Canes Preview: South Florida Bulls

Series History

Miami and South Florida have only met seven times in their program history, with Miami leading the series 6-1. The two programs aren't necessarily rivals, but their 2024 match-up felt like a heated affair until Cam Ward and company blew the doors open in the second half, winning the game 50-15. Miami has controlled the series with its first match-up against South Florida in 2005, with Miami winning 27-7. From 2009 to 2013, Miami and South Florida met every year, with Miami going 4-1 in the stretch, with wins in 2009, by the score of 31-10, 6-3 in 2011, 40-9 in 2012, and 49-21 in 2013. South Florida won their first and only game in the series in 2010, 23-20, and it was the second-to-last game of Randy Shannon's coaching tenure at Miami. Miami and South Florida hadn't met in 11 years, but they played each other in 2024. As I mentioned earlier, the game was intense and heated until Miami asserted its dominance over South Florida. The two squads will meet up for the eighth time tomorrow, when they play at Hard Rock Stadium. Miami and South Florida will meet up in 2027 at Raymond James Stadium and in 2028 at Hard Rock Stadium.

Keys to the Game

Miami needs to take care of the Bulls' uptempo offense. If they can shut it down and get the Miami offense clicking, the game won't be that close. Miami can't afford to commit dumb penalties that give South Florida any hope because it's going to provide them with life, and they can absolutely capitalize on the mistakes.

South Florida needs to stick to what they do best: being fast and playing with a massive chip on their shoulders. The Bulls are one of those teams that can be an enormous nuisance and definitely win this game.

Prediciton

South Florida is an excellent team, having won over ranked Boise State (now unranked) and Florida in The Swamp. Yeah, you can say both Boise State and Florida are highly overrated, but you can't take that away from South Florida. They can find a way to win this game, and I personally like Alex Golesh and what he is doing for this program. Miami has playmakers on both sides of the ball, and they are way more talented than South Florida. Still, they need to do the whole hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard, and if they can show the grinding way Mario loves to play, then we can see this game being like how 2024 was played out, being an absolute dog fight, and in the second half, Miami just running away with this game. If South Florida wins this game, they will be an absolute unit in the American Athletic Conference, potentially causing shockwaves in the College Football Playoffs. After all, when was the last time a Group of 5 team won three straight games against top 25 teams?  Miami wins, and then they will be really confident about going into the Florida game at home. They have a great shot at running the table of the ACC with a potential top 10 match-up with their heated rivals, Florida State. Overall, I personally see Miami winning this game cause the talent and the imposing nature the Canes play with will just kill South Florida over a four-quarter game.