‘Whatever it takes’: Canes top Irish in showdown
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Andrea Adelson
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Notre Dame had one last chance to beat Miami, 1:04 left on the clock, redshirt freshman CJ Carr charged with driving the Irish down the field.
Miami coach Mario Cristobal surveyed the field from the opposite sideline. He had a feeling his stalwart defensive ends, Rueben Bain Jr. and Akheem Mesidor, would come through and take advantage of the tired Irish offensive line.
Sure enough, Mesidor and Bain came up with sacks on back-to-back plays to end the game, sealing the No. 10 Hurricanes’ raucous 27-24 victory over No. 6 Notre Dame on Sunday night.
“You know the old saying, these are heavyweight bouts, and rounds 11 through 15 are going to separate the winners and the guys that don’t win it,” Cristobal said. “So we knew it was going to somehow, some way, get to this, and we just felt that if we were tired, that they were going to be more tired. And that was a chance at ‘whatever it takes mentality,’ and going to get it done.”
Perhaps even more gratifying was watching the Miami defense make the plays to seal a game. Last season, the Hurricanes lost a chance to play in the ACC championship game after blowing a 21-0 lead to Syracuse to end the regular season. Cristobal made staff changes, bringing in new defensive coordinator Corey Hetherman to revamp not just the scheme but the attitude with which Miami played.
Injuries hampered Mesidor and Bain last season. But leading into the matchup with Notre Dame, both talked about feeling healthy and ready to play well in the new aggressive scheme that would allow them to make plays.
“We go through the two-minute drill every single day in the hot sun,” Mesidor said. “When the lights are up, and it’s cool outside, and when the moment is right, we’re going to get after it.”
He then referenced their uniform numbers. Mesidor wears No. 3 and Bain wears No. 4.
“Three and four all day,” Mesidor said.
“All day!” Bain said in response. “Best in the nation.”
Both players said it did not go unnoticed that Notre Dame was the favorite in the game. Bain showed his cellphone lock screen during his postgame news conference, with a screen grab of an article that, he said, had negative things to say about him.
Perhaps that provided a little extra motivation. But it seemed renewing a rivalry with the Irish was motivation enough. Scores of former players and coaches, including Jimmy Johnson, Michael Irvin, Devin Hester and Ray Lewis, stood on the sideline in one of the most anticipated home season openers in recent memory.
Carson Beck made his debut for the Hurricanes, after transferring from Georgia, and helped get his team in position for the game-winning score after Notre Dame erased a two-touchdown lead and tied the game at 24 with 3:21 remaining.
Miami had dominated up front for a majority of the game, but after scoring on the opening drive of the third quarter, the play calling turned conservative, and the Hurricanes mustered 15 yards on their ensuing four drives.
Beck said he told his teammates when they got the ball back they were going to go down the field and score. He opened the drive with a completion to CJ Daniels, who wowed earlier in the game with a one-handed leaping 20-yard touchdown catch to give Miami the lead at halftime. From there, Miami handed off to CharMar Brown, who got the Hurricanes into field goal range.
That set up transfer kicker Carter Davis to line up for a 47-yard field goal attempt. Davis beat out two other kickers to win the starting job but had spent the bulk of his career as a kickoff specialist. Headed into Sunday night, he had gone 4-of-11 in his career on field goal attempts.
Beck said he was nervous as he saw Davis line up. Davis said he went through his mental checklist, trying not to let the sold-out crowd get to him.
“Once I looked up at it and I saw it was in, I’d say my heartbeat skipped, plus accelerated, because I was just so excited for it,” Davis said.
Beck finished 20-of-31 for 205 yards with two touchdowns. Carr, making his first career start, made some gutty plays throughout the course of the game — including a diving 7-yard run to tie the game up. But with the game on the line, he was unable to even get an opportunity for a score, thanks to the Miami defense.
Notre Dame has now lost seven straight road games to Miami.
“Tonight wasn’t good enough out of me, specifically. We’ve got to get better,” Carr said.
Coach Marcus Freeman said, “Every goal we have is ahead of us,” but added that the Irish have to play better on the offensive and defensive lines. The Irish had one sack and struggled to get after Beck.
“You’re not going to be really successful on defense if you can’t get pressure on the quarterback with four-man rushes,” Freeman said.
Miami did that, particularly at the end of the game, when it stepped the pressure up on Carr. The result was its first win over an AP Top 10 opponent since beating No. 3 Notre Dame 41-8 in 2017.
“It’s just an unbelievable night for so many people that poured so much into this,” Cristobal said. “Just grateful to be in this opportunity and really hungry and driven [for] the next one.”
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Kristen Shilton
Buffalo Sabres captain Rasmus Dahlin is taking a leave of absence from the team to join his fiancée in Sweden, where she continues to recover from a heart transplant.
There is no timetable for when Dahlin will return to the Sabres. Coach Lindy Ruff was able to share that Dahlin’s fiancée, Carolina Matovac, hadn’t suffered any setbacks.
“[Dahlin] said everything is OK,” Ruff told reporters Friday. “I think it’s been incredibly hard. I fully understand what this young man is going through. I don’t think you can describe it. I’m very passionate about the fact that no one would want to walk in his shoes and to have dealt with what he has dealt with. He has the support of everybody on this. This is larger than hockey.”
Matovac began feeling sick last summer while she and Dahlin were vacationing in France. She experienced sudden heart failure and received life-saving care en route to the hospital. Matovac has remained in Sweden to recover while Dahlin started the new season with Buffalo.
The 25-year-old blueliner is two years into his tenure as Sabres captain and has anchored the club’s defense practically since Buffalo drafted him first overall in 2018. Given Matovac’s health issues, it has been a distracting season for Dahlin, but he has managed nine points in 14 games and carries a heavy workload at over 24 minutes per night.
But Dahlin expressed some frustration about his performance this season following Buffalo’s 3-0 loss to St. Louis on Thursday.
“I got more to give. I’m not satisfied,” Dahlin told reporters. “I want to create more. I want to do more out there. I’m not satisfied, but I’m on the way.”
Some things are bigger than a stat sheet or standings, though, and that’s where Ruff wants to see Dahlin’s focus going for now.
“Family and personal come before hockey,” Ruff said. “Hockey’s our job, hockey’s our lifeline, but family and personal trump anything else.”
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