Miami vs. Florida Recap: Gators allow most points in home opener ever | CBS Sports

On The. Rivalry renewed in Gainesville. Canes adding new quarterback Cam Ward from Washington State via the transfer portal to what was a top three offense in the conference last season. Graham Mertz and the Gators, coming off their third straight losing season for the first time since 1974. Would love to have Tim Tebow in the lineup wearing one five. He said, it's okay. You can you can wear one five. Miami's opening drive cam Ward back foot to ninth year. Tight end cam McCormick. Cam to cam. I see you. Canes off to a good start up. Seven. Nothing. Three minutes to go in the second. Hand off to Montrell Johnson Jr. Down the sideline 71 yard touchdown scamper. Florida down 17 to 10. His 28th career rushing touchdown, most among active SEC players. Under a minute to go in the first half. Ward fires one between the safeties to Xavier Restrepo 24 yard scoring strike. Canes go into the half of 24 to 10. Ward. The first half 16 to 2173. Two touchdowns and a pick. Mid third Ward. This is special spins out of a tackle. Back of the end zone to Jacolby George. Oh baby what a play 23 yard touchdown chomp chomp in Gainesville. Ward 26 to 35 385. Passing yards, three touchdowns. Most yards in a Miami debut by any player since 1980. Final 40s of the third. Graham Mertz picked off, intercepted by Michael Powell, headed the other way. Finally brought down after a 67 yard return. And unfortunately on the delivery, Mertz was hit hard in the pocket. Left the game did not return, and Miami routs their rival 41 to 17, their largest win against the Florida Gators since 2002. Florida's most points allowed 41, in a home opener, and the seat gets hotter for Billy Napier as Miami wins it, 41 to 17. Cam Ward have a debut kid. Time now to welcome in the host of Josh Bates College football show, Josh Pate from Gainesville, Florida. And Josh, you know it's week one. So I don't want to overreact to anything but Miami. They made sure they let everybody know that Florida cannot hang with them. Outside of that 7171 yard run from Johnson, they dominated this game. So what type of statement do you think the hurricanes made with their new QB in cam Ward showing out? I'm always I mean I'm like you, I'm always careful. I'm just going to put the box score in my pocket. There's really no story. It tells you didn't just tell with the highlight. I'm always careful in week one. I always say the wise man just observes week one. The foolish man draws conclusions. So maybe we shouldn't totally conclude, you know, Miami is back. Miami is the favorite. This Miami is the favorite that I think we can conclude some things about Florida. But we talk winners first on this show, Miami was under the distinct impression they nailed the transfer portal. Let's just go back to the spring when they landed cam Ward, who was the feature point of that highlight. They knew it's time to go all in. And so not only did they get him, you saw a guy pick a ball off there. Well he went here last year. He was in Washington. You saw Brown the tight end the wide receiver earlier today make catches while he was at Houston last year. And they've got players already on this roster. But it's just a freshman and sophomore class baked in. And they shine today. But this transfer portal class it's such a feast or famine proposition. But if it's feast for you, if you nail it like they did that you can take quantum leaps. And then also I'm standing on the field now. It's totally empty in this stadium now. But man, late third quarter, early fourth quarter. They had already sort of drained this place. And it's one thing to go on the road and win. And Miami hadn't had nearly enough of these type games in the past couple of decades. But to do it in such a resounding fashion against an in-state rival where you'll certainly have major recruiting ripple effects emanate from this game, and to do it emphatically in an SEC teams building when the rest of the ACC has been sucking air. Quite honestly, over this week, one week, zero time frame, we got to type the statement in all caps, however big a statement we could possibly type. That's how big a statement it is for Miami. Very well said. Now when you look at Miami, the rest of their schedule, does this change how you view them in the ACC, or is your expectation the same coming into this game? No, I thought they were the favorite to win the ACC. I think a lot of people had they looked at Miami and put Georgia uniforms on them, or put Alabama uniforms on them, no one would have had any doubt because this team looked like an SEC team physically. It's just that people have this this fair and valid, baked in doubt in their subconscious. They remember the Georgia Tech meltdown last year. They remember years past when we saw false headlines of Miami's back because they did this and it was just a spark. But it wasn't a fire. I believe that this team is probably the premiere roster in this conference for a couple of months, and the more we went through fall camp, the more buzz you get. I went and watched them practice a couple of weeks ago. There aren't many teams that look better than that. That's not a guarantee of anything. But then when you put your stamp on it in week one and you start to validate a lot of the buzz that people had heard, it was a really tightly closed off fall camp, by the way. So all you had to go on was message board rumors and hearsay. It wasn't open for the media. And so this was everyone's first glimpse, media included, for the most part, at Miami. And man, I don't know how you could be happier. I'm standing in the tunnel as they're walking up, and a lot of them are are very quick to remind you. We could probably be hung half a hundred or more if we wanted to. Today. This game was over early. Third quarter. And they're not wrong. It was. Yeah Hurricane fans very confident after the showing they put out in Gainesville on the other side we talked about Florida. You talked about earlier on CBS sports HQ. There were so many questions about Florida's offense and just their team. Billy Napier, what do you think they need to do to turn the page? Because this was not a performance that leaves a lot of hope for Florida nation. I hate it, I hate it. We were here this spring. We did an entire show here. We did a sit down with Billy and it was it was so striking. When you walk around this place, the stuff that people used to complain about at Florida, they don't complain about it anymore. They've got all the resources in the world here. They've got mega facilities. So in other words, every box that you would claim you need checked to win is checked. And you know, when you when you hear the vision pitched to you, when you see it laid out in front of you, it makes total sense. There's just a disconnect somewhere. And in year three, I mean, going into this game now, we were asking, can they make a bowl game? So in year three, that being the narrative around this team was already unacceptable for the fan base. But they were willing to push that aside because, hey, if we beat Miami in week one, who knows? This is college football. Anything can happen. Maybe those teams on our schedule aren't as good as we think they are. Maybe we're better than we think they are, but you could feel how thin that layer of bravado was, because when Miami goes up 2 or 3 scores, you feel the unrest. You start to hear the booing. You start to see the stadium empty out. And I don't know what the point of no return is, but we know it's there. In coaching, some people call it losing a team. I'm not sitting here trying to claim Billy Napier's lost his team, but when you lose the important juice that you have to have to be a major program. And keep in mind, not only are you just trying to salvage things here, you're trying to compete against Georgia. You know, you're trying to compete against Alabama, against Texas, and they're freight trains all moving in the same direction at the same time. And if your program feels like it's being pulled 6 or 7 different ways, can't get out of its own way at some point. And that point will be tonight. By the way, uncomfortable conversations will start to be had. I hate it, I hate it because I think they got a lot of the right parts here. But for whatever reason, it's not clicking. And there was such a physical disparity in performance on the field today that it's glaring and probably goes beyond that point of being argumentative. And let's debate it. There's no debating. This was just an expletive filled performance today that's best left for us to talk about during the commercial break. And what's worse is the schedule only gets tougher for Florida on the other side of Miami. They look like a team that is poised to win the ACC. Josh Pate we appreciate the time, man, and make sure to check out Josh Pate's college football show Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday at 8 p.m. eastern Live on YouTube. Also, check him out on Twitter and Instagram at Josh Pate CFB the Josh Pate College