Everything Miami Head Coach Mario Cristobal Had To Say After Resilient Win Against Cal
Miami Hurricanes head coach Mario Cristobal has seen it all and this game against the California Golden Bears was no different. He talked to the media after a long night to talk about his Cardiac Canes as they got the comeback victory against the Golden Bears.
Opening Statement...
Here so I appreciate you guys being here and hanging with us throughout the game the best way to sum it up is it's the best example of resiliency and toughness and just no quit mentality that I've ever been fortunate enough to be a part of um I mean the game was 35-10 at one point and all that you saw was guys saying we're going to do this you know because we can do it and they did and uh just kept clawing and scratching the defense started you know holding up getting us the ball back and well you guys saw the rest so I'll just go right the questions.
On when things started to change during the 25-point comeback...
I'll hold by this and I'm sure it'll show up on film we did a lot of routine things wrong today and we dropped a lot of routine passes you know we dropped. You know we had some routine reads that we weren't going follow through. We started running the ball well and started establishing that and then we had some plan issues on defense where I think in the first half they had half the amount of plays that we had half the amount of yardage but were beating us by you know a couple of scores so we did a lot of routine things that required discipline technique and fundamentals. We did those wrong and it led to you know us being in a hole you know so we had to do a lot of things right and still did some things wrong to fight out of it.
On star quarterback Cam Ward...
Have you ever seen a quarterback like Cam Ward that can just stay in a game no matter what the score is no I mean that's why everybody says oh you know when if he throws a pick or what not to pull in the range it's like you can't I mean you can't let a guy make that many plays and have that much self-confidence at the moment it doesn't go your way start getting nerved up and start pulling the plug on the whole thing you uh he the one thing you got to understand too as the game goes on I mean the other side's getting worn out too now you know you see the pass for starts to slow down the coverage starts to slip up a little bit we're getting off press better we're beating man coverage better um early on we had a tough time seeing the field.
On Cal and their game plan against the Hurricanes....
Credit to them they had two weeks to prepare for us they we got every wrinkle every beater you could imagine and you know it's awesome it's awesome to travel 3,000 miles have the air-condition busted in there and have the opponent team the opposing team have two-weeks to prepare for you aside from that everything is perfectly fine the defense you know had their turnaround too they really did that that was to me that was a part and even we even overcame a face mask after a sack and got him on the ground again in a big hit man wow what a big hit um credit to Cal I need to say that really I should have said at the beginning to coach Wilcox and his team uh to the environment you know provided by you know game day and the people here and then to um to Mendoza who you know obviously there's a lot of ties there you know go back ways just a a gutty talented young man that played his his heart out and um but all about the the decision to go for two in the third quarter proved to be huge
Breakdown the time management and highlighting the defense to close the game..
We're not chasing points so it was we made the right calls felt like um all the stuff regarding that and regarding when we're going to use our timeouts and what we're going to call when it's down when you're down there It's tricky because you still got to have a touchdown but they're 30 seconds on the clock so you can be picky if you want to but then if it's fourth down and your throat's all lodged up because you haven't scored yet it's different so I think coach Guidry and his coaches made some great adjustments to get us so three a row where they got us the ball right back it was 35-10 and it went to 35-18 then 38-18, then 38-25, 38-32, 39-38. Him and Coach Dawson they just kept chipping away man they just kept working the clock and then again the players man the leadership on the team whenever there was a timeout, TV timeout, injury timeout whatever it was you saw offensive players coming out to encourage the defensive guys and vice versa you saw a lot of that. You just saw a team that they just their belief in each other is absolutely insane because I don't think anyone I'd be shocked to see how many people turned off their TV and moved on you know so good for them.
On the long day on the West Coast...
Well yeah, that's what we do brother you know we get up early like this you know. The travel was great there was no I don't think anyone should or could point at that. We handled it the right way. I think all the teams for the most part that traveled out west did a good job. Systems are in place process is in place so but the players, they want to play ball and we started out fast but man we sure made we'll talk about it when we get back home we made a lot of mistakes tonight.
On the resilience of this year's team compared to teams from the past..
The difference is in their attitude I think I need to do a better job articulating certain things because it comes across almost like you know down. I don't want to do that you know. I know why it was so important to come back to Miami. Moments like this make it you know they validate all that stuff is to to get that thing turned to be part of getting a thing turned where it just you just you fight you fight to get it done you find a way to get it done but yeah I don't think I don't know how many teams in the country would have come back against that defense okay that that defense leads the country in interceptions and is a top 10 defense from a production standpoint so know this team has got the we could be so good man and we got to get there because we have to.
On the bye week and getting players back.....
We're beat up. Yeah we are beat up and I mean we had Ruben back tonight you saw some of the impactful plays he had but you look at game one you know when we were hitting on all cylinders early. We lost four guys that game we lost Damari we lost Ryan Rodriguez, Jalen Rivers Rueben Bain and those are two of those four guys who went out for the coin toss. Those are important guys you know and it's been six weeks and now Rueben looked great tonight so he'll be at full strength. Elijah Alston we expect him to be back when we get back as well. Jalen Rivers, we expect them to be back. The others are going to take a little bit longer and then two things have to be done; number one we've got to get our guys healed up and rested and recovered while at the same time you know polishing technique and fundamentals and diving deep into us self scouting and the second part is we got to get more guy some more the reserves to play winning football for us. We've got to continue the process and the push for development so that guys can get when they have meaningful snaps that they're not just kind of eating up space you know. That they're actually out there performing their job at a high level of making plays.
On the no-call for targeting...
I just gave it to God and said thank God you know.
On Cam Ward's mentality...
Cam's a dog man he's a dude it's one of those I mean in his eyes he was 1,000% convinced that he was going to get it done and people say oh I just said that because the game was No that dude all week long knew that this game was going to be a challenge because what they do coverage wise and he had a look in his eye that was just like okay this guy's going to he's going to rip it and when he threw that pick at they ran back it just like it got dialed up it turned up even more so no. I've said it a million times I have complete and utter faith in that guy and everything he represents and stands for.
On the Jaydn Ott 66-yard touchdown on fourth and one...
We wanted to use a timeout to try to get the ball in their territory that we could stop it. They run a sneak or they run you know the slice play which they ran and uh we lost the eyes for it and then on our side was about one it was a long one it was about one and a half and I just felt like man you know been run the ball well um been leaning on these guys. Ott is a dangerous guy to cover so is right and when we slipped them out there they were in cover zero that guy took a great angle he took a great angle and before we could get turned around and up the field. He cut our legs.
On the multiple unsportsmanlike conduct calls against the Hurricanes...
I mean some of it is complete and utter BS. We haven't solved some of that with certain guys so it'll have to take another step but then some of it it's like come on playing ball. Like these are you know we play a sport where we're asked to smash ourselves into each other for three-four hours a day and then like be absolutely perfect outside of that time like who are we hitting right it's football.
