119th Battle for the Victory Bell Preview Notes
UC will host the 119th Battle for the Victory Bell at their home-away-from-home, Mike Brown’s Concrete Jungle. Kick-off is set for 7:00pm against the Miami Redhawks, as the ‘Cats look to win a 9th-consecutive Bell. See you all Saturday night at the Banks!
Pregame news and notes below, but first, a few rivalry fun facts: The UC-Miami rivalry, first played in 1888, is the oldest in the nation (in a tie with North Carolina-Wake Forest, who have met “only” 106 times). In 2016, it will become the second most-played rivalry in the nation, behind the Battle for Paul Bunyan’s Axe (Minnesota-Wisconsin). The Mizzou-Kansas Border War currently holds 2nd place with 120 meetings, but that rivalry game fell victim to conference realignment, and is now dormant.
No Excuses, Play Like A Champion (Rule #76)
There are no excuses for anything less than a dominating performance from the Bearcats on Saturday night. Miami is winless since October 27, 2012. That’s 19 games in a row. And as I’ve mentioned before, this series remains a “rivalry” in name only. UC has won eight straight Victory Bells by an average score of 36-9, and won 9-of-10 since the Ben Roethlisberger era ended in Oxford. The 19 consecutive losses have made the Redhawks a weekly inclusion in ESPN’s weekly “Bottom Ten” column, which is a really entertaining read if you haven’t checked it out before. Miami U. looked bad on both sides of the ball in a 34-10 loss to Michigan last week – yes, the Michigan got boatraced 31-0 by Notre Dame. Ex-Bearcat Bennie Coney and the FCS Eastern Kentucky Colonels even beat “J-Crew U.” in Week 2. If UC doesn’t totally dominate, I’ll be very, very worried going into next week’s showdown with Ohio State.
Look For Gunner and the UC Offense To Stay Hot
Cincinnati QB Gunner Kiel dazzled in his collegiate debut last Friday night. His 6 TD passes tied a school record, and set the NCAA record for most TD passes in a player’s first college game. For what it’s worth, Kiel established the conference record in the two year-old American Conference, too. And Kiel must be licking his chops this week in the film room. Coming off a 58 point, 584 yard performance, he and the UC offense will get to face a Miami Redhawks team that has been downright dreadful for several years now. Last year, UC struggled to an underwhelming 14-0 win against Miami. While UC’s defense was dominant, Brendan Kay’s aching throwing arm caused him to struggle with accuracy, which crippled the Bearcat offense. Look for no such issues this year. Kiel’s accuracy and ability to fit the ball into tight windows in the opener was impressive. This Battle for the Victory Bell will probably get ugly quickly, unless UC just plain forgets to show up.
Offensive Line Health Issues
Starting C Deyshawn Bond and Starting RT Cody Keebler both left UC’s win over Toledo last week with injuries. Keebler’s injury did not appear serious, as he walked off the field under his own power. Bond, however, was seen heading for the locker room on crutches with an apparent knee injury. Head Coach Tommy Tuberville says that Bond is day-to-day, which is encouraging. Perhaps he will miss this weekend’s game, but it sure would be nice to get Bond back in time for the trip to Columbus next week. The Rimington Trophy (Best College Center) Watch List member is a cornerstone of this year’s offensive line.
Can the UC Defense Improve?
This will be a pretty big step down in competition from last week, but it would be nice to see the Bearcats’ defense iron out some of the issues that plagued them against Toldeo. Foremost were the several blown assignments in the secondary that allowed the Rockets to have guys wide open (like 15-yards open) for big plays three or four times. I expect the run defense to be better simply because UC should physically dominate the trenches, as they did last year (when they held MU to 87 total yards). One of my high school basketball coaches used to say, “You either get better or get worse every time you play.” The Bearcats defense can either coast on their superior talent and just go through the motions, or they can actually focus on the schemes, put in some hard work, and get better. Let’s hope it’s the latter, because they need to get a lot better by next weekend.
Special Teams Position Battles Continue?
Or will they? The big surprise of the opener versus Toledo was that Redshirt Freshmen Andrew Gantz and Sam Geraci beat out seniors Tony Miliano and John Lloyd for the kicking and punting duties, respectively – at least for last week. Tuberville says that the position battles for specialist positions will be “ongoing” and “week-to-week,” but both Gantz and Geraci performed well against Toledo, so I would be shocked if either loses his starting job this week. Gantz missed an extra point in the first quarter, but I think you can chalk that one up to nerves for a Freshman playing in his first college game. He connected on his other six PATs, as well as a 34-yard field goal. Geraci was even more impressive while handling the punting duties. His long was 48, and his 38.3-yard average was dragged down by the two perfect pooch-punts he rolled inside the 5 yard-line. The American Conference went so far as to name Gerachi the league’s Special Teams Player of the Week.
Battle of the Irish Scrapheap
Notre Dame transfers Gunner Kiel and Andrew Hendrix, teammates and fellow backup QBs on Notre Dame’s 2012 BCS Runner Up team, will face off against each other on Saturday night. Kiel, of course, was highly touted as a top-ranked prep QB, but decided to transer after fellow Freshman Everett Golson beat him out for the starting job and then led the Irish to said National Title Game birth. Hendrix, for his part, was not highly touted, but is a name familiar to football fans in Southwest Ohio. Hendrix quarterbacked the Moeller Crusaders in 2009, and was recruited by UC before signing with Notre Dame. He then proceed master the fine arts of hand-signaling, clipboard carrying, and headset wearing for four years in South Bend. He did play a little at ND, but it was pretty much all in mop-up duty, and without any head-turning results. Hendrix used the NCAA’s transfer exemption for players who have graduated to go to Miami and play immediately, while working on a Masters’ degree. His play for the Redhawks has been very lackluster so far this year. In three games this year, Hendrix has completed just 48% of his passes, and has tossed 5 INTs to go with his 5 TDs. Kiel has more TDs (and no picks) in just one game.
Large Crowd Expected
UC is anticipating a crowd of over 40,000 for the game against Miami, which would approach a “sell out,” at least in UC’s 2014 configuration of Paul Brown Stadium. In an effort to create a more intimate and electric gameday atmosphere, UC has closed the upper deck as the Bearcats play the 2014 season in the purgatory of PBS. This has effectively reduced capacity to roughly 43,000 for UC home games. The Saturday 7:00pm start time, regional opponent, and great weather forecast will all help drive attendance up for this game. It should be a great atmosphere.
Feel Good Story: Munchie Returns
It was great to see QB Munchie LeGeaux return to the field last week, and complete 4-of-5 passes no less. I wasn’t really thrilled to see all three QBs playing in the second quarter, because I feel like that helped set a tone of “we’re up 41-7, so we’re shutting it down” way too early in the game. I would have rather seen Munchie (and Evans) play later in the game, but good for him. Tuberville says that all three QBs will play again this week, and there will probably be plenty of garbage time to go around. Congrats to Munchie for working so hard to rehab from that terrible knee injury he suffered last year at Illinois, in which he tore just about everything there is to tear in a knee. It’s remarkable that he is back a year later, and he will be a tremendous asset for UC this season. You can’t put a pricetag on having a Senior QB available, just in case you need him.