After many years of people wondering when Miami would become “The U” again, it’s time to acknowledge the Hurricanes might be destined to reclaim their throne near the top of college football.
On Saturday, Miami managed to go from being on upset alert to winning big, something that has become a theme of its 2024 season.
Trailing 21-17 at halftime, Cam Ward rallied the Hurricanes to a 53-31 win over Duke. The victory keeps Miami as one of college football’s few unbeaten teams at 9-0. Miami also now sits in a very comfortable position when it comes to the ACC standings thanks to both Clemson and Pittsburgh losing later in the day.
Ward tossed five touchdowns and threw for exactly 400 yards while completing 25 of 41 passes. Thanks to Ward’s big second half, Miami was able to stay the course and add Duke to its list of comeback or close wins, a list that also includes Virginia Tech, California and the same Louisville team that knocked off Clemson.
Even though strength of schedule matters and needs to be utilized when ranking or evaluating teams, winning games can trump all else in this new 12-team College Football Playoff format. Winning can get you to your conference title game, and then winning that automatically gets you into the playoff.
And barring a devastating collapse, it’s starting to feel like Miami is at least assured a shot at playing for its first ACC crown at minimum.
While some will argue the Hurricanes aren’t as good as their record shows, there are also plenty of teams, some that are ranked by the Associated Press, with an even easier schedule, at least according to ESPN’s FPI (Football Power Index) metric.
But regardless where the Hurricanes are ranked — they entered Week 10 at No. 5 in the AP poll — only Georgia Tech, Wake Forest and Syracuse stand in their way of completing an unblemished regular season. An undefeated season would then send Miami to the ACC Championship Game.
Outside of Ward, the 2024 Hurricanes may not be as riddled with All-Americans as past great Miami teams, but as long as they can keep winning, that doesn’t really matter.
Taking this current success all the way to the program’s sixth national title may still seem unrealistic, but head coach Mario Cristobal, who knows about winning at a high level from being part of two national championship teams during his playing days at Miami, appears to have the Hurricanes back as a nationally relevant program again.
It’s also important to recognize that Miami has not appeared in a major bowl game since the 2017 Orange Bowl, a game it lost to Wisconsin, Miami has not won a conference title of any kind since its final Big East trophy in 2003 and the Hurricanes have not played for a national championship since falling at the hands of Ohio State in a classic matchup to close the 2002 season.
So as Miami now controls its own destiny, it’s staring to feel like it is destined to make 2024 a special season and one remembered as what triggered the return of “The U” to college football.
