Mario Cristobal Reasserts Why The Hurricanes Belonged In The College Football Playoff
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Notre Dame leaped the Miami Hurricanes in the AP polls for the first time after Miami lost their second game of the season against Southern Methodist University.
The loss to SMU was a second conference loss and almost proved to be catastrophic, especially considering how Miami continued to be ranked. Duke ended up winning the ACC with five losses and Miami's CFP hopes seemed to be in the gutter.
It wasn't until the December 7 selection show that fans saw the CFP committee prioritize the head-to-head record between Miami and Notre Dame to include them in the tournament. While some believe their performance against Texas A&M justified the argument for their exclusion from the CFP, Hurricanes head coach Mario Cristobal believes his team proved they belonged in the playoffs before their win against Texas A&M.
Nothing fuzzy about Miami
Cristobal was asked whether the win against No. 7 Texas A&M said anything about the committee's decision to include Miami in the CFP. The Hurricanes head coach said the committee made the right decision no matter what.
"Look, regardless of what the result was today, they made the right decision. I said it a lot of times before. Last year we had to go to court, I felt, because we had a case, other teams had a case, but it was fuzzy, it was muddy. This year, what was fuzzy about it?"Mario Cristobal
Cristobal is referring to last year's campaign with 2025 No. 1 overall NFL Draft pick Cam Ward at the helm of the offense. Last season, Miami lost to unranked Georgia Tech while ranked No. 4. The Hurricanes followed this loss up with a brutal 42 to 38 loss to unranked Syracuse while ranked No. 8.
Head-to-head always matters
These losses made it much more difficult for the committee to include the Hurricanes compared to this season. Cristobal explained exactly why there was always no debate regarding Miami's inclusion in the CFP. A win against the Aggies in the playoffs didn't justify their work throughout the entire regular season more than a win against Notre Dame in week one did.
"We come down to the end, we had common opponents with another great football team that I'm sure would do great in the playoffs, but we did better against those common opponents and we won the head-to-head."Mario Cristobal
The two teams outside the bubble played each other in regular season to determine which team was the better team. That's the only metric that matters to coach Cristobal. The Hurricanes stayed competitive enough to stay in the bubble and since they did, head-to-head had to be the difference. The committee mislead viewers since Notre Dame had been ranked ahead of the Hurricanes for most of the season following the loss to SMU.
Cristobal expressed his plea to keep head-to-head an important factor of ranking teams.
"God forbid we should ever get away from the meaning of head-to-head because just look out there today how many guys were helped off the field? How many guys had to be carried or limp off or get on crutches? How many guys are seeing the doctor right now for competing head-to-head. Let us never, ever devalue the importance of head-to-head competition, please."Mario Cristobal
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