Watch Everything Mario Cristobal Said After Dominant Victory over Virginia Tech

Some might call it a scare for the Miami Hurricanes, but for all of the game, the Hurricanes dominated the Virginia Tech Hokies as they kept pace to try to sneak into the College Football Playoff.

The goal right now is to stay focused and win out and that started against the Hokies.

Head coach Mario Cristobal was short after the game with a trip back home on the books as they prepare to take on Pitt in the final game of the season.

Opening Statement:

Good to see our guys come out and start really really fast. Uh kind of a strange game in terms of number of possessions. I believe we only had eight, scored on six of them. Um and some, you know, a lot of really really good stuff and some stuff to clean up as well. But proud of our guys coming out here today without, you know, our frontline players and OJ Frederique, um David Blay, Jakobe going down. Keonte's been down. Um Josh tried to go, he couldn't go. But we got a little bit out of CJ, but um Keonte, you know, was a guy I you know, I mentioned him a lot, but anyways, proud of our guys. Coming out and and get it done.

On Jakobe Thomas Injury:

I think he's doing good. Just took a really good shot there. Probably a helmet right to the arm. You always want to check it to see if there's a any type of fracture, but um x-rays were negative. We feel really confident that he'll be ready to roll next week.

On the Offensive and Defensive Execution against the Hokies...

"To come out and go right down the field, it just kind of continued to get better offensively, you know, for the last several weeks, and I think it was just carryover from that"You know, the only thing that we'd like to clean up, you like to stay aggressive and not completely, I would say, take the energy away from the team of your team, but it got chippy out there on both sides, and there were some things that we hurt ourselves with. a couple of big plays, if you could take those away, obviously, we have a really good defensive day "We gave up some runs today.  You know, they came from the well, they ran hard, got to give them credit. And we missed some tackles. But all in all, it's just that we've had control of the game from the beginning, all the way to the end, and really proud of our guys."

On Virginia Tech's Run Game...

Yeah, you know, there were obviously, you know, the runs that were getting outside, they did a good job out leveraging us with motions to blocks, getting angles, and getting hats, getting numbers in a couple of times. Now, we were in position to make a play just to make it a couple times, we were on different pages, W to spill, went a box, and then the alley player were to fit it.  And those are things that we have been really good at, and we did not, were optimal today and the way we did it, but we did have some really good quarterback hits, some, foring that fumble there at the end, some other ones that, you know, kind of went back and forth, some fourth down stops that were blown, and then out, I mean, it was a lot of stuff, a lot of, like, crazy stuff today out there. sort of, you know, a little bit of an odd game in the respect of number possession and you know, stoppages, but I know everybody was out there wok her butt stop trying to make it right. I

On Being aggressive at the end...

I mean, if people are gonna play main coverage and load the box, it's not fair to, our players. It just kind of sit there and run it in there and, you know, get to get two and three free hitters on your guys, so we're gonna stay aggressive. We only had I got, eight possessions.  I mean, we feel like, you know, you almost didn't even get to play an entire game, so when you have eight possessions, you take advantage of them, I think we scored on six of eight, and the two would score on. I know we had an Aaron snap. We thought we had hurricadence, and the other one a holding penalty.  And we were really were clicking really well. And then we had on one of the field goals, I know that Carson was trying to get the ball to Malachi, and felt like the wind just kind of took that one and buried it, but a lot of stuff a lot of good stuff, a lot of stuff to work on. Another

On the Offensive connection between players...

Yeah, I mean, they continues to evolve, as you mentioned right there, two really high level players, very well connected. I think it's really important to mention Keelan. I think it's really important to mention Upshaw's big catch as well on third down. often, I mean, with his, hit him on a double move, really big play and they get to start us off.  I think just all in on, to spread the ball around really good, to check outs, you know, usually we make more people miss credit to them. Tech tackle does well. We didn't make them miss well enough.  Our run. I don't even know how many total plays we had, but it wasn't a ton. I believe we had how many, well, I'll figured out later guys I apologize, but 63. 63 total place. total play count. game for us, but you know, for 31 points that 63 plays, you, you know, somewhere in there, right

On the Freshman Starting...

Sure, I think it's two full. I think it bodes well for us right now,'cause they're playing on a high level, and certainly, I mean, if you if you're a player out there, right a recruit and you're seeing, man, these guys have some legitimate real deal dudes that are young and are making plays, it's exciting for the now, and it's exciting for the future.  The Miami Hurricane Football, so we're going to push those guys' hard, you know, but there's nothing there's on the game plan that they can't run. They're very well coached, they're very proactive, and they're approached to the game, and certainly looking forward to them continuing to evolve through and eventually be able to lead us.

On the Defensive Tackle Play...

Yeah, you know, and we were obviously short-handed mods coming back off that injury, so we're a little bit shorthanded there. Armondo went in there, did a really good job also. We missed David Blay, but credit to Moton, played with great pad level, great get off, was very disruptive, got in the backfield, and as you mentioned, you know, those negative plays, when you take an offense and you take them off schedule, it makes it really rough for those guys to convert.

On going for the Touchdown late...

Sure, I mean, we're just we're playing ball. We're not slowing down because, you know, whether some people call it style points and all that other stuff, we're just playing ball and trying to make our team better and staying aggressive. When we call it aggressive, our players, they play aggressive, but and I've heard what you said, but I think it's really important to state, I think it goes for anyone who's ever played the game or coach the game because people can throw around the word eye test.  Well, how about the field test? Right? We're head to head matters, you know, things like that.  So that's what football's always been about on the field, getting it finding a way to get it done and proud of our guys today and looking forward to playing a great Pittsburgh team next week, you on the road again for a great opportunity for our program and again, great football team. We're looking forward to playing

On the officials and keeping the team focused...

A lot of reviews. Got to know those officials really well. There's a lot of time with it, man. I mean, it's it's a little bit of them, it's a little bit of the coaches, it's everybody involved them. I mean, we made a commitment before we left the locker room. There's, you know, 70,000 people out there, but our is all that matters.  Right? Not a single person in those seats is gonna make a play, and they're not going to bring energy for us. Hope it gets you fired up. to be able to play in front of just a great atmosphere.  I mean credit to Virginia Tech for providing with a unbelievable atmosphere. But our guys know that we have to keep, we've gotten so much better. We've won a lot of a lot of games over the last two years, and we're getting better. and we still have to get better to accomplish things we want to accomplish, and they know that part of that is being able to save.  So between the ears, man, you know? I mean, if you allow yourself to drift and all the crazy fun stuff's going on in the scoreboard of people they're honoring, you know, I mean , it's like stimuli from hell, man. Like, there's something going on all the time, you? So let's stick to playing football for those three and a half, four hours, and I think everything will be okay.

Justice Sandle is a graduate of Mississippi State University and is the site lead for the Miami Hurricanes on SI. He can be reached at Twitter @Justice_News5.