Miami coach Mario Cristobal’s Hurricanes suffered a 26-20 upset loss to the SMU Mustangs in Week 10 action to drop them to a 6-2 record this season. The loss led to the Hurricanes tumbling to No. 18 in the AP Top 25 Poll and leaves their college football playoff hopes hanging by a thread.
The loss to the Mustangs mirrored the one against the Louisville Cardinals two weeks ago and led to some Miami fans questioning Cristobal’s suitability for the job.
Analyst Calls Out Mario Cristobal’s Miami Tenure
During Sunday’s segment of the “CBS Sports” show, analyst Brad Crawford painted a grim picture of the Cristobal tenure in Coral Gables and the Hurricanes’ chances of making the college football playoffs this year.
“I don’t know how Miami keeps losing these games against teams that they’re more talented than,” Crawford said.
“And it’s happened under Cristobal half a dozen times over the last couple of seasons. Miami was supposed to win both of those games (Louisville & SMU), but they got beat at the point of attack, at the line of scrimmage, and had critical turnovers. The writing is on the wall that this team is not what we thought it was four or five weeks ago, when they were the number two team in the country.
“Carson Beck has had a litany of mistakes. Miami has had some disciplinary foul issues that have cost them in big possession moments. Miami is a team right now, the ACC is a one-bid playoff league and there are two or three teams that are in better positions to make that bracket than the Hurricanes.”
Cristobal Takes Blame for Miami Loss
The Hurricanes were ranked as high as No. 2 in the AP Top 25 Poll a month ago, but have since tumbled down the rankings, exacerbated by the loss to the SMU Mustangs. During his postgame news conference, Cristobal took the blame for the latest Hurricanes loss.
“We didn’t take care of business, and that’s completely on us,” Mario Cristobal said. “If you’re raised the right way, and you got the right stuff inside you, you go right back to work. You don’t know how things shake out. This is certainly a wild college football season, and the focus has to be on us taking care of our business.
“You always give credit to the opponent because that’s a good football team. When you make that many mistakes, it’s on everybody in the organization. You allow yourself to be put in a position where you can get beat, and that’s what happened today.”
According to the Allstate Playoff Predictor, the Hurricanes have just a 9% chance of clinching a college football playoff berth.