Andy & Ari On3 - Louisville UPSETS Miami | Where do Mario Cristobal and Canes go from here?

Starting point is 00:00:00 Ari, number two, Miami, goes down to Louisville on a Friday night. What now? One of our, I don't know if I want to call it a super team. We've said maybe Ohio State's the only thing resembling a super team this year. But one of our, this team may finish undefeated teams, no longer undefeated, looking very mortal. What do you think this means for the rest of the hurricane season? well Miami has a very easy schedule and I think that what might happen here is going to get kind of crazy because if you go and you look at the way that the rest of the league is set up they only play SMU Syracuse NC State Virginia Tech and Pitt for the rest of the year and the hurricanes don't play Georgia Tech Duke or Virginia the teams that are so they don't control their own destiny in the ACC championship race I don't know how it's going to play out maybe Virginia Duke and Georgia Tech will lose games like this and Well, let's not forget Louisville, with one loss in conference,

Starting point is 00:01:03 they lost ahead of them and have the tiebreaker. So the ACC, I don't know if it's just going to be an annual thing with really large conferences and no way for these teams to play each other where there's going to be insane tiebreakers at the end of the year. But I still think that you could make the case that Miami with the wins that they already have control their own destiny for the playoff because if they finish 11 and 1 and miss the ACC championship game, I think with a win over Notre Dame they might be in. They'll be fine.

Starting point is 00:01:31 They do kind of need Notre Dame to keep winning. That would help. The Florida wins probably not going to do much for them. But if you're in the Notre Dame controls their own destiny with two losses camp, this was in a great situation for you. Right, because you do not want Miami and Notre Dame fighting for the last at-large birth. Yeah, Miami is going to get it. In this scenario, have won fewer loss in a head-to-head win.

Starting point is 00:01:54 I don't know how you could overcome that. But you know what irritates me the most about this? What's that? Yeah. like every single person has just like oh my Mario Cristobal stinks Miami's going to choke like the people who glommed on to the narrative of this was going to happen without doing any analysis of how good the team is from top to bottom like turned out to be right and like that bothers me I hate when people what did Mario Cristobal do wrong like I don't think he did anything wrong yeah I noticed that on social media Friday night I'm like what what did he do wrong in this game from a from a game management standpoint standpoint. I mean, he didn't call the fair catch, non-fair. Like, Malachi, Tony did not call for a fair catch. So that's one. The Carson Beck interceptions, like, those were bad interceptions. But you can't blame that on the head coach. So I don't get to take any credit for anything. But that's the Carson Beck that made me wary of the offseason hype. Now, he proved us wrong through the first six games of the season. And I still think that that was probably just his worst outing. I'm not, If you're here to say that Carson Beck Stanks, I think that's an overreaction too.

Starting point is 00:03:04 But that you cannot win a game against a pretty good team. Like Louisville maybe is a top 15 team in the country. And I know this is a Miami reaction show, but like Louisville is also all we want. I mean, they're really good. Really good. And I think there's a conversation too. And I don't know, given Jeff Brom's background in Louisville, like what he would be on the open job market. but you want to talk about a guy who wins everywhere he goes.

Starting point is 00:03:31 I mean, like, that's another example. He took Purdue to the Big Ten championship game. I mean, thinking about that, like that alone, like, you know, we're going to have a long conversation on Saturday and after the games are over about, like, what James, I mean, the James Franklin situation means for Penn State and, like, who they're going to go higher now that Signetti is extended. And it seems like Ole Miss is trying to extend at the moment. Listen, I also wouldn't, wouldn't discount Brom for Florida.

Starting point is 00:03:57 I would hire Brom anywhere, I think. I think that he has shown that he can do less with more. And people who do less with more can always do more with more. So, but yeah, the Mario Cristobal thing is interesting because I wonder if we're going to ever get to a point that we got to with James Franklin with him, which is he built the program. They're not the same as they used to be before they took over. They're a much better place than they were, but he cannot get over the hump. Now, I think that were probably a little bit too early in his tenure to, He still has a chance to get over the hump this year.

Starting point is 00:04:30 And he still has a chance to get over the hump, exactly. So, like, I don't know about you. I thought that Miami was one of the clear three best teams in the sport this year. They played terribly on Friday night. I don't know if that changes things. I think that it has to. Like, you can't, you know, punish Alabama in that discussion for losing to Florida State and not punish Miami in that discussion for losing to Louisville. Let me ask you this question.

Starting point is 00:04:53 Who would you rank ahead of whom? Would you rank Alabama ahead of Miami? I would, they have better wins. I would rank Alabama ahead of Miami. I think Alabama should be the highest ranked one lost team in the country because of their wins. Right. And I think Alabama probably slots in ahead of some undefeated teams. Like, Texas Tech has not really been challenged.

Starting point is 00:05:13 And so in the AP poll, Alabama is ahead of Texas Tech. Yeah. And I wonder what you do with like an A&M type scenario. I mean, the thing about A&M and Alabama, even though they don't play each other in a regular season, if A&M finish is undefeated in the regular season, they should be ahead of Alabama. And by the way, they'll probably just play each other in Atlanta.

Starting point is 00:05:34 And M has a really good win. I still think that if you beat Notre Dame, I think Miami and A&M get to absorb a good win for the time being. We'll see what happens in the USC game, which happens Saturday night. Which is electric. But, yeah, I think that Miami still has a chance.

Starting point is 00:05:51 And I don't know if this is going to catch people by surprise, but I still think that they could win the national title this year. I do too because of the way they're built on both lines of scrimmage. Now, if they play a game like they did Friday night, they are going to lose in the playoff because Louisville was gashing them in the run game, especially they're late in the third quarter going into the fourth quarter. And then, of course, they had the touchdown, the Chris Bell touchdown in the early in the fourth quarter where Miami's tackling looked like Miami's tackling last year.

Starting point is 00:06:18 And you can't have that come back, especially in a high leverage game, especially against a really good opponent. So that's the part that you worry about with Miami. And the other part is the way the schedule shakes out is they are probably not going to be or they shouldn't be challenged. Now, they might wind up getting challenged by SMU, maybe by Pitt, because Pitt's freshman quarterback is electric too. Maybe they get challenged a little bit the rest of the way, but they should be double-digit favorites in the remaining six games. You could make the case, and maybe as we get more context, it'll turn out that like Louisville is, the hardest team that they played because that's the other thing too it's like you can sit here

Starting point is 00:07:00 and have a 15 minute conversation about you know how they were upset on friday night and it's like in four weeks it might not have been an upset like louisville might actually just be a top 10 team um and also if you were watching the game uh louville was up by two possessions and then turn the ball over with eight minutes left inside their own 15 yard line and gave miami a touchdown like it wasn't a one possession game and miami had a chance to win and that's a credit to them but you know the thing that stands out to me more than anything is I think that a fan would probably be Carson Beck stinks. Like that's the main takeaway. Mario Cristobal and Carson Beck stinks. But the main takeaway for me, Andy, is what you just referred to. They were being gashed at times on

Starting point is 00:07:37 defense. Now, obviously, Isaac Brown, the running back for Louisville is somebody who's averaging 7.3 yards of carry this year and is a very good player. But here's the stat. And I don't know if you've looked at the box yet, Andy. But do you know how many rushing yards Miami had with that offensive line? They did not run the ball well at all in this. game. This was a failure of the offensive line to get a push and it hasn't had this problem all year long. This has not been an issue for Miami. And so I wasn't sure there was going to be a team that could do this except maybe in Ohio State or somebody that had just obscene amounts of talent in the front seven. But this is like Miami just enforced its will against the other

Starting point is 00:08:20 teams it played. Right. So that to me is the biggest alarm. Like Carson Beck at times last year was prone to throw interceptions. This isn't like a out-of-left field result. And I think that they need to clean that up because Miami isn't going to be in a position, especially in the postseason to survive three or four interceptions. And if you go back to Carson Beck at Georgia, obviously when he had Brock Bowers and Ladd-McConkie, he was really good. But the other part of that is he threw the ball really effectively when they ran the ball really effectively.

Starting point is 00:08:51 The play action game was working. When the defense has to respect the run game, Carson Beck is a lot more effective. And Miami's still built to make the defense respect the run game, but they just didn't get it done against Louisville. And that's what worries you because if you can't do it against Louisville, you probably can't do it against Ohio State or you probably can't do it against Alabama. You've got to be able to do that. Miami was supposed to be different this year. Right now, it feels the same. But the reason why Miami was supposed to be different isn't because of Carson Beck.

Starting point is 00:09:27 They downgraded dramatically a quarterback this year. And that's not an insult to Carson Beck. That's a compliment. Yeah, it's just Cam Ward's really good. The reason why I thought that they had a chance to be different this year and to compete with the Ohio states of the world is because of their front seven on the defense and because of their offensive line on offense. And the thing that would keep me up at night if I were a Miami fan is, is how did you get pushed around yesterday? How did you get pushed around on Friday night by Louisville?

Starting point is 00:09:53 And if you can get pushed around by Louisville, then you're going to get pushed around by Alabama. You're going to get pushed around by Georgia, by Ohio State and every other team that plays like that. Now, it's not an, that's not, we're not insulting Louisville here. We're not like, oh, Louisville is terrible. They shouldn't be able to push you around. Louisville, like, the thing is Louisville could still win the ACC.

Starting point is 00:10:10 Louisville could still go to the playoff. Like, we're discounting that and assuming that Louisville's going to lose somewhere along the way. But look, they got a chance. If you look at the rest of their schedule, they can win every game left on their schedule. Like, they can finish the season 11 and 1. Who is going to win the ACC is kind of like a fool's errand right now. It's kind of starting to look like the- Oh, yeah. And it's really interesting because the ACC is, there's a cluster of teams that are very good at the top. And then the bottom is really bad. And then you have a hit in the middle, which is different since the quarterback change and is good now.

Starting point is 00:10:54 And there's another team that we haven't mentioned in the ACCStandings. Like SMU also has no loss in the ACCC standings. SMU has two losses, but they are both out of conference. So, you know, Miami does not control their own destiny. I do not believe Louisville, who has a loss does at the moment too. Virginia, there's four teams that are unbeaten to play each other on Saturday. So one of those will get cleared out. but Miami needs a lot of help in the ACC race.

Starting point is 00:11:19 I think they need zero help in the playoff race. So, and maybe this is the way that ACC gets two teams in. Miami finishes 11 and 1, and then they're not figuring in because they don't play any of the other teams anymore. The only other team they play, I think, that is in competition right now for the ACC championship is SMU. Like, they don't play anybody else. So there's a complete separation between Miami and the rest of the contenders.

Starting point is 00:11:43 So I guess if you're Jim Phillips, you're like, well, this is actually going to work out great. Because if Miami runs the table, they won't knock off any of the other teams that are in the ACC championship race. Whoever wins the ACC championship is going to get in automatically and then Miami will also get in. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's going to be, it's going to be a strange race.

Starting point is 00:11:59 Because, again, Louisville doesn't really play any of these other teams other than SMU as well. So Louisville, Miami and SMU will kind of figure some things out amongst themselves. And meanwhile, Duke and Georgia Tech will figure some things out amongst themselves. And Louisville will, yeah, well,

Starting point is 00:12:15 I mean, we'll see. Louisville was in the Miami and SMU group because they all play. Yeah, and it's important because what you just said is true. We're not insulting Louisville when we say you're not supposed to get pushed around by them. The reason why it came out that way is because in my thought process coming into the weekend, I thought Miami was on Ohio State's tier. And like, no offense. Right.

Starting point is 00:12:34 We thought, we thought really nobody other than maybe Ohio State could push them around like that. Yeah, which brings us to a secondary conversation. are we like an Ohio State loss away from actually arriving at nobody's good? Yep, yep, that was, I was thinking about that as I was driving around, and that's exactly right, because what you saw on Friday night in Miami Gardens, Florida, you could see at some point in an Ohio State game. It's not outside their own possibility. We have seen this happen.

Starting point is 00:13:10 It's a long season. It's hard to win every game. it is hard to get up for every game especially when you're the type of team that every other team is up for like they're as up as they're going to be when they play you and that's that's how louisville was i mean louisville had the whole nation to itself on friday night everybody who loves college football was watching it was a chance for louisville to make a statement and they were up they were ready to play somebody tweeted at me last night andy Ohio State might be better than everybody else.

Starting point is 00:13:47 They are not elite by elite standards, which I think I'm, I don't know. Ohio State still needs to. We'll see. Like, they're going to play more games. It's too early to tell that right now. But you look at the rest of Ohio State schedule, they don't, I don't even know if they have a chance to prove that.

Starting point is 00:14:06 They don't play another ranked team for the rest of the year. They're going to go undefeated probably unless they lose to Michigan again. But the point. I'm going to make, though, and I might, I think we need to talk about this, you know, at length in the recap show, especially depending on how things go. But as you look around the country and like, you know, A&M is not in that discussion right now for, you know, elite of the elite because of preconceived notions and stuff. But is this the year? And I have to push down my urge to curse. The year that a team like Texas Tech can actually do it.

Starting point is 00:14:42 A team that we think is a cute story. Like, is this a year that Indiana legitimately could win the national title? Like, I think we need to start rewiring our brains now to get out of this thought process that only five teams can win it because of there are those the five teams. And I hope you're right. I hope you're right because it makes it a more fun sport if Texas Tech can win it, if Indiana can win it. Like if Texas Tech wins the national title this year or Indian. Indiana wins the national title. Now, Indiana's a Big Ten team, but that would probably,

Starting point is 00:15:16 what do you think would be more unlikely in the minds of somebody four years ago? Indiana. Indiana. So, like, I just, I feel like we don't know, and we're probably not going to know. Texas Tech has a big game today. This is a great way to set it up against Arizona State. They're a multi-score favorite in that game. I don't know if they announced.

Starting point is 00:15:34 Texas Tech has not won by fewer than 24 points in any game this season. But like, if Texas Tech runs through the Big 12 and beats the crap out of everybody in 2020 in the playoff we think they would have just played Alabama and lost by 30 because Alabama had Devante Smith on all those guys on that team yeah but there's no 2020 Alabama waiting around if this version of Texas Tech goes 13 and oh goes into the playoff as a two seat or whatever and they they wind up with Alabama in the second round like it's probably a one score spread you know what I think about and you might agree with this if you go look at the 14 playoff era you go through all the teams that got

Starting point is 00:16:20 their ass kicked in the first round in the semis if you were to insert those teams that got their ass kicked by the mega teams back in 2016 15 17 18 and you dropped them into this year if they could all win the national title in this season they probably could you're talking about like 2016 Ohio State or 2015 Ohio State or no 2015 Ohio State didn't make playoff. 2016, Ohio State got housed by Clemson in the playoff. But yeah, that's the type of team. The Washington team that got destroyed by Alabama

Starting point is 00:16:51 from my final. Yeah, like all those teams that were really good in the regular season that ended up having to face a buzzsaw that just had the unfortunate reality of existing at a time where super teams existed. Oh, Producer River with the 2015 Michigan State team. Yeah, like with the 2015 Michigan State team that beat Ohio State on the road with Connor, well, Connor Cook didn't play in that game, but Connor Cook

Starting point is 00:17:15 was their quarterback. Like, would they be able to compete in a four-quarter game with everybody in college football now? Right. And they got, it was 41 to nothing. We got destroyed by Alabama on the first round. So, yeah, I think that's a great question. It is a great question. And, but to bring it back to this game, to Miami losing the Louisville, it also means that those teams that are going to be in the playoff, those teams that can win the national championship are going to lose games in the regular season. It's going to happen. You can say weak conference, you can say whatever you want. There's no conference weak enough to keep you from losing a game because it's hard to win 12 or 13 games in a row in this era because nobody's that deep. Yeah. And maybe it's just

Starting point is 00:18:02 a reminder too that we need to recalibrate our brains. It's like, okay, Miami lost a three-point game at home to another team that's you know five and one or whatever like that's just the sport now i don't know i don't know and it was fun and it was a great game and everybody went crazy when liuval one and there's going to be more of that in fact as we record this a couple hours away from kickoffs on saturday there's going to be more of that today and that's the best part we'll talk to you tonight

Andy & Ari On3 - Louisville UPSETS Miami | Where do Mario Cristobal and Canes go from here?

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