UM’s Diaz on play ‘that will haunt me forever,’ his rationale and why call was regrettable
A six-pack of Miami Hurricanes notes on a Monday:
▪ It’s ironic that running a defense — what was supposed to be Manny Diaz’s greatest skill and a driving force behind him landing the UM head coaching job — could end up costing him his job.
But it’s especially ironic that the play that might doom him more than any other this season completely belied who he is as a coach. Diaz is known as an aggressive blitzer, a coach and coordinator usually willing to send extra rushers to disrupt the quarterback.
While his decision to rush only three on fourth-and-14 of FSU’s game-winning drive can be rationalized, the decision was nevertheless regrettable, an epithet on this road to nowhere.
Diaz explained his fourth-and-14 scheme decision on Joe Rose’s WQAM show on Monday:
“There was a guy spotting [the QB on that play],” Diaz said of Keontra Smith.
“There was a guy there spying on Travis. You have to look at the situation. Fourth down-and-14, you’ve got a field that is condensed because you’re in the red zone. And that is the play of the game, there’s no denying, that’s what the whole thing was about.
“They had not been a drop back team on third down. They were running a lot of sprint outs. You could tell, they weren’t very confident in their pass protection against our rush.
“They were lining up in unbalanced formations with all the receivers and tight end over on one side. With James [Williams] going out we had to make some arrangements in our dime package. And simply the play that also came out in my mind was the play against North Carolina a couple years ago when we gave up the fourth-and-17 on the last drive. So we had actually practiced that situation honestly since that North Carolina game a couple years ago.
“Say, hey, listen we’re going to drop in to maximum coverage and we’re going to defend the sticks. And the part that breaks my heart is the part that [we] just did not get our guys to understand our depth of our drops.
“If we just understood… We were playing the coverage, this is what I’m responsible for. We’re playing the coverage not aware that they’ve gotta get 14 for the first down. We got a couple guys that aren’t as deep as they need to be, and if they were they would sit there and the ball would hit them right in the face. There was really one guy getting the ball on that play.
“So, we went back yesterday, analyzed, and talked about it with the players — all the different choices and all the different coverages and all the different things we could have done in that situation.
“And it simply just came down to us as coaches not getting our guys prepared enough to execute the coverage as it was called in that situation. That was the ball game.”
Later in the day, Diaz told reporters in a Zoom session that “the fourth-and-14 will haunt me forever. We’re on the wrong side of history for this game. As a coach, you always blame yourself. What can you have done more to prepare your guys to execute in that situation?”
What’s frustrating about that play call — beyond it not working and the lack of preparation — is that UM had its greatest success against FSU by rushing four, five or six. And on the only other play in the second half when UM rushed three, the Hurricanes yielded a 14-yard completion on third-and-10.
I went back and looked at FSU quarterback Jordan Travis’ drop backs in the second half. What I found raises questions about the wisdom of rushing only three on that pivotal late play.
1). When UM rushed six, those plays produced a 14-yard gain on a screen and an incomplete pass that was pressured.
2). When UM rushed five, those plays produced two incomplete passes that were pressured; a loss of 4 yards on one play when Travis had to eat the ball; no gain by the quarterback when he was pressured on third-and-11; a reception for a gain of 3 yards on a third-and-4; an 11-yard completion and an incomplete pass on that final FSU drive.
3). When UM rushed four, the plays resulted in two sacks, two incomplete passes under heavy pressure, a completion that lost 4 yards, a completion that gained seven on a third-and-11 and the 59-yard completion to J’Khi Douglas — beating Kamren Kinchens — to take FSU to UM’s 21 with 2:08 left.
There was one other play — on third-and-14 of that final drive — where the Canes initially rushed three but Amari Carter then barreled toward Travis in what appeared to be a delayed blitz. That pressure from Carter took Douglas to the ground and forced an incompletion.
But on fourth-and-14, here was one big difference from the third-and-14 play, besides the poor coverage from defensive backs:
UM again rushed three but the “spy” on Travis — Keonta Smith — just stood there and (unlike Carter on the previous play) opted not to run toward Travis to try to disrupt the throw.
There was a clear lane for Smith to rush Travis, but he would have needed to make the decision quickly to have any chance to affect the play.
Asked if Smith would have been permitted or encouraged to rush Travis on that play, inside linebackers coach Jon Patke said Monday:
“We don’t go get them [rush the quarterback] unless they are out of the pocket, off the mark. [Smith] didn’t feel he was off the mark so we didn’t rush. We don’t want the quarterback to run [for a big gain on fourth-and-14. Smith was patient there. Looking back, maybe he could have made a play, maybe not. He was doing what he was coached to do.”
Regardless, the biggest blame on the play goes to Te’Coury Couch (who allowed the reception to Andrew Parchment) and the safeties (Kinchens, Avantae Williams) for not helping.
Diaz’s decision not to rush more than three wasn’t egregiously awful; squandering 12 seconds before calling timeout on FSU’s two late drives was more objectionable.
But the fourth-and-14 scheme decision was questionable, considering all the pressure UM generated by rushing five throughout the second half, and considering his young defensive backfield was ill-prepared for the play.
▪ For weeks, a UM administrative source told us that athletic director Blake James was safe and would survive the continuing problems of the football program.
But the administrator told us over the weekend that James is no longer considered safe and he stands very much at risk.
“There’s so much discontent [about the football program],” the administrator said of fans and trustees and donors.
If James is replaced - which many now expect - a successor likely would replace Diaz.
5 PM UPDATE: UM and James have parted ways, according to a source. Here’s our story.
▪ Disappointing to see UM’s offensive line regress against a stout FSU defensive line. The Seminoles sacked Tyler Van Dyke three times and pressured him 10 times, per Pro Football Focus.
Running back Jaylan Knighton gained 2 yards or less on 10 of his 16 runs. DJ Scaife and Jarrid Williams graded out lowest among UM’s offensive linemen.
Knighton played 65 snaps, compared to three for Thad Franklin and one for Cody Brown.
▪ At receiver, Charleston Rambo played 70 of UM’s 72 snaps, with Key’Shawn Smith logging 66, Mike Harley Jr. 47 and Xavier Restrepo 19.
Among the freshman receivers, Romello Brinson played six, Breshard Smith five and Jacolby George three.
All six of the freshmen skill players — Brinson, Smith, George, Franklin, Brown and Elijah Arroyo (four snaps Saturday) — are getting in the game but playing sparingly.
▪ Defensively, a strong case could be made that Leonard Taylor needs to play more. He logged 20 snaps — as many as Jordan Miller — and fewer than Nesta Silvera (45), Jon Ford (30) and Jared Harrison Hunte (28).
▪ With James Williams missing the second half with an injury, Avantae Williams played 66 snaps. Fellow safety Kinchens played 77. Keshawn Washington played one.
Beyond Tyrique Stevenson (who played all 79 snaps), the Canes allocated cornerback snaps this way: starter DJ Ivey 33, Marcus Clarke 39, and Couch 19.
This story was originally published November 15, 2021 at 2:53 PM.
