Hurricanes Look For First Win In Over A Month Against Visiting Pitt
Follow CBSMIAMI.COM: Facebook | Twitter
MIAMI (CBSMiami) – The Miami Hurricanes, in the middle of a four game losing streak, are as happy as anyone that the calendar has flipped from October to November.
The last time Miami tasted a victory was October 1st against Georgia Tech.
The Hurricanes have faced many problems during their October swoon. Brad Kaaya has been sacked 18 times in the last four games, the defense has one takeaway (an interception against Florida State) and the longest touchdown is a 35-yard pass to tight end Chris Herndon.
Now the Hurricanes welcome in the 5-3 Pittsburgh Panthers. Pitt is 2nd in the Atlantic Coast Conference, scoring 38 points per game.
James Conner leads the rushing attack piling up 239 yards per game also 2nd in the ACC. Then, there is defensive end Ejuan Price who has nine of his 25 career sacks this season.
"He is very, very fast off the ball," Hurricanes head coach Mark Richt said. "Very strong. Kind of a low-to-the-ground guy, too, which is problematic. A lot of times you'll get a relatively tall offensive linemen trying to work on a guy that can play low and play powerful, play strong…so just his get-off, when the ball is snapped and how quickly he gets off the line. If you have a tackle concerned about being beat on a speed rush, you tend to overset at times, and then he comes back underneath. If you have just one guy on him, it's almost not fair, quite frankly."
In order to break the game losing streak Coach Richt has emphasized pass protection in practice as well as a quick start and effort and attitude.
"The players are working hard," Richt said. "They're focusing. When you're learning how to be a man, you do your job, every day. You do the best you can. When you're on a team, you do your best – not only for yourself, but for your team, because you care about each other. The motivation for our guys is that, every day, we show up and get to work. Regardless of the circumstances, you have to get up and go. That's just like in life. You might not want to get up one day, for whatever reason, you don't feel well. But guess what? You have to get up and do your job. If you don't, you have people counting on you, and it won't go well for them. I think they take pride in showing up every day and getting to work. Obviously we want to win games too, there's no doubt about that. But every single day, you have to make a choice on what your attitude is and what your effort is – you can control that. That's what I tell these guys – you can control your attitude, and you can control your effort. That's up to you. If you care enough about your teammates, and you truly are doing things that a man will do, you'll take care of business."
As far as the sacks are concerned, that's more problematic since there is no quick fix.
Offensive lineman KC McDermott on the issues of the offensive line: "It is nothing scheme wise or coaching wise. It is just player execution. We have to execute better up front. If we don't do that, it is all on us. It is not scheme or coaching. We have to play harder and play nastier and make sure we get our assignments down right. If we do that, we will win."
The Miami defense needs to help the cause. In each of the last 4 games the defense has allowed at least 400 yards and has not been able to force any turnovers therefore the offense is always on the long field.
Pitt's offense presents several problems. It's a Pittsburgh attack that is creative with the way they use their players.
Once Pitt gets inside an opponents' red-zone, the Panthers have converted 80 percent of those opportunities for touchdowns. Pittsburgh is averaging 38 points per game.
"That's why they're up there in scoring, because they've done such a great job there," Richt said. "It probably starts with their offensive line." James Conner has 45 career rushing touchdowns.
NOTES
Kickoff is at 12:30 p.m.
It's Homecoming weekend for the University of Miami.
Nine ACC teams including Miami are in the bottom 50 in the nation for most penalized.
The Hurricanes are averaging 60,561 fans at home.
Miami has 75 tackles for losses this season, surpassing last year's total of 66.