December 30, 2018 will always be remembered as a wild day for Miami Hurricanes football fans after what went down on what started out as an uneventful Sunday morning in Coral Gables, FL. Over the course of the last 12 hours of the day, the Miami Hurricanes football team went from having its head coach retire unexpectedly to immediately turning around and convincing its native son to stay and lead the team. Plus they gave a four million dollar donation to Temple University!
We went from losing the heart, soul, and mastermind of our talented defense to keeping him and improving with new ideas and returning veterans. From what would have been an old coach forced to go against his wishes in the twilight of his career to what now should be a full commitment by a new coach to maximizing our offensive talent.
We went from being fans that were faced with what was almost certain to be a messy and uncertain future to fans excited and naive about our unlimited future.
Much has been written about Manny Diaz in the last two weeks since he took over for the Miami Hurricanes. But I think the most important thing about Manny is that he gets it. Richt did as well, he just didn't seem to have the energy to go through an upheaval of philosophy and family. Over the last half of the 2018 season, The U had taken a big U-turn and was trending the negative way in terms of momentum: the offense couldn't put up points, the team was losing and fracturing, recruits were seeing what was coming and jumping ship, our best coach was poached to go lead another program - things were not looking good in the immediate future.
When Manny took over the reins as Defensive Coordinator, he understood what long time Miami fans get in that we perform best when the team takes on the momentum of the city -- fast, aggressive, and tough. He knows that the defense's attacking philosophy that forces opponents into uncomfortable situations and mistakes is exactly what was missing from the offensive side of the ball. The best thing is that Manny gets that Miami players not only want to take advantage of your mistakes and make you regret it, but then they want to make sure to remind you about it very loudly (see: Turnover Chain). This momentum that was brought to the defensive side of the ball was the perfect marriage of scheme fitting persona and talent and has been a huge success the last three years.
Now Manny is in charge of creating the same culture across the entire program. My criticisms of Richt's offense before were that his style of offense is predicated on making the exact right decisions and reads and then executing -- it's very veteran heavy and reliant on precision. But the offenses that are so common on the many successful local high school teams are ones that are reliant on space and speed, on playing fast and intuitive instead of methodical and read-based. Players from South Florida can be summed up succinctly as being based on action, not reaction. They take charge, and want to attack you whether on offense or defense. Or even special teams.
By relying more on speed and instincts and quick plays in space, you give the offensive playmakers more room to use their gifts and make plays. South Florida football players are not always the biggest but they're usually the fastest and feistiest. That's why Al Golden's defensive scheme didn't achieve as much as it could've during his tenure, because they were relying on a read-and-react 3-4 defense that required the DL to hold their blocks and the LBs to sit and read -- our players were put at a disadvantage and their athletic and football potential was artificially limited based on scheme.
The funny thing is that the offense was taking advantage of our players' gifts during this time. The best two Offensive Coordinators that we've had since our last championship were probably Jedd Fisch and James Coley. However they came along when the defense was underachieving because of scheme fit. And in the following three years (the last three under Richt), Diaz and the defensive coaches had the defense playing well but the offense was underachieving because of scheme fit.
That's why I was a fan of either Fisch or Coley coming back as our new Offensive Coordinator. I was also a fan of some of the other rumors (Larry Fedora, Jeff Scott, or Brian Wright over Major Applewhite or Tee Martin). I am also a big fan of the hire of Dan Enos, most recently QB coach for a football team that's out in the middle of Alabama. He seems to be a respected QB tutor (as was Mark Richt before, Jon Richt much less so) that has mentored QBs up to their max potential before in Tua/Jalen, the Allen bros at Arkansas, that one decent Cincy QB, and Drew Stanton at Michigan State. He also has coordinated record-setting offenses before at multiple stops and is bringing with him what should be an upgrade in OL coach in Butch Barry.
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This post has rambled on a bit but the main points that I have tried to get across are:
- I like the Diaz hire, as it's an instant momentum boost to the Canes
- Diaz seems to understand how best to utilize football talent on the Miami roster: by playing fast, aggressive, and relying on instincts
- I like the Enos hire a lot on the offensive side of the ball
- I am excited for the upcoming season and beyond, as opposed to two weeks ago when we were all but certain to face a couple tough years had not all of this craziness not happened
Go Canes!