underwhelming for a program like Miami.
Defense
The defense was better than the offense for the Canes in Cristobal’s first year, but it wasn’t stellar. Miami, likely by stroke of some dumb luck, landed Lance Guidry. Kevin Steele left Alabama to be the coordinator there and Guidry stepped in after Tulane hired him away earlier in the off-season. He led by my metrics, a absolutely stellar Marshall defense last year and should bring a lot of concepts to Miami that they’ll be able to utilize.
Guidry has a unique way of getting defenses to playing sound, and it all starts with simplicity and speed. His defenses are always in the right place and they play fast and hard, usually in a lot of man coverage and aggressiveness. Sounds a lot like early 2000’s The U type of defenses. He runs everything off of a 4 down front with the big guys, and he should be thrilled at what they have there.
The Miami defensive front is arguably the best in the country with Ahkeem Mesidor, Leonard Taylor III and Jahfari Harvey all returning. They’ll be spelled by depth pieces like Branson Deen who has 25 starts under his belt at Purdue and former star recruit Nyjalik Kelly. Thomas Gore transfers in from Georgia State with 15 games started. This was the 3rd most disruptive defensive line in college football last year and they return 4 of their top 5 in TFL and sacks. This should be a downright nasty defensive front.
The linebackers should like Guidry’s system quite a bit, as they won’t be left on an island to cover for an all out attack of a defensive line that Steele tends to utilize. They’ll return Corey Flagg Jr. in his starting role and they landed Francisco Mauigoa from Washington State who likely came in a package with his 5 star brother on the offensive line. He has a lot of starting experience and should slot into a starting role, with Bissainthe and Chase Msith backing them up.
The secondary will be pretty multiple and it all starts with returning all American Kamren Kinchens. He had a huge year last season with 59 tackles, 6 interceptions and 12 total passes defended. Te’Cory Couch returns as one of the cornerback starters and they added Davonte Brown from the portal who has started 31 games at UCF. Kinchens running mate James Williams returns as a starter at safety and has tantalizing upside with his 6’5 frame and former 5 star recruiting rank. The depth here is pretty solid. After the starting crew there are 5 guys that have started over 10 games in their careers and then the younger guys are loaded with 4 stars.
This defense should be just as aggressive but way more sound on the back.
Summary
The offense will improve just because of how bad it was last year, but there is limiting upside. The defense should continue to be as aggressive as they were, but I’d expect them to be way more sound and give up less back-breaking big plays.
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