Diaz smiles through rain & pain as Canes win, reach bowl game he may not be around to coach | Opinion
Senior Day festivities were held pre-game Saturday night to honor the 24 Miami Hurricanes football players on the occasion of the final home game of their college careers.
It was raining hard, then and for much of the night. The crowd had not yet filled in and was less than sparse.
It was poignant, and a bit tough to watch. Names were called to a patter of applause and, one by one, players trotted out carrying a bouquet of flowers. One by one they posed for a photo with head coach Manny Diaz, who beamed a big smile every time -- almost as if his future hadn’t been turned upside down. Almost as if this whole night was not, well ... strange.
The players were saying goodbye.
Diaz was, too, quite likely, his picture-perfect smile belying all of it.
It was a most bittersweet night for UM football at Hard Rock Stadium.
It was that for the departing seniors -- the latest class of Canes who came to Coral Gables planning to restore this program to past glories and the latest to leave having fallen way short.
It surely was bittersweet for the head coach, who was celebrating a 38-26 victory over Virginia Tech that made Miami bowl-eligible -- but doing so knowing his days here are most likely ebbing as the search for a new athletic director suggests Diaz won’t be back.
And how strange, this night, for Canes fans? Do you tepidly applaud a 6-5 record (4-3 in the ACC) and qualifying for a bowl, the bare minimum for a successful year? Or do you politely table the booing for a season of unmitigated disappointment after UM won 10 games last year and entered this one ranked No. 14?
Bittersweet all around.
“Very proud of our team,” Diaz said afterward. “Started off great, which we challenged them to do. And finished what we started.”
It followed a turbulent week in which athletics director Blake James was fired, tossing Diaz’s future further into doubt.
“Tonight was an extension of the week,” Diaz said. “The word coaches throw around all the time is culture. Our culture eventually will see it through. Tonight [Tech] made a run when we weren’t playing at our best, but [we showed] our resolve, not flinching.”
Diaz deftly deflected every invitation to emote on how tough this has all been for him. It was mentioned to him how he was smiling at the very end as his players celebrated.
“Just proud of our team. Our guys played hard for each other,” he said. “As a coaching staff, that’s what we’re most proud of. It was a happy night. I don’t remember exactly what smile you were talking about, but, to see your players at the end of the game, if that doesn’t make you smile, I cant help you.”
Virginia Tech fired its coach, Justin Fuente, last week, so Saturday saw an interim coach facing (likely) a lame-duck coach.
Diaz, to his credit, powers through the end with a business-as-usual mindset, at least outwardly, even though little about this season has been usual.
“I’ve never felt going into a game that it wasn’t a game that that we didn’t have to win,” he’d said entering this one.
(That’s a grammatical flag for a double-negative, but it’s under review).
Saturday’s comfortable(ish) win had to be a surprise to Canes fans, and good for their nerves. All six of Miami’s previous ACC games had been decided by four points or fewer, most in the final seconds, with a combined score of 200-200. This was the first time in conference play this year that Miami’s defense had not allowed at least 30 points.
Of course, because these are the Canes and nothing is easy, 21-3 and 28-10 leads evaporated and UM led by only 31-26 entering the fourth quarter, after a 72-yard scoring pass to Will Mallory off a double-flea flicker was negated by a Zion Nelson holding penalty.
But a 55-yard Tyler Van Dyke TD throw to Mike Harley put it away amid the downpour.
Weird game for this, too: Miami had a negligible ground game much of the night. All of the offensive damage was done on the arm of Van Dyke, who passed for 357 yards and three TDs as Charleston Rambo became Miami’s first 1,000-yard receiver since 2014.
Van Dyke called the win special.
“For sure, coming off the loss to FSU,” he said. “Now getting an extra game [with the bowl], and possibly getting to eight wins is special.”
The crowd for the home finale was announced most generously as 40,839.
The Hurricanes will be favored to win at Duke next week in its regular season finale and finish 7-5. The bowl to follow figures to be second- or third-tier. Think Gasparilla, Sun, Holiday or, our personal favorite, the Duke’s Mayo Bowl. The Canes are 1-10 in bowl games since 2008, another gauge of the program’s decline since winning the last of five national championships in 2001.
Likely portending Diaz’s ouster, Blake James this past week became the first AD in university annals to be fired, although history may not record that officially because UM called it “a mutual parting.” That was a public courtesy to the good soldier James, for sure. The U was moving on.
Diaz’s one hope is that a bowl win for an 8-5 finish may be enough to buy him another season, but it may already be too late. If history is any guide, it’s more likely Diaz will be let go after the Duke game and an interim replacement will work the bowl. Then the new AD and a search committee will hire the new head coach by around mid-December.
If all of this proves true, then Diaz is down to his final hurrahs -- and Saturday night was his last before the home fans, many of whom have called for his departure and will cheer it. Or cheer the very idea of change, perhaps.
As the game ended UM’s seniors got a victory ride on the shoulders of teammates.
“Great to see those guys get carried off with a W,” said tight end Wll Mallory.
Canes players and coaches, Diaz among them, then stood still at the corner of the field in a fast-emptying stadium as the rain fell hard while the band played the school’s alma mater.
It sounded a little like a funeral dirge.
Miami
McClatchy
This story was originally published November 20, 2021 at 10:57 PM.
