{"id":125472,"date":"2026-01-20T22:13:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T22:13:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125472\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T22:13:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T22:13:11","slug":"mario-cristobal-highlights-good-moments-from-miami-season-fuel-moving-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/125472\/","title":{"rendered":"Mario Cristobal highlights good moments from Miami season, \u2018fuel\u2019 moving forward"},"content":{"rendered":"

No. 10 Miami<\/a>\u2018s run in the College Football Playoff came to an end Monday night at the hands of No. 1 Indiana<\/a> 27-21. The Hurricanes had a chance to score a go-ahead touchdown late in the game, but a costly Carson Beck<\/a> interception gashed all hopes of that.<\/p>\n

Although the \u2018Canes were unable to bring home a National Championship to South Beach, you can\u2019t take away just how stellar of a season it was for Mario Cristobal<\/a>\u2018s team. Miami won 13 games for the first time ever, racked up wins in the Fiesta Bowl and the Cotton Bowl, and knocked off four top-10 ranked opponents.<\/p>\n

Following the National Championship loss, Cristobal highlighted those good moments, while cementing the fact that his program will be using the loss as fuel next season.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, any loss is going to be painful but I\u2019d like to reflect on the fact that these guys won 13 games this year,\u201d Cristobal said. \u201cThey got to the postseason for the first time in Playoff history, then beat four top-10 teams, seven top-25 teams, won the Fiesta Bowl, won the Cotton Bowl, and I\u2019ll take blame that we were one drive short of winning the National Championship.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see anything negative, but I do see pain in moments like this. But you should, if we\u2019re a competitor worth anything. You feel it and you give those feelings a direction. I know the guys coming back will, and I know the guys moving on will continue to use that as fuel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mario Cristobal says CFP run was \u2018for the University of Miami\u2019<\/p>\n

Cristobal, who played at Miami from 1989-1992 and was hired to lead the program into a new era in 2022, has brought his alma mater back to national relevance in just a short amount of time. As recently as 2022, Miami lost a home game to Middle Tennessee State<\/a>. Just three seasons later, the \u2018Canes were on the doorstep of winning a national title and will be considered one of the favorites to do so next season.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not about me,\u201d Cristobal continued. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter the day or the time, I\u2019m always gonna be really, really motivated because this is not for me. This is for the University of Miami. Our drive and determination has always been off the charts and it\u2019s fueled by them. I want to do well by them, and the fact we aren\u2019t leaving with the national title in hand is really hard to deal with.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re worth a damn as a competitor, you take all that stuff and give it a direction. That direction is to always let these guys know wherever they are in life that I\u2019ve got their back and am just a phone call away no matter what, like my coach has always been for me. And for the ones that follow them, they will understand what the standard is, and they\u2019ll be held to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following the loss to Indiana, Miami finishes with a 13-3 record with ranked wins over No. 2 Ohio State<\/a> (Cotton Bowl), No. 6 Notre Dame<\/a>, No. 6 Ole Miss<\/a> (Fiesta Bowl), No. 7 Texas A&M<\/a> (CFP), No. 18 Florida State<\/a>, No. 18 USF<\/a>, and No. 22 Pittsburgh<\/a>. Under Cristobal, the \u2018Canes are 23-6 across the past two seasons and have proved that \u2018The U\u2019 is officially \u2018back\u2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No. 10 Miami\u2018s run in the College Football Playoff came to an end Monday night at the hands…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125473,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[39356,123,125,124],"class_list":["post-125472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-mario-cristobal-88-columbus","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125472\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}