Amid criticism, Mark Richt defends his play-calling and says execution needs to improve

The questions about the Miami Hurricanes’ play-calling haven’t subsided, and Mark Richt once again came to the defense of his approach at his weekly news conference Tuesday in Coral Gables.

Despite his offense failing to score more than 14 points in back-to-back games, the coach continues to assert Miami’s offensive issues stem more from poor execution than the actual plays being run.

“There’s nothing wrong with plays being called, quite frankly. What’s wrong is we haven’t executed well enough,” Richt said when asked for his response to bubbling criticism from fans. “If anybody got in the room with us and saw what we’re doing, and how we’re doing it and why we’re doing it, if they knew football they’d know that we have to do a better job of executing what we call, quite frankly.

“I’ve been saying that’s coaching all along, too. That’s part of it. There are some times a certain play would be better than another play at certain times, but the bottom line is if we looked at the tape and said, ‘These plays got no chance of success,’ then I would agree, but that’s not the case. The plays have a chance for success if everybody does what they’re supposed to do. The tough thing about offensive football is most every time 11 out of 11 got to do it right. There can be times when maybe a guy over here on the backside has a missed assignment or something and it doesn’t affect things, but for the most part everybody’s got to do their job.

“The bottom line is we’re not scoring enough points right now.”

The Hurricanes (5-3, 2-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) are in the midst of one of their worst offensive slumps since Richt took over in 2016. Only one other time — at the end of ACC play in 2017 — has Miami failed to crack 14 in consecutive games, and those two games included a three-point effort against Clemson in the ACC Championship Game. These two offensive meltdowns came against the Virginia Cavaliers and Boston College Eagles, both of whom entered the games unranked. On Saturday, the Hurricanes return home for a game against the Duke Blue Devils (5-3, 1-3) at Hard Rock Stadium.

In recent days, players and coaches have acknowledged they hear the frustrations from the fan base, much of which has been directed toward Richt’s play-calling.

When he came back to his alma mater, Richt expressed excitement at the idea of reclaiming play-calling duties after he handed those to offensive coordinator Mike Bobo while with the Georgia Bulldogs in 2006. Bobo kept those duties until he left following the 2014 season, at which point Brian Schottenheimer took over as offensive coordinator and primary play-caller.

At this point, Richt isn’t thinking about handing over his role as chief play-caller.

“Not right this minute,” Richt said. “We’re not thinking in terms of that.”

▪ Richt also took some time to discuss Miami’s typical offensive installation plans. The coach won’t usually throw out a play just because it isn’t working in practice. The Hurricanes instead rep everything in the game plan until it works.

“What happens is if we run a play and it’s not executed properly, we call out, ‘Reload, reload,’ and we just do it again,” Richt said. “We get it right and go to the next play. If the next play is not good, we do it again, so we have our [No.] 1 unit taking ‘X’ amount of reps, and if they through their rack of five plays or whatever it is, then usually there’s time enough for the No. 2 unit to get three or four reps, whatever it is we choose for them to get. So, if we execute well, the twos get more reps. If the ones don’t execute too well — it might take them seven times to get four plays right — well, then there’s not a whole lot of time for the twos to get a lot of reps and then we go right back to the ones again. The key is we’re going to make the corrections as we go. We don’t just say, ‘Oh, too bad’ and forget about it. When it’s not done properly, we do it again with the [No.] 1 unit.

“If there’s a play we don’t like, we’ll certainly throw it out, but just because one guy makes a mistake on a play doesn’t mean the play’s bad. That’s the whole point we’re trying to make. It’s not that the plays are bad, it’s the execution of the play that’s bad, so if everybody doesn’t do it right, we re-rack it and we do it again until we get it right. When you get it right, hey, it works, everybody.”

▪ Earlier in the day, offensive coordinator Thomas Brown said Miami is still working on getting the right players in the right places. Some significant injuries at skill positions have forced the Hurricanes to rely heavily on freshman starters, including wide receiver Dee Wiggins, tight end Brevin Jordan and offensive lineman DJ Scaife.

“If you change a guy then that guy has a learning curve, too,” Richt said. “We are playing a lot more younger guys than we expected to. We had some injury issues. We’ve had some things like that that have caused us to play certain guys. Obviously younger guys have more trouble being consistent than a veteran. That’s just the way it is. I’m not blaming the freshmen by any means, but the bottom line is if you make a change then this guy is going to go through his issues. The thing is for everybody to stick together, everybody to keep working hard and everybody to keep perfecting what they do, and take care of their job and we’ll be fine. That’s the answer.”

▪ Richt said tight end Will Mallory missed practice Tuesday due to an eye infection. Richt isn’t sure how long the freshman will be out. As long as Mallory is out, Jordan is the only healthy tight end on scholarship.

This story was originally published October 30, 2018 at 2:27 PM.