Mario Cristobal Impressed With Defense After Goal-Line Stands In Miami's Spring Game

Miami Hurricanes head coach Mario Cristobal, a former offensive lineman, expresses pride in his defense's performance while maintaining his offensive line roots, highlighting the team's potential for the upcoming season.

Miami Hurricanes head coach Mario Cristobal on the sideline against the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in the second quarter at Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field. | Brett Davis-Imagn Images

Miami Hurricanes head football coach Mario Cristobal is a former offensive lineman, and a very good one. He has two NCAA National Championships on his resume from his days as a player with the Miami Hurricanes from 1989 - 1992.

However, now as a head coach, he needs to make sure his team is stellar on both sides of the ball if he wants to accomplish his ultimate goal of winning a National Championship. Still, it stands to reason that deep down, he is partial to the trenches on the offensive side of the ball. After multiple goal-line stands in Saturday's spring game, he praised the defense, but he made it clear that he was still an offensive lineman at heart:

“As an offensive lineman, what do you think I’m going to say?” Cristobal said. “I want to projectile vomit on the offensive side. But on the defensive side, I’ll tell you two things – number one, great job from a schematic standpoint, just finding a way to expose certain gaps and timing it up really well. And even more so, a couple guys just hunkering down, putting their feet in the ground and knocking people back. So, you can’t take away from that. … We kind of needed that. … We’ve done short yard [situations], but we haven’t done a bunch of goal line in the spring. … Overall, that was a great job by the defense, so I’ll hold my personal feelings aside.”

He, of course, said this mostly in jest and is happy to see his defense taking big steps forward. This is a great sign for the upcoming season. Especially considering that the Canes are still without starting quarterback Carson Beck. While he surely wants to see the offense thriving, the defense should be able to dominate without the starting quarterback playing and they did just that on Saturday.

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