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from around the Sunshine State. This is Florida Football Insiders, a part of
the College Gridiron Coast to Coast podcast ever and here's your host, Jason Tylers.
Alright, welcome in week to Florida Football Insiders podcast, part of the
Coach College Football College Gridiron. Excuse me, Coast to Coast podcast network feed.
I'm your host, Jason down in Tampa. A pretty wild week one
of the college football season. We had some upsets, we had some near
misses, some disappointing play and such throughout the state of Flooria. Remember this
podcast is gonna focus on all things State of Florida college football. We'll probably
sprinkling a little NFL. Here's the NFL season's about to kick off, but
we're most of our focus will be on the college football seen here in the
state of Florida. And it was a very up and down week for teams
in the state of Florida. We had one let's see one, two,
three, four, five teams win in two teams lose the USF Bowls,
and the Florida Gators fall as the Florida State Seminoles, UCF, FIU Miami,
and FAU all win week one for them on the schedule. Let's start
off with the show showcase game of the weekend in the state of Florida.
The Florida States Seminoles Sunday Night in Orlando get off to a so so start
in the first half. LSU kind of had the better of play. Give
the Florida State defense credit. They stepped up with two fourth down stops in
the first half. LSU takes the lead seventeen fourteen at the half on a
late field goal last play the first half, and then the Seminoles destroy LSU
in the second half forty five twenty four final. They outscore LSU thirty one
nothing until a late garbage touchdown by LSU, But a tremendous performance by the
Seminoles on offense scored five straight times with the ball in the second half,
led by Jordan Travis with four touchdown passes, three of those going to Michigan
State transfer Keyon Coleman, who was a impact player. If you're the Seminoles,
you want to cut down on the penalties. Had several personal foul of
fouls in the first half, a couple of bone headed plays there on,
a couple of late hits, but all in all, the defense showed up
to me the difference in the game. Florida State's ability in the trenches to
withstand LSU and hold up to LSU and as well as on the offensive line,
they were able to protect Jordan Travis, did not hear Harold Perkins's name
one time, and they were able to run the ball with a lot of
effectiveness in the second half. So kudos to the Seminoles and Mike Norvell.
As you head to week two, you have the showdown with at Clemson in
three weeks. If you saw Clemson getting beat pretty pretty handily now I want
to say handily, but they did not play very well at Duke. Duke
beats them twenty eight to seven, move the ball a lot, but several
turnovers and miss field goals and all that stuff. So if you're Florida State,
you got to be feeling good knowing three weeks from now you're gonna be
in Death Valley against Clemson. In your ACC hopes and National Championship playoff hopes
are very much in the offings win or lose. But if you, especially
if you win that game at Clemson, you're gonna have it your first of
all, you're gonna knock Clemson out of the race Clemson and we'll be out
with two losses and your path to the CFP playoff will have just gotten a
lot, lot clear. But so kudos to Mike Norvelle and the Seminoles for
a big forty five twenty four win. Let's go to the second game,
which was the first game of the weekend on Thursday night in Salt Lake City,
Utah beats Florida twenty four to eleven. It's just a very blase performance
by the Gators. Not a whole lot of pizzazz. Merch did Graham.
Merch did end up throwing for over three hundred yards, but those were a
lot of those yards were empty calories late in the game with kind of the
game was out of hand. Just not very impressed. Not a very good
performance by Billy Napier and the Gators. You know, they're just they're just
gonna be a very very mediocre team. In my view based on what I
saw on Thursday nights, not a lot of running game, only forty five
yards rushing. I believe in the forty three yards total rushing in the game.
And Utah has got a really good defense. I get it, but
I just don't see the explode veness on offense. I don't see a lot
of you know, impact players yet on offense for the Gators. Merch did
okay, but the offensive line wasn't great. He got hit a lot.
Uh and the Gators are oh and one with a tough schedule ahead, So
I would have some concerns if I'm Billy Napier and the Gators. They go
down twenty four to eleven. U SEF wins big uh John John R's plumbly
two hundred and eighty yards, three touchdowns, two picks. We're not gonna
talk much about that game. That game was blowout city against Kent State.
Uh f A f I you excuse me. They win fourteen to twelve to
go to one to one over main a loose performance there against a one double
A team FCS team, but they do get the w you are gonna hear
from uh A. J Ricketts play by play voice of the Panthers. You're
also gonna hear from Josephaki, play by play voice of the Miami Hurricanes.
And you're gonna hear from Matt mersh show from The Orlando Sentinel. We're gonna
preview the UCF nights after I finish up here with the recap from last week.
So three great guests, three more team previews from the State of Florida.
The only team we're missing is FAU, so we are. We've got
a request out to FAU to try to get potentially Tom Herman hopefully to give
us a little preview of the team, but we'll see. So you're gonna
get three previews this week. And remember, if you missed the previews last
week, go check out Florida Florida State and and who's my other team and
USF. We did Florida Florida State USF last week. We talked to Jeff
Kolhan, voice of the Seminoles, Sean Kelly voice of the Gators, and
Joey Johnston, sideline reporter for the Bulls Radio Network. So if you missed
any of those previews, we gave you some great insight that led into these
week one games. Go check it out last week on the Florida Football Insiders
podcast, Week one, So all right again, FIU win fourteen twelve goes
to one and one. They have North Texas this week, which we're gonna
get to. Let's see one more note about UCF Xavier Townsend five catches for
eighty one yards and a touchdown. The reason I mentioned him he is a
product of Tampa where I'm at Berkeley Prep. I actually know people that coached
him. So he is a wide receiver, really good athlete. It's gonna
be a good player for UCF. So shout out to Xavier Townsend five for
eighty one and a touchdown for UCF in week one. So let's see Miami.
Nice performance by to Miami thirty eight three over Miami of Ohio and very
again. They've got a showdown this week with Texas A and m We're gonna
talk to Joe Zagaki about that. You'll hear that, so you will know
much more where Miami's at the end of this week with Texas A and m
coming to Coral Gables in Miami. So that's that'll be a very very high
profile game. This is a good week for games. You got Texas Alabama,
you got my me, A and M. You got some good,
good games on the schedule. FAU gets off to one and oz start under
Tom Herman. They win forty two twenty over Monmouth. The FAU Casey Thompson,
the quarterback, who is the I believe the quarterback from Texas and then
he went to Nebraska last year. This guy's transferred more times than UH than
UH. It's about the third or fourth school through for five touchdowns, probably
a grad Yeah, through for five touchdowns for FAU. Good for him,
and a nice start for Tom Herman and FAU. And last but not least,
USF they go down. They played pretty pretty well at Western Kentucky,
end up losing forty one twenty four, but the game was much closer than
that. Some costly turnovers by Byron Brown the quarterback, but the USF can't
really. Good start for Alex Golish. Again, not a lot of people
thought they would be super competitive, and they very much were in that game
to late into the fourth quarters. So good start for you USF, even
though they come up short. They win, they lose forty one twenty four.
They have Florida A and M and then two weeks. They have Alabama
coming to Raymond James Stadium here in Tampa that I will be at the game.
So USF again, good start for Alex Scoli. Is still plenty to
clean up, but again a good start. They had the lead there for
much of that first half and it was a back and forth game till about
middle of the fourth quarter. So good start there for Alex Scholis. So
there's your recap again again, huge win Florida State, kind of a lackluster
loss out of Florida. Miami looked good, USF look pretty decent, and
then we have fiu FAU will know more about them when their competition level ramps
up a little bit. In the same with UCF. UCF has a big
game this week as well. They go to Boise Boys. He played Washington
last week and Michael Pennocks from Washington who's a Tampa guy, Tampa high school
product. He lit Boise up pretty good. But again he's gonna light up
a lot of people, so that'll be a very competitive game. UCF at
UCF at Boise State on Saturday. Long trip for those guys, so that'll
be an interesting That'll be an interesting non conference matchup. There, So there's
your recap again. We're gonna talk to Josiahacky first from Miami that We're gonna
talk to Matt Mischelle covering UCF for the Orlando Sentinel, and then we're gonna
wrap it up with a j Ricketts play by play man for the FIU Panthers.
So I think you'll enjoy the chats, get some good insight about these
rosters, about the storylines for each team and such. So enjoy the podcast.
If you haven't already done so, hit that subscribe button on your podcast
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Gridiron Coast to Coast podcast network feed Florida Football Insiders. If you'd like to
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package with Danielson and Nessler, and he also works with Buck and Aikman on
the Money Night Bought broadcast for ESPN. So this guy is dialed in.
He's at the biggest games every week. So you'll enjoy our chat with David
Moulton on the Powers on Sports Podcasts, which will come out probably Wednesday night
this week. And you can also check me out on the press Box Radio
Show. I do co host the radio show on Wednesdays from eight to ten
am. Go to press Box Radio dot com. We're we're on stations in
five different states. You can listen again on the website feed. You can
listen on demand as well. So the press Box rad we talk based out.
We talk lots of college football, a lot of sec talk, things
like that. So the press Box Radio Show Wednesday mornings eight to ten and
the press Box Radio shows every week every day from eight to ten, but
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with Mike and he does a great job putting the show together. So press
Box Radio dot com, Florida Football Insiders, powers on sports podcasts, lots
of places to find me. And if you're a Tampa Bay Buccaneers fan NFL
fan, check out the No Quarter Given Podcast. I do a podcast that's
all Tampa Bay Buccaneers centric. So we did a great season preview this week
that that came out this week that previews the game against at Minnesota. We
talked about the roster, we talk about the salary cap, we talk about
Mike Evans contract situation, a lot of stuff. We're talk about stuff.
You're a Tampa bab Buccaneers fan, No Quarter Given Podcast, It's the place
to go, so appreciate the support, appreciate the time. We'll be right
back in just a minute or two with Josighaki play by play guy the Miami
Hurricanes, and now a word from Titan Home Lending. Are you in the
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Two zero five seven nine zero one four zero four. All right, welcome
back to our simulcast Powers on Sports podcast in Florida Football Insiders Podcast. Next
up, where are going to preview the Miami Hurricanes year two of Mario Cristo
Ball And We're going to talk to no better person than can give us a
full breakdown of the Hurricanes, all things Miami sports. Longtime legend in the
Miami sports media world, mister Joe Osaghacki been the long time play by play
voice of the Canes football and basketball, and again a fixture in South Florida
sports. If you're down in that area, you know Joe very well.
So welcome to the podcast. Joe, Thank you, appreciate you having me
ready to talk about the Hurricanes. That's right, before we get to the
Hurricanes, I gotta ask you to Miami sports scene questions. Give us a
sense of the hype about Messi being in Miami and the whole just the whirlwind
of what that's been the last month or so. Well, obviously he's been
magical. Messi has been magical. Everybody's talking about it. Has created more
interests in soccer in this area than probably ever before. What I do find
funny about it is everybody talks about Miami, Miami, Miami, and they
play the games in Fort Lauderdale. So I feel like I live in Browery
County, not too far from Fort Lauderdale, that Fort Lauderdale is getting the
short end of the stick. But he certainly has turned this community upside down.
One more question, before we get to the Canes football side. You
had the pleasure of being a part of the final four run for the basketball
team this year, first ever Final four run for larenag and the Hurricanes.
Just just give us a sense of the excitement and just the thrill of the
Canes making a Final four. Yeah, for me personally, it was one
of the greatest months of my broadcast career. Probably the most intense three or
four weeks that I've ever had high level games right to the Final four,
and just being at the Final four personally was you know, it's the whole
event that I've never been through or done or broadcast, So I felt like
I was able to check that off my list. But to follow the team
and be able to narrate and deliver the soundtrack of that season was really really
special. It was thrilling. It meant a lot to the program. I
think in the long run, is you know, going to change the program?
I think a little bit, because now you know, players are gonna
look at the University of Miami and say, yeah, hey, they play
basketball too. It's not just a football school. They legitimately, legitimately have
a really good basketball program. But it was just so exciting, so passionate,
and just a great throw ride. Really something that I will will never
forget. Yeah, it was a great run for sure, and obviously you
had the other added storyline that he had Fau right up the road from you
guys that were in it too, and just for that South Florida market.
Just a great funny thing. Is sorry to interrupt, but FAU game was
right before our game, and the way the broadcast positions are set up at
the final four, you're kind of below the floor and you're not center court
because that goes to CBS and network radio. So you're right about the free
throw line, maybe a little bit below the free throw line, and just
below the floor. Your eyes were like even with the floor and the last
shot of the game for San Diego State, I probably could have helped Fau.
I could have tackled the San Diego State shooter. He was right in
front of me, and I thought, Man, if there is ever a
time to have a call that would you know, as luck would have had
it, that would have been a great, great spot because in the broadcast
world now you're kind of getting pushed farther and farther away from the action.
It just so happened for that game. That game winning shot was probably three
feet right in front of me. Of course it wasn't my game. I
wasn't calling it, but it was race smack in front of me. I
thought so bad for FAU because this such a great story as well. Nah,
you're right it was. It was a dream, dream season for both
South Florida schools for sure. So all right, let's get to the football
side of things with the hurricane. Obviously, Mario crystal Ball year two year
one, five and seven overall record three and five in the ACC not kind
of what they wanted to start off the era with. But again, Mario
comes in. He's been known as a great recruiter, and you're seeing the
fruits of that labor here last year and obviously well into this year. Give
us a sense of just Mario's re acclimation in South Florida. How how's that
gone from just reintegrating himself into the community. Obviously we know he played there
back in the glory days. Talk about that relationship with Mario in the community.
Well, I think he's got a very good relationship with the community.
He's from here, he understands this community. He came back to get this
make this program prominent. I think the where the wires all got crossed was
after Miami made that transition from many Diaz to Mario many Das his team when
he lost his job. They had lost that season, I don't know,
three or four game games by a couple of points. Lost in Virginia on
a field goal that hit off the upright, lost to North Carolina going in
for the game winning score. Again ball's intercepted at the line of scrimmage.
Lose the Florida State up there on a fourth and fourteen play. If you
get off the field, you know you win that game. So that's three
games right there, right, And I think people thought, well, here
comes to Mario with his great coaching staff. We ought to be able to
improve on those three games we lost with Manny. That's that's coaching, right.
And then it didn't go that way, and Van Dyke got hurt,
the offensive line got hurt, and I'm not sure that either scheme was the
right scheme for the defense or the offense. So there wasn't a connection there.
And then I think Mario he looks at the big picture. You know,
you lose a couple of games along the way here. He looks at
the big picture and says, oh, wait a minute. You know,
I understand we should be beating the likes of Virginia and Duke a hell Middle
Tennessee. But you didn't bring me here just to win those games. You
brought me here to compete with Alabama and Georgia whether they lose those games,
the Duke and everything, and fans are like, well, hell, we
can't beat Duke, and you're talking about Georgia. So he finally comes out
and says, listen, I'm gonna say when no one else has had the
balls to say, which is we need to rebuild this program. Nobody has
said that. It's always been for the last twenty years. Oh, Miami's
back, Miami's gonna be back. We're gonna get close to being back.
Well, when you have the things that have happened to this program, the
amount of attrition, the amount of coaching change, the amount of getting beat
on recruiting, throw in a scandal. You've dug yourself a gigantic ditch.
You can't get out of that by saying, oh, we're one player away,
we're one scheme away, we're one coach away. So finally, when
this thing just hit rock bottom last year, he said, look I'm here,
I'm tough. I can take it. Fly your airplanes, do whatever
you want. I can take it. So I think people now are warming
up to the fact, like, okay, we see what his vision is
now, So marn't some are just gonna, you know, go to that
default position of well, we're Miami and we should win. But that doesn't
work anymore. We're Florida, We're gonna win. Doesn't work. We're Texas,
We're gonna win. Doesn't work. We're usc We're gonna win. Not
working. Alabama, Georgia. Look at what the NFL says, you know,
Georgia the last shot or three years, like thirty players in the NFL
recruiting, managing your roster. That's what wins. That's what he's doing.
And now he's he's building it the way he knows how, which is size
and speed, size in the trenches on the perimeter. It's not a complete
project right now. It's a work in progress. But I can I can
finally see this vision, this blueprint you mentioned, you mentioned kind of the
chemistry wasn't there last year. He changes both coordinators brings in Shannon Dawson from
Houston, Lance Geddri from Marshall to as far as offensive defensive coordinators. Is
that a key part of this element is the coaching in the and the cohesion
of a of a system to fit kind of what you want to do offensively.
I know, Mario's our offensive line guy, or you know, he
wants to play a physical brand of football. You think these these two new
hires are gonna fit that mold better? Yeah, I think they're more in
line with what Miami had when they you know, uh, we're successful in
the eighties and nineties. Just go to Jimmy Johnson, right, he follows
Howard Stillenberg. He comes here from Oklahoma State. At that time, nobody
really knew who Jimmy Johnson was. He was an up and I mean coach
from from the big Big eight, I guess at the time, right,
Big twelve now Big sixteen, at the time, the Big eight, And
I guess My point is this, guys like Dawson and Giddry are still on
the way up and in their position as as coaches at Marshall and at Houston,
they were fighting every single day for their job. It's like, you
know, these high school coaches in Texas who you know, battle every day
because it means so much. You lose the game, you're out right.
So Dawson and Gidrey are creative, They're they're finding ways to be successful.
I thought it was interesting that Gidrey looked at looked at the defense and said,
well, I want to see what they do, well, what's good
for them, what they like doing. And you know, we're kind of
back to what many Diaz was doing defensively a little bit, and that is
attacking the quarterback, being aggressive, giving the offense. It's a lot to
think about trying to mess with the offensive line the opponent's blocking policy. Getry
though, is more in line with we got to stop the run. I
think, Manny, you know, fair unfair stopping the run with something you
did on the way to the quarterback. So maybe both guys high risk defense.
When you play a high risk defense, you're gonna pay the price for
that, right. You're gonna make some big plays, but be prepared to
give something up. You can't defend everything. You gotta make a choice.
People think you can defend everything, you can't. So then offensively, you
know, Miami was abysmal last year, ninety fifth and rushing ninety sixth and
scoring eighty six in the red zone. Twenty three points a game for the
University of Miami. Shannon Dawson his offense last year at Houston forty or more
points four times, thirty or more points ten times, and Miami out to
score thirty or more points every time out right, with the kind of the
kind of athletes available to Miami, they should and the way football is played
today, twenty three points of the University of Miami. I think I could
could come up with twenty three points a game. Miami should the average thirty
points a game the way college football has played today. Now, defending is
a whole different story. You know. I feel bad for defensive coordinators.
And I think Shannon Dawson has got that right attitude mentality. I hate using
that word swagger, but he's got this confidence and I think he's just in
line with the way the game is played today. And I'm not so sure
that you know, I hate to say this, but you know, maybe
last year some of those guys looked at their talent went well, you know,
hey, I didn't I don't have anybody here that could start for you
know, Michigan or Alabama. All Right, I get that, right,
That's why you're here. You got to figure out what to do with this
this group. And I think that's where Dawson and Gidrey are. They understand
that Miami probably is not elite yet and if you're not elites, then what
do you gotta do? You got to figure out how to make it hard
on the other team. That's always been the beauty of Jim Laronega. You
know, we get really good talent in Miami and basketball, probably not what
Duke and Carolina get, but he figures out a style that makes it hard
on the other guys. And Gidrey and Dawson I think also like Coachell look
at it and say, Okay, I know what the weakness is going to
be. What the crypt that I is for those for the opposition, and
we're going to attack it. And so I think that's why that will be
better this year. And you're putting to your point. On offense, Miami
only had one game when they scored over twenty four against the Power of five
team, and five times they were left they were held to seventeen or less.
Last year. That's just not a way of formula. You can't win
that way until he's college football. I mean, I don't care who's staying
new Rockley can be on the side. You're not gonna win in today's football
with that kind of production. Looking at the guys that are back on offense,
obviously, Tyler Van Dyke is a key. We all thought he was
gonna have a good year last year, didn't play as well. This guy's
an NFL prospect, a lot of talent. Give me, give me what
he needs to do better in this new system to be able to make Miami
a viable contender in the ACC. Stay healthy. Can't play with a bad
shoulder, so stay uprights and trust his protection and trust the offense. And
I think it's incumbent on Dawson to understand about Van Dyke, and I think
he does. I hope he does, at least this is my opinion.
Maybe I'm the one that's wrong. I'm you know, I'm just a broadcaster,
so I throw out opinions like everybody else. I think Van Dyke is
best when you get him into a groove. It's like a pitcher who can't
get into the strike zone. Well, if he's not throwing strikes. It
doesn't have command. You got to figure out how to get him to throw.
And Van Dyke's case, he's a little bit streaky. So sometimes I
think the evidence would show with Rett Lashley two years ago, we go fast,
we get the ball in his hands and we throw it to somebody who's
open. We go fast, we hit open receivers. Not everything has to
be a deep over route for Van Dyke. We get him going, we
get him some confidence, we get him going. And so I think Miami's
trying to manage this fine line between going fast like they did a couple of
years ago, and then also grinding up the opponent of his Mario wants to
be physical and run the football. So Dawson two years ago with Houston,
they were numbers six in the country in time of possession, So I think
he understands that bounce. To answer your question, Van Dyke's got to stay
healthy. He's got the five best lineman in front of him that he's had
since he's been here. All that being said, you know when he plays
against Miami of Ohio, it would be his eighteen start. That's all eighteen.
He hadn't gone a full season but if you look at his sample size
in those eighteen you look at what he did in twenty twenty one when he
had six straight three undred yard games, he had seven games and three touchdowns
or more. And then last year there was a small glimpse when they went
back to let's speed it up for him. North Carolina Virginia Tech. North
Carolina four ninety six, Virginia Tech three forty two. Then he gets hurt.
So I think you know where he feels comfortable, what his sweet spot
is. They got to get him there. Give us a couple of names
of some dynamic offensive players. I know they've got a good running backs room,
but give me a couple of names of some guys who they expect to
be really productive at the skill positions on offense. Well, I'm going to
change that to a little bit of the guys they need. I don't know
that they are as dynamic as they you know it probably need to be more
dynamic, but you got to work with what you have. So they have
safety and numbers. They've got different combinations. You have Colby Young who's six
foot five, so you throw him the ball in the red zoe, he
can go up and snatch it. The guy they can't do without is Rostreppo,
Xavier Rostreppo. I don't know if I would call him dynamic, but
I would call him dependable, and I would say, you know, he
got hurt last year and that was a real thorn in Van Dyke's side.
He's just he's a player that Van Dyke has such confidence in and great chemistry
with. So does Rostreppo beat you deep? I don't know. Maybe he
does. Is he out jump people? Probably not, But what he does
he just outworks everybody. Throw him the ball, He's gonna die for it.
He's gonna make a great attempt and I most likely he'll catch it,
but he makes acrobatic plays. It might be a catch and fall down,
but he's gonna catch it. Maybe he sneaks the high in the defense.
If he does and you lay it out for him, he's gonna he's gonna
catch. It's gonna be great on third downs, gonna be a great decoy.
They can't do without him. The guys they need to elevate their games
that could be dynamic Jacobe George but Charge Smith. Guys that are dynamic but
are too young are Ray Ray, Joseph and Robbie Washington, at least I
think they're true. We'll see, you know, Ray Ray Joseph was great
in the spring, been great in camp. My concerned with young players like
that when you throw them in and you need to use them a lot.
As they get they get banged up because you know they're gonna be not physically
where everybody else is. But Ray Ray Joseph can be a game changer,
and so can Robbie Washington. You'll listen to jose Zagaki, the voice of
the Miami Hurricanes for football and basketball, were just giving it give me a
preview of the twenty twenty three Hurricanes and interesting staff that I research in Miami.
Last year, turnover margin was huge. Since two thousand and seventeen,
the Canes are one in seventeen in games with two plus turnovers. Last year
they were oh and six in games with two plus turnovers and five and one
when they didn't turn it over twice. How much of an emphasis is possessing
the ball in ball security. It's funny that you bring that up, because
what was odd about Miami is they were they were I think it's minus five
over the season for turnovers. They were minus five. The defense took the
ball away twenty times. Right. That's pretty good. Now, not as
good as two thousand and one people want to be two thousand one. Two
thousand and one they took it away forty eight times, but the offense gave
it away twenty five. Right. So to your point, that's to a
game they're not gonna win, So big emphasis on offense protecting the ball.
I think a lot of that again was there was no consistent consists since at
quarterback, so there were more interceptions because he played three quarterbacks. Jake Garcia
not with the program anymore. I don't know what he had for interceptions,
but he had a lot. Van Dyke had five, Jakari Brown had had
a couple. Garcia seemed like he threw a lot. Threw him in really
a bad spot, like pick six is coming off the goal line. So
it wasn't only the turnovers. It was also where they happened often. It
was I mean, it's one thing to play sudden change, but I mean
we were throwing pick sixes or the other team is getting the ball at the
ten yard line. You're not gonna win. Do that. I would say,
clean up the turnovers, but also they were number one oh six in
the nation and penalties, and maybe some of that was frustration. Some of
that's probably the lousy refereeing in the ACC. It's always been bad. You
know, they just over afficiate in this league. I think the SEC looks
at the ACC and says, are you guys playing flag football in that league?
You know, they just always over officiate games. And then, but
that being said, especially on defense, Miami said gets way too many,
you know, personal foul penalties, fifteen yard penalties that extend drives. They
lost to Texas at M last year. I think by a touchdown whatever it
was, thirteen to six, sixteen to six, whatever the score was,
and they played pretty good defense. A and M hit him. Uh Iannis
Smith had a forty yard catch, twenty thirty yard catch. James Williams gets
called for a personal foul. He picked them up, grabbed them, you
know, bear hugged him and slammed them down. In the SEC. Not
a penalty, ACC officials in that game. I guess an SEC team penalty
fifteen yards. Now, you can't do that. Fifteen yards. He's he's
got him gathered in, you know, lay him down. He slams them
down next play, No, two plays later, touchdown, right, So
you can't shoot yourself in the foot like that. One hundred and sixty in
the nation and penalties, you can't have that. My point of the ACC
though, I don't know what it was last year, but a couple of
years ago, fourteen teams in the ACC ten we're in the bottom fifty of
most penalty penalized in the country. How do you have a conference where ten
of your teams are in the are the worst penalized teams in the country.
You're right, now, that's a that's a great point. Every league officiates
their games differently and they should just blow up, you know, a league
officiated and just thinking nationwide. That's that's that's that's a valid point as well.
A couple more things I'll get you out of here. Let's look the
schedule a little bit. Obviously a huge game early with Texas A and m
coming to Miami. Then in October you got a gauntlet, you go to
North Carolina, you got Clemson early November, go to NC State in Florida
State and back to back weeks. Talk about the importance of getting off to
that good start in that Texas A and M game. You know A and
M. You know they they underachieved and there's a lot of pressure on them.
So Jimbo goes with a play Callege Savant and Bobby Petrino. Dame is
here A and M. I mean, I have their depth chart right in
front of me. I'm already up to that game, and I just can't
believe the amount of talent on their team and how they lost six games in
a row last year is beyond beyond me. Now, what they did is
they got rid of all the people they didn't want, and they kept all
the guys that they wanted, and every guy in that roster is like a
five star guy. They a chain with the Dolphins. They replaced him with
Ruben Owens, five star, number one running back in the country. And
they do that at every position. Now I'm looking at their defensive line.
They've got one, two, They've got nine nine guys that are either four
or five star guy on their defensive line, their linebackers, their safety DEMONI
Richardson, who was throwing out of our game last year, is a SEC
all SEC player. He's back. Chappelle is back, Bryce Anderson's back.
Anderson was a five star player, Gilbert's back, their entire secondary's back.
So that's a monumental challenge for Miami. To answer your question, I'll answer
it this way. I saw the stat the other day. The last five
years against ACC opponents, MINAI is eleven and nine at home, twelve and
nine on the road. First of all, eleven and nine at home against
the ACC, and that's third best in the conference. Another reason shows you
to why the ACC really struggles. Just Clemson's undefeated at home in the last
five years, Miami's eleven and nine. They lose ninth home games at home
fifteen or twenty years, So you've got to re establish a home field advantage.
It's not the stadium in Texas, A and m the not an ACC
team, but you got to win these games at home. And then to
your point, if you want to play for the championship in the ACCA,
the way that the schedule came out, everybody that's picked in front of Miami,
Florida State, Clemson, Carolina, Ncctate, they're all in Miami schedule.
If they win those games, they'll play for the ACC champion championship.
So then that gets me to Miami's got a lot of players that want to
play in the NFL, and I just sell those guys, Well, you
think you're an NFL player, go prove it. You're playing teams of NFL
players on it. Don't dodge it you Okay? Is it? You want
to go to the NFL? All right? What you want to be a
free agent? Or you want to be in the sixth round, seventh round,
or do you want to show the NFL you know you're worth the first
round, third round. We'll go do it against Clemson in North Carolina or
Florida's Sea right now, big quart I mean, Carolina's got a big quarterback,
Clemson's got a big quarterback. Florida State's got expectations this year. So
the schedules right in front of them. If they could perform. And remember
the ACC takes the top two teams now or division, So there's opportunity there
that you can lose a game and still make it to the title game.
Yeah, and look, Carolina has had Miami's number. They gotta go beat
Carolina, you know they I think it's four years in a row, five
years in a row, Carolina has beatn Miami and you know they've beaten they
crushed them, a couple of times. I think three or four of the
seed loss up there on a fourth down and fifteen play Miami, uh may
daz his first year, come all the way back. They've got him beat
beat one play, one play on defense. Can't can't get it. Next
year Carolina comes down here and runs for eight thousand yards, you know,
but up seven hundred yards on the ground, couldn't stop him. Go to
Carolina two years ago, marching in for the last for the game winning score.
Balls deflected at the line of scrimmage, interception game over last year,
Van Dyke throws for almost five hundred yards and you lose the game. Right,
You've got a right. And obviously with Florida State's resurgence under Mike Norvell,
you want to see that Miami Florida State rivalry re emerged. Are you
hearing anything about realignment? Obviously Miami Florida State had been talked about. Is
Miami inned the accor is this a team that potentially could be on the move,
And you know, six months to a year, nothing will surprise me,
Jason. I think that the Miami brand, you know, I feel
like there are a certain amount of people in and around the ACC that are
trying to hold on for dear life with the ACC. And then I think
there are a whole bunch of people outside of the league that's say, you
know, we gotta not we gotta get rid of this league so that we
can get to what we really want, which is X amount of teams in
a smaller amount. Really, I guess what they want is the NFL and
the NBA, right they want that on Fox and ESPN, And how that
plays out, I don't know. It's doesn't make a lot of sense.
Some of it doesn't make a lot of sense to me beyond football, which
really nobody's thinking about. And I understand in that, uh it's it's very
peculiar. But you know, I think Miami's going to be in play,
I think, and they have to be in play because the way it's it's
shaping up. Major schools I think could be left out. Look callin Stamford
right now are out on the outside unless they come into the ACC. And
there's no guarantee the ECC survives after that, and there are teams inside the
ACC, there's no guarantee that they get absorbed by whatever this uh this uh
game is that the networks are playing, which is you know, we want
these great matchups all the time. Problem with with with that is on paper,
you know, this Big ten thing looks great or Big twelve, whatever
whatever. They're gonna call it the Big ten, Big twenty, you know.
Okay, so Michigan is going to play all the USC, UCLA,
Oregon watch all those teams. Right, So we get to what week seven
and we got this great matchup of Michigans in Miami. No, no,
but gonna do it the other way. Michigan, Michigan and USC. Oh
they played in the Rose Bowl for so many years. Well guess what now
they're both four and four right because they're playing, you know, killing each
other inside their conference. Right. I don't know, but I think Miami's
going to be in play. They want to be in play. I wouldn't
be shocked if they end up in the Big ten. You know a lot
of rumors about Big ten. Once Miami in North Carolina, maybe the SEC
takes Florida, Satan Clemson and then we're done. I don't know. All
I tell the fans where they can find your broadcast if they don't have a
Miami radio affiliate in their town. Where can they where can they listen?
All the great broadcast you who who's your who's your analyst? My partner is
Don Bailey Junior. He was the center of the ninth from nineteen eighty seventy
nine to eighty two. Jimmy Kelly was his quarterback. Mark Rip was his
roommate. Don was the captain of those teams and really was part of the
teams that transformed the University of Miami. So he's my partner. We've got
Josh Jarrow who is my sideline reporter. And outside of well anywhere in the
world, you can listen on the Odyssey app Odyssey dot com or the Odyssey
app au d a c y Odyssey and it's free, the free Odyssey app.
You know some some colleges are stuck behind a paywall. We are not.
And of course satellite radio also a serious satellite radio. That's awesome that
Joe's been on the call? Is is this year twenty two or twenty three?
This would be my thirty fifth year on the broadcast and my twenty second
as a play by play, okay, twenty second play again. Joe is
a fixture in Miami sports. If you if you've lived in that area.
He's been on TV, he's covered, he's done everything in the Miami sports
me a true a troop legend in that in that market. Last thing,
give me, give me a quick though on the Dolphins. You expect him
up contend for the AFC East brutal Division. Is he's gonna be brutal?
Yeah, I do. I think, uh, you know, I just
like everything else. To me, it's pretty simple for them. I think
they're gonna be better on defense. They've changed their strategy and Vic Fangio's really
you know, he's a defensive savants. Offensively, to me, it's pretty
simple, keep two upright, keep a vertical. Yeah, when he's when
he's upright, I think he's very good. But every time he drops back
the throat. Now I think you kind of go like this year you're looking
through played fingers. And the other thing is which they didn't run the ball
really well. And Daniel came from the forty nine ers, and I thought,
for sure, you know, there'll be a much better running team.
And I really like the way the forty nine ers play offense because I think
that's the week you gotta win in the NFL. You gotta you know,
you've got to be able to slug it out a little bit, and their
run game has just been awful, so certainly a good run game would probably
help to it. But I think it all comes down that's true. What
they got those you know, between the Hill and Waddle just throwing the ball,
they're gonna out run everybody, right right right, Well, Josip Gacy,
appreciate the time, and have a great year with the Hurricanes. Hopefully
we'll see you guys in the a SEC title game, maybe a Florida State
Miami second coming of that game'd be awesome for the state of Florida. And
we really appreciate your time. All right, thank you, appreciate it.
Have a great year, Joe, and we'll be right back on the Powers
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your ticket needs this fall. All right, welcome back Florida Football Insiders podcast.
You just heard from the voice of the of the Miami Hurricanes, Joe
Sagaki talking about the twenty twenty three Hurricanes. And next up on our preview
list is the Central Florida Nights. UCF Gus Malzon and company making the big
jump to the Big twelve this year, coming off a nine and five season
in twenty twenty two. Again, big big move there for UCF joining the
Big twelve. Obviously with all the realignment stuff, they were kind of ahead
of the curve, which was a great thing for UCF. And we'll see
a lot of a lot of benefits moving forward for the UCF athletics program.
And no better person to talk all things UCF other than our guy, Matt
Murchelle from the Orlando Sentinel. You've heard me and talk with Matt many many
times the last year or so about Florida State. He is now covering the
UCF beat there in Orlando. So welcome to the podcast. Matt. Appreciate
you joining us, No problem, thank you, I appreciate it. All
right, Let's get right to it. Talk about the just the chatter about
joining the Big twelve and what has been the kind of the community sentiment and
campus and athletics wise, about the challenge and thrill of joining such a big
league and such a well known football conference. Yeah, there's a lot of
excitement as you can imagine. I mean they've known about this for a couple
of years now. They accepted the invitation and then they kind of had to
wait until you know, everything can kind of become official and the buyeout and
everything, and and this is it. You know, they've they've they've been
welcomed in along with you know, BYU Houston and Cincinnati. As you mentioned,
they were ahead of the curve as you look at all the realignment news.
I don't think anyone would have thought, you know, two years ago
when this first move came about for the Big twelve, that we would see
so much movement that the Back twelve would basically collapse and these other schools would
join the Big twelve. So they really kind of got it, got in
on the ground floor, so to speak, when it came to realignment,
and it's it's really helped them out. They don't have to feel necessarily like
they're trying to find a home or somewhere to go to. And like I
said, excitement has been the main word. This is something that ucfans and
the UCF athletic department in the football program have been building up for. They
wanted to do this back in twenty thirteen, you know, they were they
submitted a proposal, they wanted to the Big twelve to accept them. It
didn't happen at that time, you know, so there was a lot of
disappointment, But then it came around this time around Obviously the twenty seventeen twenty
eighteen seasons really kind of had a big factor and some of this decision the
success that they've had as well, so lots of excitement and as you mentioned,
lots of financial implications for this move, but almost doubles almost good pointed
being triples what they were making from the American Athletic Conference when it comes to
media rights deal, that's huge for them, Lots of buzz, lots of
attention. All their games are going to be on big major networks with the
ESPN and Fox, So everyone's excited and you know, almost to the point
of wanting to move past that. Gus balls on in the beginning of preseason
camp. We kept asking about the Big twelve and he finally just said,
I don't when we're past that. We got to move on and get to
talking football and what we need to do. So they're not focused so much
so on that as then just playing their football games, but others outside the
program, everybody really is looking forward to this seasons. Has Gus talked about
how he thinks the recruiting is maybe already improved knowing that they're going to the
Big twelve. Obviously, you know the high profile aspect you mentioned of all
their games are gonna be on TV. Gus has used to big profile programs
obviously his time at Auburn. What's been his thought about the recruiting side of
things, How that's going to improve things. Oh, the recruiting are It's
already paid off. I mean, and he knew that when they when they
accepted the invitation, that then they could go into kids homes and say,
listen, we're gonna be in the Big twelve and a couple of years.
We're gonna be in the Big twelve in a year, you know. And
that's really paid off. They've been able to add a lot of talent to
this roster. This twenty twenty four recruiting class is ranked in the top thirty
right now, which has never happened. And you see have football history.
He's got nine four star players. That's something they haven't haven't been able to
do. They've got a lot of guys around the state of Florida, which
they've done a great job of Orlando. They've hooked a lot of local kids.
He's been doing that over the last couple of years. But I asked
us about recruiting and he said, yeah, believe me, the Big twelve
is a big part of what we're trying to do. Kids are excited about
this. They want to be able to play on a national stage they want
to be able to play for you know, college football playoff championship. You
know, so this Big twelve has really helped them out. And of course,
you know it's everything kind of parlays into that recruiting success. You know,
you look at the fact that when they get more money, they'll upgrade
facilities, they'll do things like that. That's going to be attractive option.
Plus, anytime you could point to the TV, like as I mentioned and
say, look, we're on you know, Thursday night on FS one,
you know, I think kids are gonna be excited. You know, they're
gonna be able to be on national television and people are gonna be able to
watch them. Let's get to the guys on the field, the current roster
and such. Let's start with the offense. Obviously, John Reese plumbly comes
back as you're as starting quarterback, led the team with eight over eight hundred
yards rushing last year, almost twenty six hundred yards passing, fourteen touchdowns eight
picks. To me, the one thing, you know with that offense,
we know when Gus was really successful at Auburn, a tremendously strong running game,
offensive line, running backs. Where does John Reese plumbly need to improve.
To me passing, He's just not been a consistent enough pass sure.
Is that the biggest part of his game that needs to improve? Yeah.
You know, Well, in the off season, you know, Gus brought
in Darren Henshaw, you know, to be the new offensive coordinator, and
he's a guy that that had some familiarity with Gus and and and Gus said,
listen, I'm gonna turn over play calling duties to Darren, you know,
because he said, I've got a lot of a lot of things i
gotta do with you know, name image and lightness and some of the he
kind of took on the kind of a jam role more, you know,
this thing. And so Darren Henshaw came in with the idea of I'm gonna
we're gonna expand this offense. We're gonna push this offense. You know,
they want to push the ball downfield. They felt like last year they just
didn't do enough of that, you know, and that getting the ball downfield
going vertical really kind of helps the running game, you know, and that's
gonna be something they're gonna have to do. So when he took over,
and he took over the quarterbacks coaching duty. He sat down with John Rice
Plumbing. One of the thing they talked about is they don't want him to
run nearly as much as he did last year. They felt like at the
end of last season, Gus told me he was beat up. He was
banged up. He took credit onus on that. Gus said, listen,
I shouldn't have run him as much as I did, you know, because
that really hurt us in the end because he was just banged up. And
so the thought now is they want John Rice Plumbing to be a better quarterback.
They wanted to sit in the pocket, to make his reads, to
find his talented receivers, to find the escape valve, to look for it
for guys instead of having to fill right away that he has to run with
the football, because they don't want to take that away from him. But
they also know that they can't have him be the leading rusher on this team.
They've got five talented running backs coming and what's leading with RJ. Harvey,
and they feel like those guys can carry the bulk of the rushing duties.
They want John Rice really to kind of set in the pocket and find
those receivers and make plays now, you know. I asked us and said,
how do you take a dual threat guy and maybe rein him in a
little bit? And he said, it's really hard because he brought up Cam
Newton. You remember when he had Cam Newton. He said, I told
Cam Newton all the time. I said, Cam, you got you gotta
run on a bound, you gotta slide. We don't want to get hurt.
And he said, Cam ignored every instruction I gave him on that,
and he said, and he was successful. So he said, I've done
the kind of with John Rice. I've told listen, you've got to be
better. But I'm not gonna put handcuffs on him. So these guys gonna
be able to do his things. So I think what you're going to see
in a year two with John Rice is just that maturity of stepping up,
making throws, finding the open receiver and not maybe getting happy feet and trying
to run out of the pocket anytime there's a little bit of pressure. One
of the biggest jumps I guess that you will see obviously jumping from from from
UCF to the big twelve bulk of the offensive line, depth of the old
line. Talk about the offensive line. Are they prepared to be able to
compete at the Big twelve level from an offensive life perspective, Yeah, that's
a That's a unit that Gus has talked a lot about in the preseason.
And you know, they really liked the depth they built on both the offensive
and defensive lines. And he pointed the offensive line and said, we need
to be deeper. We need to be better than that because we're gonna They've
got six road games this year. They go to Boise State. That's gonna
be a long trip for them. He understands they're gonna be a lot guys
are gonna get tired. They need to switch some guys out. So in
the off season they brought in four offensive linemen, guys with experience. You
know Drake Metcalf, who's gonna take over at center. He's a guy from
Stanford. Blulish Schmidt was a guy who started thirty or so games at Fresno
State. He's gonna start at left guard. You look at a guy like
Marcellos Marshall, he was at Kent State. You know they're bringing him in.
He's gonna play right tackle. At this point, Amari ili Kite comes
in he's probably gonna step in and back up in some spots. So they've
got a lot of guys that they feel like I've experienced from the transfer portal.
They've got guys they've been developing. You know, they feel like that's
going to be an opportunity for them to run. I think Gus told us
maybe they feel like they can go nine ten deep on the offensive line now,
I mean, and that's something they haven't been able to do. And
he thinks it's gonna be a huge benefit for them, especially when they get
down the road and some of these long road trips, you know, when
they go to Oklahoma, when they go to Lubbock for Texas Tech, that's
gonna be where they need this the depth. Talk about some of the skill
guys you'd mentioned r J. Harvey. They seem like they're pretty excited about
their wide receiver corps. If they've got if Plumble can get them the ball.
They like what they have out. Why talk about the skill guys a
little bit? Yeah, you know, the running back room they say is
the best they've had. They got five guys, different types of styles.
R J. Harvey is gonna be the primary back, but they got Johnny
Richardson, who's a speedster, a guy who can really break big plays.
You know. They've got Jordan McDonald who's guy's short yards. They really like
DeMarcus Bowman's the guy that they brought He's a transfer from Florida a couple of
years ago. They feel like he can really be a big time ruiser.
So they like their running backs room. You look at the receivers. They
got Javon Baker, Kobe Hudson coming back, Xavier Townsend's coming back. Townsend
was injured last year. They feel like he can take on a bigger role
this year. They brought in some transfers as well. In that position.
Trent went Moore from Florida comes in as well. They feel like they're they're
set at that position. They feel like those guys are really going to stand
out. And then you got the tight ends. You know, let's talk
about Alec Haller, who's been around for a long time. He's really going
to be the primary. They brought in a freshman and Randy Pittman, who
was really highly regarded. He's had a great camp. They feel like he
could step up and be able to make some plays as well. So I
think there's more than enough skilled position players around John Rice pluming that he's got
opportunities to make this offense a lot more versatile than it was last year.
Look look into the defense to me, the look at their stats and you
know, just watching them play a few times, getting disruption with the front
set would seem to be the biggest issue. Pass rush, that kind of
stuff. Again, back to the trenches, being able to hold up in
the trenches. Obviously, the Big twelve is not a huge running league.
You say, you don't have to be as dominant, but it's important to
be able to put pressure on the quarterback with as much passing. That goes
on to the Big twelve. Talk about the defensive side of the ball,
a front seven, especially where they need to get better. Yeah, and
that's a group where they're really excited about. You know, you look at
you know, Josh Salazar comes back, Ricky Barber, Tremon Morris Brash,
those guys have come back. They've got lots of experience in the defensive line.
Lee Hunter steps in at that defensive tackle position. They really like Lee.
He wasn't really in shape last year. They feel like his motors great.
I've had so many guys telling me this ball camp that he's a guy
to watch. They feel like you can really put a lot of pressure.
They want to be disruptive. As you mentioned up front, they've got to
get to the quarterback. They've got to stop the running game because they've got
some guys in the secondary they feel like can make plays. They need to
make some turnovers. That's something that they got to focus on. They've got
a deep linebacker corps. Jason Johnson had over one hundred twenty tackles last year.
He leads the linebackers. Walter Yates, the third is back as well.
And then the secondary. You know what I mean, this is a
younger secondary. You know Brandon Adams, Corey Thornton, Quadrick Bullard, you
know Nicaa Martinez. But they've also got some depth in the secondary as well.
So Addison Williams the new defensive coordinator. He was there last year as
their defensive backs coach. He's he's taken on the role of defensive coordinator now.
And you know he told us, you know, listen, we want
to be aggressive. We've got to stop the run, but we also got
to get great turnovers because they know if they could flip the field, you
know, short field. That just makes that offense more opportunities to score points.
Listen to Matt Marschelle Orlando Sentinel or preview in the UCF nights. As
they head into year one of the Big Twelve, they're big transition. Let's
get to the schedule. You kind of mentioned it a little bit before.
A lot of road games. You know, this week they're at Boise State
with it, which is a big non conference game, long trip to Boise,
Idaho. You go to Kansas State, you go to Oklahoma, you
go to Cincinnati. Just talk about the gruel and the and the demand and
just a grueling road trip that UCF drew in year one. Yeah, you
know, I think Gus has talked about this a lot, about this road
schedule. You know, listen, they've got six road games. I think
that's the most. They travel the most miles than anyone in the Big Twelve
this year. I think of seventeen thousand miles when you look at round trip,
it's a lot of road trips, you know. And what Gus talked
about a lot was not so much the you know, yes you have to
prepare for that, but he talked about it's on the back end of the
trips that you start to feel it, he said. Listen the Boise State
game, for instance, he said, we probably won't get back to Orlando
until the sun comes up, you know, six seven am in the morning.
Our flight gets back here. He's like, that's gonna change how we
handle things because normally they like to practice, you know, on Sunday afternoons.
Well, they may not be able to do that because when they're traveling
so much, he said, they may have to push things back a little.
So that's gonna have to change something. So they have to change up
a little bit of a schedule. They have to understand that, yes,
we're gonna be on the road, We're gonna face hostile crowds, We're gonna
get places we haven't been before. I think that's gonna be a challenge.
I mean, I don't think anyone can prepare for, you know, being
in Manhattan, you know, for the Kansas State game, or going to
Oklahoma Norman. You know, that's a historic site, you know, and
playing there. I'm going to love it, you know, Texas check is
going to be interesting. So there are some some challenges. I think that
this team is going to face, so they're gonna have to find a way
to kind of put that aside and not focus so much on being on the
road and just focus on like it's a regular football game. But again,
it's a lot of miles on this team, and you know, that's where
the depth that they've tried to build up over the last two years, it's
really they think we'll pay off in the end. Does Gus Does Gus realistic?
And he's probably never gonna say this publicly, but do you think that
deep down Gus realistic to think this is a year if we can go five
hundred and the Big Twelve, it's a hell of a year for us.
Oh, he'll he'll never say that. I mean, I think they're focus
is winning the Big Twelve. Obviously they feel that way. I think they've
got the best chance of any of the new teams coming in. I think
they're the best, better fit and quipped, and I think they'll do better
than a lot of people give them credit for. You know, I think
they're picked to finish eighth in the media poll. I had them at seven.
I just think some of these road games are going to be a little
challenging, you know, I mean, I think and then, as you
said, you're making the adjustment, you're stepping up and playing a different level
of competition. You know, Gus is familiar with that, but you've got
a lot of these players who've been playing in the American they haven't played in
it. Let's just say, you know a Kansas state, you know who's
been there, Baylor for instance. You know you're gonna get some of these
challenges coming in Oklahoma. Even so they have to kind of adjust to that.
So I think they feel like, listen, if they can be Bowl
eligible or they can get to seven or eight wins, I think that's pretty
good I have on my mind in eight win season. I think they can
get there now if they stay healthy. I think they got a great chance,
and there's opportunities to flip some games that maybe they aren't going to be
favored in. But Gus will never say publicly, we want to go find
what. I think he feels like they want to win every games as much
as they can, and that's why I think he's trying to deflect a little
bit the attention on the Big twelve. I don't think he wants everyone to
focus on what I think he wants to focus on one game at a time,
which you know every coach puts that out there as well. Last thing
I'll get you at a coaching staff wise, I know you mentioned Darren Henshaw
coming in on the offense or any other any other major coaching changes on the
staff. No, I think Darren's the big one. I mean, Darren
was a guy and Darren he's former UCF quarterback. He's a guy that knows
the history of the school. He went to U A B. He went
went over to UAB last year. I think he was working with them.
He worked with Gus two years ago as an analyst. I think the biggest
thing for Darren is just developing the quarterbacks. You know, the quarterbacks have
talked all about how they've gotten so much better in the footwork, They've gotten
so much better and reading defenses. Those are the little things that necessarily don't
show up in the statbox so much, but I think are going to be
huge for them because they need to understand that. Listen, you know,
we can't just sit back and run the ball every time. We got to
find ways to make these plays. And they've got enough talent that they could
be able to do that. Fan base wise, you think it's gonna be
a pretty pretty busy bounce house. You think it's gonna be with the Big
Twelve. You've got Big twelve teams coming to town, a little bit better
of a home schedule as far as national names, things like that. How
excited do you think that the student body is for the for the bounce house
to be jumping? Well? I think I want to say every home Big
twelve game is a sellout at this point. Maybe you know, I mean
that they've they've talked about. I mean, there's a a ton of excitement,
and again, you know you expect that, you know, you expect
to see that kind of excitement going on. I expect to see them have
record sales, you know, when it comes to everything. What you hope
is that they can If they can start out strong, I think that just
only goes well for them when you're looking at the tickets, and I think
they'll do well on the road as well. I think, you know,
I've spoken to some fans. I mean, again, we talked about the
travel. It's gonna be different for some UCF fans. I mean, listen
to go to Kansas and Kansas State and to go to Boise State. Listen,
just beat packing, you know, getting a trip together to Boise State,
took ale that tots neither is Lummock by the way, So you know,
I think there's there's there's things challenges that UCF fans they'll probably pick and
choose a lot of their games where they want to go to because but I
still expect them to show up because I think this is exciting. This is
the first year in the Big Twelve. They want to check out these new
cities and these new stadiums and see these new teams. So I think that's
where the excitement is going to come from. Well, Matt, celebrate where
they can find out your great coverage of of UCF. And I know,
Matt, you do other things throughout the year, but UCF's kind of your
main beat this time of year. So tell the fans where they can find
out your great work. Orlando Sentinel dot com to check out all the latest.
We had a couple of our football section came out this past weekend,
lots of previews and stuff like that. Also, you can follow me on
Twitter at os Matt Michelle or threads or whatever you like to get your your
social media news from If you're watching the video, you can see his Twitter
handle in the background there on on his wall if you're watching the video here.
So Matt does a great job covering UCF and all things Orlando sports.
We'll definitely check in with Matt as we moved through the football season to get
some further updates on the nights and other things. So about one more question,
how excited city of Orlando? You got Florida You had Florida State LSU
over the weekend, a big, big match up there, and uh,
any other big news coming out of Orlando. The Orlando sports team. You
guys make it through the storm. Okay, we did make it through the
storm. Okay. Yeah, there's a lot of excitement for florist State,
the Floris State LSU game obviously surrounding that, and you know, they just
it's just sports. You know, this is a great sports city. So
you know Football's coming in. There's a lot of discussion with you know,
NFL, you know Pro Bowl coming and at the end of the year.
So lots of excitement in Orlando, I think for their sports. Well,
Matt, keep up the great work man, and we'll be in touch,
all right. Sounds good. Thank you now a word from our partners at
Print and Marketing Solutions as well as Star Alvarado, our real ator here on
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specialist. Again, Print and Marketing Specialists, Todd Tedesco eight one three four
nine eight two eight eight seven. All right, Welcome back, Florida Football
Insiders Podcast hopefully enjoyed our chat with Matt Murschell talking all things Central Florida.
Now it's time to go a little further south in the state of Florida.
We're heading down to FIU. The Panthers year two of Mike McIntyre, coming
off of a four and eight record in twenty twenty two. They were one
of the few teams that played in Week zero and played very well at LA
Tech, but came up just short. And then they've wrapped. They follow
that up with a with a victory last Saturday night at home versus Maine to
get to one and one, and no better person to talk to about all
things Panther football then the Voice of the Panthers, uh aj ricketts Aj.
Welcome to the podcast, my man. Yeah, excited to talk fi you.
Thanks, thanks for having me on and uh looking looking forward to chopping
it up about FIU. All right, tell me a little bit about your
history. How many years is this for you at FIU? Man, this
will be the seventh now that flew by, but you're you're seven now joined,
uh joined as the play by play guy in twenty seventeen, and it's
been been a fun couple of years. And hoping we can be part of
a year or back in a bowl setting by by the end of it all,
right, tip, before we get to the football team, tell me,
give me a little career path of you. Always like to know how
guys like you get to where you're at now. And uh, you know,
give give, give the audience a little career path of a j Ricketts.
Sure, man, I mean it's ironic. I went to school down
the road at you Miami, ran track and cross country there, ended up
in Wilmington, North Carolina, which was a lot of fun. Another beach
town, coastal town, ACC country and got to cover UNC Wilmington basketball,
all the innsitable a tournament, a lot of acc stuff. But man,
I always enjoyed play by play a bit more to be a part of that,
being the broadcast booth, you know, be chronicle the game as it's
happening and have our own preparation process and execution process, kind of like the
players. Not as much depending on us though here, you know. But
uh. And in twenty seventeen, the FIU job opened up and I was
fortunate to be able to join the program. And I've been a lot of
fun moments through the years right now, you know, I alternate between the
mainly FIU, but also will do some work for Apple TV with with MLS
Season Pass and ACC Network Extra for for some U Miami games. So it
keeps things busy down here. But man, college football seasons the prime time.
It's what the most eyeballs are on, the most interest, the most
investment, and uh so a lot on the line when college football comes for
every team and excited to hopefully chronicle another good season. I want to know
you mentioned, uh you mentioned MLS. Give me, give us, give
the autumn a little sense of the whole to see phenomenon down your way.
They've been playing great since he got here. I mean they, I mean
obviously they won't they win the League Cup title, and just the euphoria of
having Messy. Just give the honors a little sense of what it's like to
have Messing in the neighborhood. Mean Miami. Man, it's it's been the
center of the sports world this year, like all of a sudden between you
know what Jimmy Butler did getting the Heat to the finals and the Panthers making
the run to the Stanley Cup finals, and and then that was You're competitive,
the Marlins started getting good and then and then you know, that was
just apparently the precursor for you know, the greatest soccer player in the world
coming to our backyard. So, you know, it's been been so much
fun. I'm telling telling myself, telling my friends, we need to go
to a game here, so like we have to find a way to get
to ourselves to a game, like just let's just spend a couple hundred dollars
and just get up there. Obviously the tickets aren't eight dollars any more,
unfortunately, but uh, you know, I think it's been worth the investment
for everyone who's gone and seen a lot of the magic of MESSI. So
that's pretty cool. Reminds me when I was in college and you know,
Lebron was here. You know, he just hopefully you don't take the greatness
for granted when when it's there, you know, every every week, so
definitely any unfortunately, and you only know he's only going to be there a
couple of years at most probably, so right, we'll take advantage of the
opportunity to see the guy. And he's an all timer for sure, and
such a world world legend around the world and club football. So all right,
yeah, so let's all right, let's get to the roster. Give
the audience a little sense of coach McIntyre. Year two. Obviously we knew
he's been at some other he's been at He was head coach with Fort Colorado,
had some success there, you know, went to Old Miss as a
defensive coordinator. But now he's back back and being in the head chair there.
Give us a little sense of coach McIntyre and his kind of coaching philosophies
and coaching style. Yeah, Jayson, I mean, what what coach mac
does is is just build programs. He knows the formula. I mean,
I think there's there's very few coaches in college football who you can say I
took programs from scratch and built them into real formidable teams. I mean Colorado.
I mean it seems more feasible now with with Dion there, But for
a long time, like he had he had such a great he did such
a great job. Colorado was in the Pactual Championship game, like in twenty
sixteen, Like people forget that they were a top ten program called Colorado at
that point in time, Like are you kidding San Jose State? They were
thinking they were thinking about folding the program, like no more football at San
Jose State, and he came in there and turned them into a top twenty
five team. Like those are not easy things to do. And so he
almost won national Coach of the Year twice. I know he got it once
and I think it may have been one Coach of the Year award and then
a different Coach of the year, so it wasn't the same overarching coach the
year, but there were there were some that were given to him, even
at San Jose State. So he knows the formula, and you know he's
he's on track to doing that here again at FIU. Look, it's,
you know, on the surface to a lot of people, you know,
four job, yeah, a tough job, and four and eight last year
doesn't raise a lot of eyebrows outside of South Florida, right, But you
look at where the program was and Butch did a lot of great things,
but it reached a point where it was one it was one win in two
years, you know, the O and five COVID season and then the one
in eleven twenty twenty one campaign. So to go from one win in two
years to four very easily could have been five, maybe six, depending on
a few different bounces. I mean that that was awesome exponential progress from one
year to the next. So internally, everyone on around the program feels that
momentum knows the step fourth that was taken. Hopefully that can be a little
bit more external and nationally recognized moving forward this year. But he knows,
he knows how to do this, and it feels like this is this is
the latest chapter of that. The speaking of that, you mentioned the kind
of the roster refere reclamation project of the roster when Butch left and he started
that process last year. Give us give the audience a sense and the fans
a sense of how active were they in the transfer portal this last year.
How many guys did they bring in transfer wise related to high school kids.
Give us a little roster kind of breakdown of transfers versus non transfers. Yeah,
you know, it's it's always it's tough every year, and you know,
who knows when we'll see changes to the structure, whether it comes from
the NC DOUBLEA or whatnot. But we're seeing it. What you know,
whatever group of five program you are, it's it seems like some power fives
are gonna are gonna take away some of your better guys. And it seems
at the same time, now every year there's going to be some Power five
guys that for whatever reason, that that role hasn't worked out there. They
want to be a little bit closer to home. You know, Mac talks
about the South Florida guys whether maybe maybe they're Iowa or Nebraska, and you
know, they they have that first winter, go through a couple of winters
and you know, either maybe they're not where they're at on the depth chart,
and you know, being close to family becomes a bigger priority, and
you know, getting some of those guys to come to Miami. So uh,
you know we've been we've been the beneficiary of that in some capacity.
You know, I'm thinking of who came in from this past this past offseason.
You know, Shamari Lawrence. That's a great example, right our our
starting running back, a Pompano Beach native, spent some years in South Dakota,
some successful ones as well. Nearly ran for a hundred yards and the
season opener last year at Kansas State, wanted to wanted to take the jump
to the FBS level, felt he could play a bigger role. And so
now he's back in South Florid. He's got a lot of friends and family
coming to his games. He ran for nearly two hundred yards and the season
opener. That's a classic example of a success story. There wasn't a Power
five guy, but but you know, went way away from Miami and came
back. So you know, starting tailback is a great example. So look,
it's it's fascinating we're in this world of college football or who we don't
know what it's gonna look like in five years, whether it's regarding transfer eligibility
in the portal out of the portal conference realignment, but right now, you
know you could transfer, you could play, and so we've got to use
that to our advantage, whether it be bringing talented players from the FCS in
or Power five guys that want to get back close to home as as well.
So Mac knows that the staff understands that. H you know, we
had some tough losses in the portal, whether it's Tyree's Chambers or leading receiver
to Maryland, Sean Peterson a great edge rusher to UCF. But it's you
know, I think the best staffs realize that that's going to happen, and
so they did a good job getting in the portal port of themselves. And
you know this, I mean the hotbed that my Broward and Dade County is
for high school football. Even when Miami and Florida State and other teams Alabama
come and get their guys, there's still plenty of other guys in those in
those two counties within a fifty mile hundred mile radius that fi you can pick
that might be three star kids or maybe a little underside, maybe not quite
heavy enough, that can be productive players for you guys. That's a good
point, right with with how much teams are relying on the portal now to
stack their rosters, that might leave a little bit more possibility right in terms
of getting players from from high schools here. It's especially in South Florida where
it's you know, so fertile recruiting ground that you may not have been able
to get before. So you know that that's a dynamic that continues to be
explored for a lot of schools. But I think our starting quarterback and we'll
probably talk more about him, but Kiwan and Jenkins is a great example.
Nearly was at Auburn. Uh want to play in front of in front of
his family here where he was. He was a legend at Miami Central.
And man, he had a big family. He had a big contingent at
at the Home Open or the other day. And man, that's that's what
I feel. Fi you can can really do a good job. I get
these these high school stars from South Florida and pack the stands with with their
support orders and the beautiful thing is again, you and I both know this.
If they're big, big players at FIU, they're gonna get drafted.
Guys like t Y Hilton come out of FIU. You're if you're good enough,
it doesn't matter where you're playing. There's enough at pro scouts, especially
in the state of Florida that are scouting. If you're good enough, even
if it's an NYU and maybe the team doesn't have the team success, you're
gonna get nos and you're gonna get scouted, and you're gonna have plenty of
opportunity to get an opportunity in the NFL. Yeah, we've seen it.
We've seen it recently. You know, he got hit a little bit by
graduating around COVID. But Maurice Alexander has found his way to the league and
he had his first pro reception with the Detroit Lyons the other day. He
was our converted quarterback that became a receiver's in. He's in the league.
Now are my broadcast partner on Saturday against North Texas coming up? Jonathan cyprian
All Conference defensive back late seven or eight years in the league. You mentioned
ty certainly as well. He's probably the highest you know, name recognition sort
of guy. James Morgan, our quarterback from a few years ago, got
drafted and it continues his pursuit. So by all means, it is certainly
a factory to to have that potential to move forward. Okay, give me
a couple of guys on offense other than t one you just mentioned. Give
me a couple of offensive guys to be a note, whether it's skill guys
or an offensive lineman here or there. Give me a couple of guys that
when you're watching FIU football, hey, watch this guy. He's keeping.
We have to mention Chris Mitchell now, I mean because he just tied t
Y and I think Tyrese. Yeah, t Y and Tyrese with with for
the school record and receiving yards in a game on Saturday. Two hundred and
one receiving yards on Saturday. So when you're in the company of ty and
Tyreese, that's that's pretty good. So he had his best game as an
FIU Panther this past weekend and so we're hoping that continues to spur. And
four, Jaylen Bracy has been a guy at the wide out spot that's had
some big games for us before UH. Antonio Patterson's our second string tailback,
Rechard freshman from Murphy's Burr around UH where Coach Mack has spent a lot of
time as well, and he had a touchdown in the season opener on the
road. Tough, physical running back that we think can do good things alongside
Shamar. So those are a couple of guys that had the skilled position spots
that I'm excited to see moving forward. But yeah, Chris Mitchell was dynamic.
Pair of touchdowns on Saturday, tightly contested to the first one was was
not an easy catch, second one who did well to bust some coverage,
but it was. It was good to see the receiving games see some success.
I know the season opener was tough and everybody knows the stat four or
passing yards in that opener. Uh key wand passes for two ninety two on
Saturday, So things were corrected his past leak. You guys run a traditional
spread offense up really up tempo. Are you guys a little slower? You
guys really fast. It's been interesting to see this year. You know,
David Yost came in has you know, some air raid experience Texas Tech to
his background, mentor Jordan Love as well when he was out west and uh,
you know against law Tech, we actually went a little bit slower and
that was that was you know, uh, purposefully done, you know,
try to take away some possessions. I don't think we only wanted to run
forty four plays. By the time it was all said and done. We
had a couple of we had a bit too many three and outs in the
in the second half. But you know, it was a slower tempo game
to your point, whereas last year we're a little bit more up tempo.
I'm not afraid to do that. I think they the staff has shown some
versatility depending on who the opponent. Maybe yeah, yeah, I think I
remember last year, you know against UTSA and that high powered offense. We
certainly went slower than we were used to and try to get Frank Harris as
few possessions as possible. It was working for a while, just couldn't get
the offense going like like we wanted. At times last week, I thought
we went pretty fast, you know. It was one of those situations to
replay was still going while the next play began began because we didn't anticipate that
tippo. So we have to we have to be sharp with that. But
yeah, they showed they showed versatility. It'll be interesting here on Saturday against
North Texas. All right, talk about let's go to the defense a little
bit. Give me a couple of names and give me what the are you
a blitzing defense? You more of a four three three four defense? Give
a little perspective on the defensive side. Yeah, you typically see a bit
more a three down lineman with with an edge rusher showing uh, you know,
trying to disguise coverage. Certainly, are our most impactful player defensively,
Its appeared to be Donovan Daniel are are starting middle linebacker? You had to
get fifteen tackles and the season opener forced to fumble on Saturday. He's just
all over the field. Uh. You know, it's been nice this year
to see, you know, the linebackers picking up the majority of the tackles.
Rather it felt like for a while there was a lot of the secondary
that was our leading tacklers and that's usually never a good thing. But but
donov Emmanuel Reggie Peterson's also the linebacker linebacker spot. He's a former walk on.
And you know, I was talking with our defensive coordinator Jabon de Witt,
and I asked, I asked about Reggie the other day. I said,
you know, does he feel like a former walk on? Still?
Do you do you trust him? Like? Where where you at with Reggie?
And he referenced the first week that he was the coach and brought Kim
in as a defenseive coordinat Reggie came to his office and said, Coach,
I'm I'm going to make you trust me. I'm going to make sure I'm
gonna make you trust me. And Javan said it before that season open.
He just walked up to him. I was like, man, I'm so
proud of you. I'm so proud of you. Like he had he has
had to earn every rep Every opportunity has not been easy on a guy like
Reggie. Peterson has made him work for but he's become He's gone from a
walk on to a very trusted UH starting linebacker. So stories stories like that
are are cool to see. I'm really really confident with the linebacker position,
and we've had a little bit more depth and size on the defensive line as
well, so and so hopefully that can be something that pays dividends. It
did on Saturday. We had three sacks, including one on the final drive
to help take Maine out of field goal position. So that that's shown through.
That's showing through in the end. Very good, Very good. Are
you listening to aj Ricketts play by place voice of the FIU Panthers. We're
here on the Florida Football Insiders podcast, you Little FIU preview If you haven't
already done so, hit that subscribe button on your podcast platform and drop us
a review. Is what we'd love to hear that uh AJ tell about where
they can find John on Twitter, an X or whatever we're calling it these
days. I keep reading I read, whether it's The Journal or the Times.
Every time they refer to it. It's like on X, which used
to be known as Twitter, and like, I guess, I guess the
AP standard is now X but uh yeah, pretty simple A j Ricketts two
ts, same on Instagram, same on TikTok. You on TikTok, Jason,
have you made your way over? I can't say that I've got a
TikTok account. I'm on the Gram, not I'm not on the Gram,
not not on not TikTok. That's perfectly acceptable because my dance skills just don't
don't add up. Man. Hey, we got to know our strengths and
we we gotta know. We gotta know them. What did you what did
you? You said you were so you were a cross country runner, rand
cross country track? I did? Yeah? Are you are you? Did
you grow up in the Miami area. No? I grew up as far
away in Florida as you can be, but still be in the state.
So up in the Panhand up in Pensacola, essentially South Alabama. Yeah,
ten hour drive away. Yeah, you know, you get. It's a
beautiful, beautiful area of Florida, just just not close enough to ever take
a trip home. In college, you know, talk about staff changes.
You mentioned new offensive coordinator any other significant staff changes on the staff, it's
been good to have some continuity and most of and most of our spot,
you know, offensive coordinator Davidios, defensive coordinator Javon de Witt both both back
for the second year. So I think that's, uh, you know,
that's obviously ideal to have some continuity in the offense. You know, obviously
we have a first year quarterback in that spot. Now he doesn't have as
much time with it, but I think I think Keiwan Jenkins is is going
to do just fine in this adjustment. What's so impressive, you know,
talking with the coaches and just being at practice and watching them, like there
is an already level of trust with ke Won making checks at the line of
scrimmage, with him seeing something and making an audible making a check to his
receivers because that's what that's what he did at at Miami Central and all the
time as he was en route to winning state championships. And you know,
there's there's times when you know, maybe you don't have to be reined in
a little bit, but they they really trust him. The one of the
touchdowns to Chris Mitchell that that was an audible. I was supposed to just
be a I think a screen pass we had. We had run in a
couple of times. It had been successful, so the coaches called it a
good and and he one saw something of the defense made a check and take
the fake the screen pass, and I mean Chris Mitchell was all by him
selling that's awesome, that's his that's his first college football game, and he
has the trust and the stuff, the stones to make it happen. So
look to put it in a perspective. I wanted to get this stat out
there too. Was looking it up a little bit like two hundred ninety two
pass yards in his first start. I mean, James Morgan has looked at
us like one of the top quarterbacks in FIU history, right. I saw
sidelines FIU post the top five today, love their coverage, love their account,
and then they posted a top five, and I think James was one
or two. And I looked at James the stats in twenty eighteen, when
when you had a school record nine wins and won a bowl game in the
regular season, I wanted to say James had two games where he threw for
two ninety two plus. In twenty nineteen, the year where we beat Miami.
He had one game, so three total, and in twenty nineteen,
which was in decent years, Bow Bowl game one time, over two ninety
two times in twenty eighteen our school record year, and Keywan comes in gets
ninety two and his first ever game. I knows, yeah, I know,
as an FCS opponent. But look, there's it's it's still still a
very positive sign something that hasn't been done a lot. It's been done times
in the last five years. So I'm really excited about what he was able
to do. And I just think it's only going to get better if he
can continue to be protected well and develop his confidence. All Right, a
couple more things. We'll get you out of here. Let's go to the
schedule a little bit. They go to North You've already played a conference game.
You go to North Texas this week. North Texas got beat hammered pretty
good by cow which a lot of people thought North Texas might be in that
game and win the game. Talk about just the schedule in general, any
any any weird things in the schedule. You play at Arkansas Real late in
the year, which is kind of the kind of a goofy time for you.
Guys to have to play them late, but you do as a money
as a kind of as a money game. Talk about the schedule a little
bit and just your thoughts of the CUSA. Yeah, I think North Texas
is one of those games that will be a nice gauge of progress from from
one year to the next. I think Western Kentucky will be the the other
one. I'm not going to say what the score of that game was last
year, but I will say it's not going to be the same, right.
I'm excited for for those two games because you know, we took it
on the chin at North Texas last year and Western as well. So I'm
I think Western Kentucky will actually be Senior Day if I'm not mistake. I'm
just going up to schedule here to be sure. Yeah, and next weekend
we had to Yukon. Yukon could have been a different game last year.
Obviously, you can end up having a pretty good season for what the recent
standards had been just one of those games like UTSA, we couldn't get things
going offensively, but we were hanging around Liberty. Look, the Liberty is
a team new to Conference USA. They're pumping in resources, They've got some
recent tradition. That'll be a great challenge on homecoming. Look, I'm excited
about our scus. We go to New Mexico State again, that's a place
where we won last year. That was right after the big loss to Western
Kentucky. And then we go out by the way, by the way,
by the way, how was that travel day to get to Lodge Cruises.
I've this, you know, you get you just you try not to complain
too much because we're just so we're so lucky to be where where we're at
and be a part of the program, and just no one wants to hear
you complaintball day, So I have to just like be like, shut up,
Hi, no one cares. But yeah, if if, if,
Since I've been provoked with the question, yeah, it's a long travel because
it's it's if it's a night game. Especially yeah, I'll say it was
a I think it was a seven o'clock click kick lesser. I'll tell this
in thirty seconds. Nobody, nobody wants to hear me event about travel.
No, we want to hear travel. We like good travel stories. Come
on, it's just to give a perspective, like the seven pm kick,
it's Mountain time game ins. Let's say the game ends at eleven, you
don't leave the stadium until twelve. They had showers, get some food,
see their parents phone calls. We don't leave till twelve. When we play
New Mexico like that, we can't leave out of the airport. In loss
cruises that the charter flight leaves out of El Paso on that trip. So
if we leave the stadium at twelve, we don't get to the airport till
one. We're not loaded and ready to go till two thirty. Let's say
it's a three and a half hour flight three thirty four, thirty five,
thirty six. You add two hours for the time difference. Landing at eight,
it's another half hour to get off. So by the time you get
back to FIU, it was like nine or nine straight straight to the waffle
House or International House of Pain. You know. I hope you saw my
Twitter. I'm a waffle house guy. Yeah, that's the play. That's
the place I love. Yeah. So, unfortunately there's not a lot in
Miami, but if there, if there was one right by f I'd be
straight to the Wahoe and then straight straight to my straight to my couch straight
to my bed, face down. But again, it's part of college football.
You know, we all we all go through it. But it's it's
a lot better after a win. And I'll I'll tell you, I'll tell
you that the law Tech one was tough, but you know, I think
the guys were still, you know, motivated for the season. You know,
you can't can't have your heads down too much after week zero, right,
head up, move forward and onto the next game. And they did
enough to to get the win here against Maine. So yeah, to finish,
to finish the question. You know, I'm excited for u TEP.
That's Vice Night. Got over a million impressions on social media for for that.
Look, there's like we see the mine Heat do it, but we
don't see a lot of college football program like pull off Ice and they're not
a lot of Ken So I think the jersey, the field, the branding,
the apparel that will go with that will be a lot of fun.
That'll be a nationally televised game, so there's a lot of fun ones to
look forward to. You guys are on CBS Sports and at a couple of
times nationally, so you'll get some good you know, publicity as far as
just exposure around the country. Yeah, part of that new television contract.
I thought Conference USA did a great job with that. Look, there was
that availability in October, kind of like maction. Okay, but we'll be
the only games on in October on those Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and hopefully that
that raises some brand awareness and some national recognition for the players that this team
and in this league has. And that'll be a lot of fun and I'm
excited to do four I think three or four ESPN Plus games as well for
the non CBS one, So we'll have some fun with it. Last thing,
tell the audience where they can find your stuff online as far as the
broadcast and through if it's a if IU website or tell us where we can
find many. Yeah, this weekend will be ESPN plus, uh six thirty
Eastern kickoff when we're on the road. Our flagship radio stations eleven forty am,
Univision w QBA eleven forty am, and that's also also have a web
stream as well, So half our game CBS Sports Network, half of our
games ESPM plus, and our our radio broadcast on eleven forty am. So
we're excited to keep rolling. Like I said, we'll have Jonathan cyprian NFL
veteran on the on the ESPN Plus broadcast with me this weekend, Billy Gill
from the from the Dan Levitard Show, and a noted FIU alums. He's
going to join for for some radio broadcast this year, like as as the
analysts. So we'll we'll have who knows, like we'll have we know we're
gonna have some fun with that. We may not be talking football the entire
time. There's there's there's a clip when he joined a couple of years ago
I don't on the ESPN Plus broadcast and it went in all sorts of directions,
but it was alsome. It was it was hilarious. So I'm excited
to have him again, and yeah, we'll have some fun with it.
Well A j Ricketts, what was your fastest mile? How fast for you?
The mile? May give me your best mile? Oh man, I
was slow by college standards. Man, I think four thirty seven was my
first slow. Come on, bro, Really, I was usually doing the
five thousand or the three thousand. I'm excited that I'm going to the Philippines
next month to run a track meet, so we'll see if I still have
it. We'll see if I still have it. Maybe, but I'm old,
some old man track running. Huh. I don't want to use that
term yet. I don't need that. I'm not ready to say that yet.
The four thirty seven is pretty damn good. So congrats to you,
my brother, Thank you, thank you need the ego boost. Appreciate it
all right, A j Ricketts played by Playboys fi U Panthers. Appreciate the
time. Have a great year on the broadcast, and we will check in
with you as we moved through the year. All right, sounds good,
Thanks Jason, I appreciate it. You got it. Thanks for listening to
the Florida Football Insiders Podcast as part of the College Gridiron Coast to Coast podcast
network. Please remember some scribe, rate and review if you've not already done
so, and you can reach out to me on Twitter at j Post Sports.
Love to hear your comments and feedback about our episodes and any programs suggestions
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