Hurricanes Begin Preparing For Rival Florida State
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CORAL GABLES (CBSMiami) – The Miami Hurricanes began preparing for their 60th encounter with the Florida State Seminoles on Tuesday morning at the team's facility in Coral Gables, Florida.
It's also the beginning of the race to Charlotte and the ACC Championship Game.
The Hurricanes will now play 8 straight ACC games.
If Miami is to have success on Saturday against the Seminoles they can't have the unforced errors that plagued them in the loss to Cincinnati.
The Canes were penalized 6 times against the Bearcats with the infractions coming at the worst times.
Miami had its 4th touchdown of the year taken off the board because of a penalty and several others thwarted touchdown drives inside the red zone.
Critical penalties Saturday vs. FSU will likely be a death warrant.
The other issue the Canes addressed is converting on 3rd downs. Miami was 4 for 15 last week and are converting only 25 per cent of the time.
The Canes must find ways to sustain drives against FSU.
Penalties and negative plays on early downs are the main culprits.
"We can't make those mistakes in the environment we're going to face," said Hurricanes head coach Al Golden.
We need to keep pressing to our guys the importance of being disciplined and finishing drives Saturday night.
The Miami defense zeroed in on the FSU run game.
The Noles may or may not have star running back Dalvin Cook listed as questionable after hurting his hamstring against Wake Forest.
FSU is still looking for the right balance on offense, but they are trending toward being more of a power run team.
Despite Miami outrushing FSU last season, since 1988 the team that rushes for more yards in this game has won 20 of 28 times.
The Hurricanes haven't beaten FSU since a Labor Day 38-34 win in Tallahassee in 2009.
The last several years losing to FSU has caused the Canes season to completely jack-knife off the road.
In 2010 Miami sputtered to the finish line and in 2013 Miami dropped 2 straight and after last year's 30-26 loss, the Hurricanes lost 4 straight.
Listen to the Miami Hurricanes take on the Florida State Seminoles this Saturday at 8:00 p.m. on Sports Radio 560 WQAM, your official radio home for the Canes!
Follow Joe Zagacki on Twitter (@canesvoice)