Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets give Miami Hurricanes first loss of 2023 season
MIAMI GARDENS — Miami was one simple kneel-down away Saturday night from gutting out a comeback win despite an ugly performance.
Then came an utterly surreal ending.
When the game was over, the No. 17 Hurricanes were left to deal with a baffling and devastating 23-20 defeat to Georgia Tech at Hard Rock Stadium that easily could have been avoided.
Leading Georgia Tech by three points and with the visitors out of timeouts, Miami snapped the ball with 33 seconds left. Instead of having quarterback Tyler Van Dyke take a knee and running off their home field with a 5-0 record, the Canes inexplicably ran an offensive play.
Running back Don Chaney Jr. ran 4 yards and fumbled. The Yellow Jackets recovered at their own 26-yard line with 26 seconds left. Four plays later, receiver Christian Leary slipped behind the defense and hauled in a 44-yard touchdown pass from Haynes King, scoring the winning points with a second left on the clock. Stunned silence swept through the stands. Georgia Tech took an intentional knee on the two-point conversion. After the kickoff, Miami had one play, but numerous laterals failed to manufacture a miracle.
“I should’ve stepped in and said, ‘Hey, take a knee,’ ” Miami coach Mario Cristobal admitted afterward.
“We didn’t play to our standard, which means we did not coach to our standard,” Cristobal said of the performance against a nearly three-touchdown underdog. “It’s very important that we’re very realistic with ourselves, and the bottom line is we’ve got to get right back to work. Everybody is down. It’s hard. It sucks. We’ve got to take it like grown men. We’ve got to get back to it and be better.”
With a win against Georgia Tech (3-3) in their ACC opener, the Hurricanes would have matched their win total from last season and set up a huge showdown next Saturday in Chapel Hill, N.C., with North Carolina. The Tar Heels improved to 5-0 with a 40-7 rout of Syracuse earlier Saturday. Instead, UM is left to pick up the emotional pieces.
“Had a chance to put it away and should have just taken a timeout right there and recalibrate,” Cristobal said. “Just take a knee. Gave them a chance and they took advantage of it and scored. It’s that simple.”
“Right now, it really sucks, it really does,” said Van Dyke. “But you’ve got to move on. There are still seven games left. We can’t dwell on this one loss and say our season is over.”
Here are five takeaways from the Hurricanes’ fall to the Yellow Jackets:
Cristobal, Shannon Dawson are to blame for this loss.
Chaney Jr.’s fumble gave Georgia Tech one final chance, but he should never have been put in that situation. Offensive coordinator Shannon Dawson called for Chaney to get a handoff instead of a kneel-down by Van Dyke, and Cristobal didn’t overrule Dawson. Chaney Jr. had 99 yards rushing when he got the ball. Cristobal said the chance to put Chaney Jr. over 100 yards was not the reason for the decision to run the ball.
“We should’ve taken a timeout, right there at the end,” Cristobal said. “Thought we could get the first down [on third-and-10 from Georgia Tech’s 30]. We talked about two hands on the ball, but that’s not good enough. Should have told them to take a knee. That’s it.”
Asked if he was surprised that he wasn’t told to take a knee, Van Dyke said, “At the end of the day, I’ve got to put us in a better situation. I don’t want to speak on that. We should not have even had a situation where we had to run the clock out, take a knee.”
Said Georgia Tech coach Brent Key: “Yeah, we kind of felt that he was going to take a knee at that point. He didn’t, though.”
Miami’s defense couldn’t save the day.
The Hurricanes’ defense dominated the Yellow Jackets for large portions of the game, allowing 61 total yards on 24 plays in the first half. But they couldn’t get a stop in the waning seconds.
On Georgia Tech’s final drive, King threw incomplete on first down, but then connected with Malik Rutherford for a 30-yard completion with 14 seconds left. After spiking the ball to stop the clock, King rolled right to buy some time and found Leary.
“We mistimed the one ball over on their sideline and he caught it and made a great play,” Cristobal said of Rutherford’s catch. “The second one, the quarterback broke contain, they slipped a guy behind the back end of our secondary and scored.”
Said Hurricanes linebacker Francisco Mauigoa: “I’m still kind of in shock that happened.”
After the ‘Canes scored to take a 10-0 lead in the third quarter, the Yellow Jackets responded with their own touchdown on an eight-play, 75-yard drive that lasted 3:18. That was the start of 17 consecutive points by the Yellow Jackets.
Van Dyke played his worst game of the season.
Van Dyke, who completed 24 of 36 passes for 288 yards and one touchdown, threw three interceptions Saturday.
“Can’t force the ball, make dumb decisions,” Van Dyke said. “Just have to do better.”
Van Dyke came into the game with 11 touchdowns and just one interception, including 10 touchdowns and no picks in the past three games. In the second quarter, Van Dyke was intercepted in the end zone by safety LaMiles Brooks. In the third quarter, cornerback Ahmari Harvey stole a third-down pass from Van Dyke. And in the fourth, safety Jaylon King intercepted Van Dyke, returning the pick 66 yards to Miami’s 15-yard line. Van Dyke made a touchdown-saving tackle, forcing the Yellow Jackets to settle for a field goal and 17-10 lead.
The Hurricanes appeared to be looking ahead to the Heels.
As the Hurricanes prepared to debut their alternate “Miami Nights” uniform and helmet Saturday, Cristobal noted of the all-black ensemble with green and orange accents, “We have one rule: Make sure when you wear something different, you make it look good.”
The ‘Canes didn’t do that except for a few exceptions. They were sluggish in the first half, scoring their first points on a 30-yard field goal by Andy Borregales as time expired. Coming off a bye week, it appeared like the ‘Canes were more focused on the upcoming matchup with the Tar Heels than on the Yellow Jackets, who were coming off a 38-27 loss to Bowling Green that prompted the changing of their defensive coordinator.
It appeared James Williams would be the Hurricanes’ hero.
With the score tied at 17 in the fourth quarter, Hurricanes safety James Williams intercepted King and his 44-yard return set up the ‘Canes offense at the Yellow Jackets’ 14. Borregales eventually booted through a 39-yard field goal for the go-ahead points with 6:23 left.
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However, the turnover would be footnote by the time the game ended. Another positive for the ‘Canes defense Saturday: Safety Kamren Kinchens, played for the first time Saturday since sustaining an unspecified head/neck injury making a hard-hitting tackle late in the game against Texas A&M Sept. 9.
The All-American junior, who was carried off on a stretcher and taken to the hospital, missed the first game of his UM career Sept. 14 against Bethune-Cookman and didn’t play Sept. 23 at Temple despite traveling with the team. Kinchens received a round of applause from Canes fans Saturday after his tackle on Georgia Tech’s second possession was announced over the PA system.
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“It was kind of a rough patch missing those games because I pride myself on making sure I’m playing through whatever,” Kinchens told the media last week, noting that he didn’t miss a game in high school. “Yeah, it was kind of like an eye-opener. You kind of sometimes take stuff for granted.”
Defensive tackle Branson Deen also played for a first time since an injury against the Aggies, coming off the bench behind starter Jared Harrison-Hunte. Two other ‘Canes hurt in that game, defensive end Akheem Mesidor and running back Mark Fletcher Jr., did not dress Saturday and their status for the UNC game is unknown.
