The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly: Louisville Cardinals 2023 Edition

Miami lost to Louisville 38-31 on Senior Day at Hard Rock Stadium.

No game recap this week.

Mike Schiffman has your 3 stars from the game.

And now, let’s get into The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

The Good

• QB Tyler Van Dyke showed why Miami’s stuck with him through all the bad this season. Here you’ll see his best singular throw since September. He can do THIS. Problem is, he hasn’t for a good while. But this is the arm talent he has.

• Van Dyke was....fine to good. Not great. Not spectacular, but serviceable. 24/39 passing (62% completions), for 327 yards and 1 TD with (the most important number) 0 INTs.
• Xavier Restrepo. A career day: 8 catches for 193 yards and a TD.
• Mark Fletcher Jr. showing why he was such a big recruiting win. Ran thru several arm tackle attempts en route to a 21 yard touchdown.

• S Kam Kinchens with an interception in 1Q. He baited the Louisville QB into thinking the seam route was open, but quickly covered the open space to make a leaping pick and give Miami the ball leading up to Miami’s second score.

• RB/WR Brashard Smith got loose for a 34 yard TD on a reverse. I love the creativity from Dawson, and the execution by the offense. Would have loved to have seen this previously this season, but that’s a conversation for another day.

• 5-star Freshman OL Francis Mauigoa has been a monster in this game. And, on the Brashard Smith reverse, he absolutely DEMOLISHED a Louisville Safety who was trying to keep Brashard from scoring. You love to see it.

• Mark Fletcher’s 55 yard run. It was ruled out inside the 1 yard line, but still, a GREAT run. Gotta get him speed training in the offseason tho. No more getting caught at the 1 next year, 22.

• Andres Borregales’ 51 yard FG to tie the game at 31. That was a MONSTER kick, and would have been good from 70.
• Dylan Joyce. 44 yard average on 5 punts.
• Jared Harrison-Hunte blocked an Extra Point.
• 486 yards of offense
• 7.5 yards per play
• 21 first downs
• 6-14 on 3rd down
• 0 turnovers
• 1 turnover forced — Kinchens’ interception
• Held Louisville star RB Jawhar Jordan to 33 yards on 9 carries. He was averaging 98 yards per game and has 8 games with 95+ yards on the season.
• 12 chunk plays — 8 passes (15+), and 4 runs (10+)
• Held Louisville to 5-12 on 3rd down
• Advanced stats were both good and bad. Good (mostly) for Miami. But there were a couple bad areas, and the wave of green (good) on the Louisville side of things was bad for Miami.

The Bad

• Losing. I hate it and it fucking sucks. And this is 3 in a row now, so just bad on top of bad on top of bad.
• Losing to Louisville. Something about their fanbase just pisses me the fuck off.
• S Kam Kinchens caught looking in the backfield yet again this season. This time, it allowed Louisville to convert a 4th and 3, which led to the Cards’ first TD of the day. That kind of thing has happened far too often for a player of Kinchens’ ability.
• 1-2 on 4th down.
• 2-3 redzone scoring.
• Allowed Louisville to go 4-5 in the red zone
• Everything else is Ugly.

The Ugly

• No seriously: Losing. I FUCKING HATE IT!
• Losing to Louisville at home for the first time ever. Need I say more?
• 0 sacks.
• 3 TFLs
• Those are foundational areas of strength for the Miami defense, and they were basically shut out.
• Allowed 470 yards of offense
• Allowed 6.6 yards per play
• Allowed 25 first downs
• 5 penalties for 50 yards. It felt like more. And they were so hurtful. I hate it.
• Didn’t cover a Louisville Tight End once all FUCKING day. Jesus, man. Make an adjustment!
• Allowed 12 receivers for Louisville to make catches.
• The decision to call a timeout before 4th and goal on the penultimate possession. Cristobal said the timeout was more valuable there, on offense, but I disagree. If you don’t score after the timeout — which Miami didn’t and was something they should have reasonably considered — the timeout is INFINITELY more valuable on defense to stop the clock and give the offense as much time as possible to come back down the field and score. Another game management blunder that had a negative effect. Miami only had 20 seconds left on the final possession after they got a stop bc they could only call timeout twice during the Louisville possession, not 3 times.
• Yet another horrible call by ACC refs. The play shown below was ruled a conversion for a first down. There are many other instances and examples, but seriously: do better, ACC refs

• SPEAKING OF OTHER TERRIBLE FUCKING CALLS, THIS FUCKING BULLSHIT ASS, CROOKED ASS, CHEATING ASS CALL BY THE REFS OF ROUGHING THE PASSER ON RUEBEN BAIN GAVE LOUISVILLE FIRST AND GOAL JUST BEFORE THE HALF! GET THE FUCK OUTTA HERE!!! THIS IS IN NO WAY, SHAPE, FORM, OR FASHION ROUGHING THE PASSER!!! FUCK YOU!!!!!!

• Receiver hits James Williams in the face. Out of bounds. After the play. In front of the ref. No call.

• Late hit. Away from the play. In the back. Of the QB. No call. Absolutely laughable.

• Disaster. Jaden Davis and Te’Cory Couch run into each other, creating an opening for Kevin Coleman, who made Kam Kinchens look like a stick in the mud, evaded Kinchens’ diving attempt to push him out of bounds, and tight-roped the sideline for a 58 yard score.

Team Grades

Offense: B

There was a lot to like today! It wasn’t perfect, but TVD looked competent, Mark Fletcher was a monster, Restrepo was damn good, and the Canes put up points when they needed. Well...until the end of the game, that is.

Defense: D

I’m surprised and saddened by this performance. Missed tackles were back in spades. And, my GOD, when are we going to make an adjustment and cover a tight end?! And the defense had no disruption, no sacks and only 3 TFLs. There were times when they got off the field when they needed to, but when the game was in the balance, the defense had no answer for the Louisville offense.

Special Teams: B+

Great kicking by Borregales. Great punting by Joyce. Good returns. But the coverage unit had another struggle on a KR. Good not great.

Coaching: F

I’m sorry, but the timeout before the penultimate 4th down play was moronic. And the lack of adjustments to the things Louisville KEPT RUNNING by the defense was infuriating. And, I’m also just wondering where the offensive creativity had previously been?! I know, Tyler’s penchant for turnovers since September was a big factor in things, but damn, we didn’t even TRY some of the stuff we saw today before today. I just......we should be further along at this point of things than we should be.

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That’s it for this installment of The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

Agree? Disagree? Hit the comments and let me know.

Go Canes