Everything that went wrong for Miami football on fourth and 17

After getting sacks on second and third down the Miami football team forced North Carolina into fourth and 17 with 2:55 remaining in the fourth quarter. It proved to be the most pivotal moment of the night.

Linebacker Shaq Quarterman sacked North Carolina quarterback Sam Howell for a loss seven yards on second down and six. Defensive end Greg Rousseau followed up with a four-yard sack of Howell on third and 13. The seemed to put the Miami football team in position to win. The Hurricanes defense would surely ice the game.

The rebuilt secondary for the Miami football team was the biggest question mark entering 2019. Through two games with Trajan Bandy being the only returning starter that has proven to be true. After leading the country in pass defense in 2018 by more than 10 yards, the Hurricanes are 106th in pass defense in 2019.

Miami simply has not been able to protect the back end. The Hurricanes have routinely given up big plays. Last season the longest completion against the Miami defense was 48 yards. This season the Hurricanes have given up three pass plays of over 60 yards. By nearly every measure Miami has failed to prevent big pass plays.

There were multiple reasons for the failure on fourth and 17. Miami was not able to get as much pressure on the previous two plays, the coverage failed and the defense just generally suffered a let down at an inopportune time. Manny Diaz spoke to the Joe Rose morning show on WQAM about what happened.

"“We played the play poorly to be honest with you…We had a pressure called and we didn’t execute up front the way that we wanted to. It was a pressure that had sacked the quarterback earlier in the game and then from a coverage standpoint, we didn’t match up on the routes very well.It was one of those plays where on all levels we didn’t play very well and if you get 4th-and-17 against our defense it should be lights out and that is one you will be thinking about all year.”"

Manny Diaz mentioned in the post discussions with the media the dominance the Miami football team had at times on Saturday. North Carolina finished with 99 yards on four drives in the middle two quarters plus a kneel down at the end of the first half. That is about as dominant as you can get.

Miami needs to play for 60 minutes though. Giving up multiple big plays and the game-deciding drive in the final minutes is what did Miami in against North Carolina and Florida. That presumably will not happen against Bethune-Cookman and Central Michigan. The Hurricanes need to take those two games to improve.

Once Virginia Tech comes to Miami Garden to begin a stretch of three consecutive games at home the Hurricanes need to buckle down defensively throughout the entire game and shut down the big plays in the passing game defensively. If they do not, the boo birds will be out at Hard Rock Stadium and not from Sebastian the Ibis.

Miami needs more production out of Bandy. Bandy had an excellent week zero against Florida. He should bounce back after a tough week two performance against North Carolina. It will be hard to judge anything in the next two weeks. The Hurricanes have to get back to being a big-play defense and not allowing the big play.