After using bye week to recover, Miami Hurricanes shift focus to second half of schedule

The Miami Hurricanes’ first bye week of the season came at perhaps the best time.

Miami, which remained at No. 6 in this week’s AP top 25 poll, started the season with six consecutive wins — first four blowouts in nonconference play followed by two come-from-behind victories to open Atlantic Coast Conference play — before they had a chance to take a breather. The Hurricanes came out of those first half-dozen games unscathed, a perfect 6-0, making them one of 11 teams in college football that still has an unblemished record.

Hurricanes coach Mario Cristobal said there were two key areas he wanted his team to focus on during the bye week.

The first was to reset and recover while also “polishing technique and fundamentals.” The team played the majority of the first half of the season without four key players in defensive end Rueben Bain Jr., left tackle Jalen Rivers, left guard Ryan Rodriguez and cornerback Damari Brown. Defensive end Elijah Alston also missed Miami’s game at Cal before the bye.

Bain returned last week, and Cristobal said Rivers and Alston should be back as well when Miami resumes play against Louisville on Saturday.

The second?

“We’ve got to get more guys, more of the reserves, to play winning football for us,” Cristobal said. “We’ve got to continue the process and the push for development so that guys, when they have meaningful snaps, they’re not just kind of eating up space, that they’re actually out there performing their job at a high level, making plays.”

Here’s a look at the rest of the Hurricanes’ regular-season schedule, with a breakdown of how each team has fared so far this season.

▪ At Louisville, Saturday: The Cardinals started their season 3-0 before dropping back-to-back games to Notre Dame on the road and SMU at home to fall out of the AP top 25. Louisville rebounded from the consecutive defeats on Saturday with a 24-20 road win against Virginia.

Miami is 11-4-1 all-time against Louisville, but the Cardinals have won four of the past six meetings dating back to 2006 — including 38-31 last season at Hard Rock Stadium.

▪ Home vs. Florida State, Oct. 26: The Seminoles have gone from being shunned from the College Football Playoff despite a perfect record last season to one of the disappointments of the 2024 season. FSU is 1-5 this season, with its lone win being a 14-9 victory against Cal on Sept. 21.

But as anyone can attest, records can generally be thrown aside during rivalry games.

Miami leads the all-time series 35-33, but FSU has won each of the past three matchups, two of which have been decided by one score.

▪ Home vs. Duke, Nov. 2: The Blue Devils started the season 5-0 before losing 24-14 last weekend to Georgia Tech. Their game in Miami next month will be Manny Diaz’s first back against his former team.

Miami is 15-5 all-time against Duke, although the Blue Devils won the most recent matchup between the teams in 2022.

▪ At Georgia Tech, Nov. 9: We all know what happened the last time Miami and Georgia Tech played a year ago. Run play instead of game-winning kneel down. Fumble. Georgia Tech game-winning touchdown. Miami’s season spiraled after that.

The Hurricanes will look to avoid a repeat of that when they go up to Atlanta.

That said, the Yellow Jackets are 5-2 this season, with their losses coming in road games against Syracuse and Louisville.

UM and Georgia Tech are tied 14-14 in the all-time series.

▪ Home vs. Wake Forest, Nov. 23: The Hurricanes will close out their home schedule against a Demon Deacons teams that is currently near the bottom of the conference. Wake Forest is 2-4 halfway through its schedule, with its lone wins coming against N.C. State and North Carolina A&T.

Miami is 8-3 all-time against Wake Forest, including wins in all five games that have taken place this century.

▪ At Syracuse, Nov. 30: Miami wraps up the regular season with a trip to New York to face Syracuse. The Orange are 5-1 to start the season, with their only loss being a two-point defeat to Stanford.

The Hurricanes are 16-7 all-time against Syracuse, although this will be the team’s first meeting since 2017 after meeting annually from 1992-2003.