There is still hope to look forward to for Miami football. Even with its final three games rescheduled, No. 10 Miami has already passed its season win total from a year ago and is in line to play in a major bowl game in 2020.
That’s a huge factor being that nine of the postseason contests have already been canceled, including four that are associated with the ACC. That leaves the conference with six bowl games with every team eligible, so there is a possibility some programs will be left out.
Your 7-1 Hurricanes are currently sitting in position to land themselves in a big-time postseason matchup, potentially a New Year’s Six Bowl, which are the six major bowls played between Dec. 30 and Jan. 2: The Cotton Bowl Classic, The Peach Bowl, The Rose Bowl, The Orange Bowl, The Sugar Bowl and The Fiesta Bowl.
The last time the Hurricanes found themselves in one of these matchups was in 2017 when they lost to Wisconsin 34-24 in the Orange Bowl that would end a season for the Hurricanes that for a second seemed to be a championship team. The Orange Bowl usually features the ACC/Notre Dame vs. Big Ten/SEC.
Should Miami miss out on that game if Clemson or Notre Dame find themselves in that matchup due to higher seeding, Miami could still be eligible for an at-large bid in one of the three remaining NY6 bowls, which would be the Peach Bowl, Cotton Bowl or Fiesta Bowl as the Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl are set to host the College Football Playoff semifinals.
Bowl predictions
College Football News, CBS Sports, 247SPORTS, Bleacher Report, ESPN, Athlon Sports all predict Miami vs. Florida in the Orange Bowl.
With this being the most probable bowl projection, I’m going to say I agree. This skewed projection just means that the industry believes the Hurricanes are going win out or just finish the season as the highest ranked ACC team to not go to the College Football Playoff.
Notre Dame already secured a spot in the ACC title game after the conference announced it will be judging the three contenders for the game (ND, Clemson and Miami) on a nine-game schedule. Clemson would have to lose to Virginia Tech this week and Miami would have to beat both Duke and North Carolina over the next two weeks to jump Clemson for a spot in the conference championship in Charlotte.
A Miami football vs. Florida game would be a huge deal for the Hurricanes, although not too much for Florida only because I believe it deserves a shot at the national title. Nonetheless, Florida quarterback Kyle Trask, who is the Heisman Trophy favorite, leads the nation in touchdown passes with 34 and is fourth with 2,810 passing yards. The Gators offense as a unit has been one of the best in the country this year, averaging 509.2 yards per game and 7.41 yards per play, each of which rank in the top 12 nationally.
Trask and King were both teammates in high school back in Texas and spend their offseason working out together, so this would be an interesting matchup that I’m sure would mean a lot to the both of them.
