Another game, another victory for the Canes! On Thursday night, your Miami Hurricanes began the 2026 home schedule with a blowout 77-7 win over the Florida A&M Rattlers. You love to see it!
Craig T. Smith has your game recap:
AND Mike Schiffman is back with the 3 stars of the game:
And with no further ado, let’s get into this edition of The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly:
The Good
- A win! I will never take this for granted.
- This epic beatdown. This looked like……certain Miami teams…..from certain previous seasons that shall not be overtly named by me.
- QB Darian Mensah. 14/15 passing for 252 yards and 3 TDs with 0 INTs
- For the season, Mensah’s numbers are QUITE good.
- WR Malachi Toney. 4 catches for 96 yards and a touchdown.
- Toney’s numbers are also pretty, pretty good so far this season.
- Mark Fletcher. 7 carries for 105 yards and 2 TDs.
- Javian Mallory making a BIG PUSH for more playing time. 10 carries for 142 yards and 2 TDs for the freshman.
- RB Mark Fletcher Jr. got the scoring started with this 46 yard touchdown. With it, he moved to 6th all-time in rushing yards, and 5th all-time in rushing touchdowns in Miami Hurricanes Football history!
- QB Darian Mensah started his passing day with this bomb to Joshua Moore for a touchdown.
- Malachi Toney is so good. (*whispers* and a better throw is a touchdown)
- Malachi Toney is incredible. This route on his touchdown catch is a thing of beauty.
- RB Girard Pringle Jr. making lemonade out of lemons for the touchdown
- OH MY GOD THIS VANCE SPAFFORD TOUCHDOWN CATCH
- Javian Mallory shows his skills on this long TD.
- Luke Nickel with a DIME to Samourian Wingo for a long TD.
- S J.J. Dunnigan making his first start. Led the team with 5 tackles on the night.
- EDGE Armondo Blount continued his stellar play. 4 tackles on the night.
- Ezekiel Marcelin and Marquise Lightfoot with the sacks.
- Ethan O’Connor looking to step into the CB1 role.
- Bryce Fitzgerald moving out to CB and playing very well.
- Loved what I saw from Kellen Wiley Jr, Cortez Redding, Jaelan Waters, and more. Lots of youngsters showed out.
- Miami didn’t face a 3rd down in the 1st half with the starting offense on ethe field. That’s pretty decent.
- 16 receivers posted a catch on the night.
- 9 players had rushes on the night.
- 6 PBUs from the defense
- 856 yards of offense. A new Miami Hurricanes record.
- A balanced 856 yards (426 passing, 430 rushing)
- 77 points. That’s the most Miami has scored since they scored 77 both times Savannah State was on the schedule.
- 5 rushing TDs
- 6 passing TDs
- 42 first downs
- 11.7 yards per play
- 15.8 yards per completion
- 9.8 yards per rush
- 25 chunk plays (9 passes, 16 rushes)
- 107 yards allowed
- 4 first downs allowed
- 1-14 3rd downs allowed
- 2.3 yards per play allowed
- 1.8 yards per rush allowed
- 6.4 yards per completion allowed
- And the list goes on and on
- I’ll end with the advanced stats chart for you to see and laugh at.
The Bad
- Only 4 TFLs
- Only 2 sacks
- 1-3 on 3rd downs
- 1 penalty. I know this is a high standard, but IDC. We were like 4 minutes from a perfect/no penalty game. And we could have had it. But we didn’t. That’s bad. IDC IDC IDC.
The Ugly
- LB Bobby Pruitt missing/not attempting a block on punt return that was THE KEY BLOCK NEEDED to spring Malachi Toney for a touchdown. UGH. C’mon dawg!
- A fumble? by WR Brennan Burton returned for a touchdown by FAMU. Calling that a fumble is generous. Buddy got the ball straight stolen from him by a FAMU defender, who returned the ball 72 yards for a touchdown.
- And with that play, there went the shutout.
- Cannon Pickett with a false start penalty in the 4th quarter to ruin the perfect game.
- Failing to convert a 3rd down in the 4th quarter
- Failing to convert the subsequent 4th down
- Turnover on downs as a result of the previous 2 plays.
Team Grades
Offense: A+ x77
Look, this was always going to be life on easy street. Miami did, quite literally, whatever they wanted with the starters in the game, and the backups were pretty darn good, too. Hell, even the third team moved the ball and pushed the total yardage number into the 800’s to set the all-time Miami record. In short, this was great, but the competition sucked, so there’s nothing really to take from this other than Miami has good players and FAMU doesn’t.
Defense: A
I thought the defense played fast and physical. I liked the rotation of faces here, but ESPECIALLY in the secondary. With Frederique, Lucas, Antoine, and Day all out for various lengths of time, it was essential to get plenty of live snaps. FAMU had the ball 13 times, and Miami forced FAMU to punt 13 times, including 11 drives where they went 3 and out, and THAT included the final
Special Teams: B
Kicking was good on PATs. Miami didn’t punt, so that doesn’t count. Miami had a bunch of fair catches on punts. But the one GLARING demerit is Pruitt’s missed/unattempted block on the one Malachi Toney PR that would have EASILY scored had he blocked his man. UGH. That really grinds my gears.
Coaching: A+
Miami was prepared and ready to go, and demolished an overmatched and undermanned FCS team. This is as it should have been. Bravo, gentlemen. 1-0. Onward.
That’s it for this installment of The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.
Hop in the comments and let me know your thoughts.
On to Wake Forest we go!
