The Miami Hurricanes Have A Mario Cristobal Problem

Four weeks ago, the Miami Hurricanes were the toast of the college football town.

Fresh off a physical domination of their instate rivals, the Florida State Seminoles, South Florida's finest looked poised for a deep playoff run and were being talked about by many as the best team in college football.

But time makes fools of us all, and the Hurricanes came plummeting back down to earth over the next month.

First, the Canes got upended by the Louisville Cardinals on a rare Friday night of action in the ACC.

Then, in an even bigger stunner, Miami traveled to Dallas to take on the SMU Mustangs.

SMU made the playoffs last season, but were coming off a heartbreaking loss to the Wake Forest Demon Deacons just a week earlier.

Surely, the Hurricanes would be able to keep the train rolling with their playoff goals still in front of them, right?

Oh, no! Not again.

It was less than a year ago that Miami took a top-five unit into Atlanta to take on the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets, only to drop that one and then another in upstate New York to Syracuse and miss their shot at the playoffs.

It feels like Déjà vu, as the Canes now have two losses before the season is even over and are on the outside looking in for the ACC Championship game.

While this may look like bad luck to the uninitiated, the problems go much deeper.

This is emblematic of head coach Mario Cristobal's style of play.

His decision-making leaves very little margin for error, and there is multiple season's worth of data to suggest this to be the case.

Both losses this season and last season were against teams with a significantly lower talent profile, meaning the games should've never been close enough.

But because Cristobal's teams routinely play within one possession of their opponents, the margin for error shrinks to a razor thin gap.

There is also the infamous decision to not kneel the ball two years ago against Georgia Tech, which represents the perfect microcosm of the Canes' coach.

Canes fans are starting to wake up to the fact that Cristobal is more of a hindrance than a help for their team.

I doubt the Hurricanes will move on from Cristobal any time soon.

He has raised the floor significantly in Coral Gables, and he's a former player and native of Miami.

However, if the Canes ever want to reach their ceiling, they might want to consider looking for someone else to don the headset in Hard Rock Stadium.

Some Miami fans may not want to hear that, but sometimes the most effective medicine is the toughest to swallow.