No one goes more in-depth into the metrics of college football than SB Nation’s Bill Connelly. Connelly is the only college football columnist and prognosticator that ranked 130 teams in FBS from top to bottom.
Connelly’s metrics are a combination of weighted four-year recruiting rankings, each team’s returning offensive and defensive production and a program average of the previous two to five seasons. The last piece is done to access a program’s strength. That’s tough for a Miami being on their third head coach in five years.
Anyone that follows Miami would say the program is healthier going forward under Diaz that it was previously with Al Golden and Mark Richt leading the programs. Richt left the program healthy but the roster in need of an upgrade. Diaz took more trips into the (transfer) portal than Sam Beckett.
Connelly has the Miami football program at a very reasonable 19th in his rankings. The Hurricanes are second in the ACC with no group of five schools in front of them. Central Florida would be understandable. Connelly’s overall rankings are called S&P+.
Any other programs being ahead of a team two years removed from a 10-3 season with a Coastal Division title is questionable. The 14 Group of Five programs ranked ahead of Miami by CBS without an explanation made little sense.