‘They take it personally.’ How the Miami Hurricanes’ offensive line is figuring things out.

Criticism of the Miami Hurricanes’ early season offensive struggles often fell on their youth.

Miami started a freshman quarterback the first five games of the season, and its offensive line has mostly featured two freshman tackles, a freshman right guard and a sophomore at center.

The trouble in pass protection and run blocking was evident, and offensive coordinator Dan Enos was forced to use tight ends Will Mallory and Brevin Jordan, a lot, as blockers to help.

Now, amid a three-game Miami Hurricanes winning streak, the unit that gave up 10 sacks in Miami’s season opener against Florida has allowed just five sacks in the past three games.

The Hurricanes offensive line is anchored by redshirt sophomore center Corey Gaynor with freshman Zion Nelson at left tackle, junior Navaughn Donaldson at left guard, sophomore DJ Scaife Jr at right tackle and freshman Jakai Clark at right guard.

They haven’t allowed anyone to get to the quarterback more than three times in a game since surrendering seven sacks to Virginia Tech on Oct 5. They held a Pittsburgh team that’s second in the nation in sacks to just two. And according to quarterback Jarren Williams, they “take personally.”

“That’s what I like about the offensive line,” Williams said after Miami’s 52-27 win over Louisville. “Corey Gaynor, he’s a leader out there. He gets everybody going. It starts in practice. You can see it. Those guys want to be perfect. And that’s the mentality we gotta have. We shouldn’t have...missed assignments. Let’s practice clean. So going out there, it translates...The goal really is to go in focused. Study film, know your assignment and execute. And it’s gonna translate because with the play calling and everything else, we’re in good position to run up the score.”

The offensive line improvement has shown in Miami’s offensive surge. The Hurricanes are averaging 31.7 points during their winning streak and 26.6 points in the past five games. With better pass protection, Williams has thrown for 566 yards and eight touchdowns in the past two games and has time to make some of the downfield throws he couldn’t earlier this season.

Enos pointed to Nelson as someone whose improvement has stood out — from getting beat off the ball often in his first few starts and showing a lack of confidence to visibly appearing more comfortable in his role.

“We went through some early, rough times,” Enos said. “Florida, A gap run-bys a little bit...There are growing pains as we know. What you’re seeing now is a guy that is gaining confidence and [Nelson is] getting coached every day, the reps are starting to add on. Again, that was an investment we made as a staff, that we’re going to invest in this guy, and we’re seeing it pay some dividends now.”’

Coach Manny Diaz noted that Nelson’s improved technique has contributed to his increased confidence.

“The more you do something the better you get at it,” Diaz said, “and with that the confidence, because now he’s getting into games and he’s functioning.

“And what is then showing up as you get better with your confidence and technique is the reason why he’s there in the first place, because he’s got great athleticism and he’s very tenacious. He stays after you, he gets after you. There were a couple really special plays this past Saturday where he was blocking a guy one way and the guy kind of went away and he pivoted around and got his hands on another guy. Those are the kind of athletic plays that flash and why we’ve thought so highly of him from the beginning.”

Nelson said it feels good to have his coaches’ trust in him, adding that it reassures him when he doesn’t have the same confidence in himself.

That confidence the coaches have in the front five trickles down to the rest of the Hurricanes’ offense.

“They come in day in and day out,” running back DeeJay Dallas said. “They work, and they’re probably the hardest working people that go unnoticed. But all of my stats, or the whole offense starts with the O-Line. They’re probably the hardest working group that we have on our team.”

This story was originally published November 13, 2019 at 2:59 PM.