Miami Hurricanes, trying to save a season and maybe Manny Diaz’s job, fall in Chapel Hill | Opinion

The Miami Hurricanes played on Saturday like a football team trying to save its season, or its head coach’s job, or both. There was desperation and fight. There was everything but the right result.

The man who preceded him as Canes coach, Mark Richt, was alluding to the growing heat on Manny Diaz during the pregame show on ACC Network.

“There are wins that bring elation and wins that bring relief,” Richt said. “This win would be about relieving the pressure.”

Would’ve been, yes.

Instead, the job security under Diaz trembles all the more after Saturday’s 45-42 ACC loss to North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

It was a heartbreaker: Miami was in position to win or at least kick a short tying field goal to force overtime — but North Carolina batted a pass and intercepted with :06 on the clock.

The Canes, trailing the whole game, showed admirable fight and resolve.

The thing is, we are way past moral victories, points for effort and ribbons for no-quit.

Bottom lines rule the landscape when your program is a five-time national champion, and so here is Diaz’s reality:

He is a mediocre 16-14 overall deep into his third season in charge.

Miami, ranked No. 14 in the preseason poll, is now 2-4 overall this season and 0-2 in conference play.

UM has now lost six of its past eight games dating to the one that begat the downward spiral: Last December’s embarrassing 66-26 home loss to UNC in which the Canes’ defense got trampled for 778 yards — 554 of them on the ground.

And the Hurricanes are staring now at a 2-6 season record, 0-4 in the ACC and a skid reaching eight losses in the past 10 games — because the next game vs. No. 22 North Carolina State and the following one at Pitt will both see Miami as an almost certain underdog.

The season is slipping fast, and Diaz’s future at UM seems headed in the same direction.

Mitigating in the coach’s favor, perhaps: the quarterback situation, with starter D’Eriq King lost for the rest of the season due to shoulder surgery.

Replacement Tyler Van Dyke, a freshman, mostly played like the rookie he is in the third start and most important one of his college career, completing 20-of-45 passes for 264 yards, with one touchdown but three interceptions.

Van Dyke was better in the second half. He might be really good. Might be the future? But, right now, he’s a really inexperienced QB trying to save a season. A lot to ask.

The bright side: Miami played the Tar Heels a lot tougher Saturday than in last winter’s epic home lay-down.

Still, missed tackles and inopportune penalties hounded the Canes once again. One penalty, roughing the kicker, wiped a UNC field goal off the board and turned it into a touchdown, a four-point swing Miami couldn’t afford. Every time UM got close Saturday, the defense failed to stop the Heels.

The Hurricanes’ problems this season certainly predated the injury to King, who had not been enjoying nearly as good a season as he did last year.

Miami’s only two wins have been vs. Appalachian State and Central Connecticut State, the kind of victories you don’t put in hype videos or brag about to recruits.

Disappointing losses continue to outnumber signature wins under Diaz.

One of those signature wins might have come a couple of weeks ago against a good Virginia team, but a last-second winning field goal boinked off the upright.

Another might have come Saturday. And almost did! But, with six seconds left ... didn’t.

And yet, rather astonishingly, Miami is not out of the race to win the ACC Coastal Division and reach the conference championship game. All remaining games are in the conference. In a most unpredictable season, Miami still could play for the ACC title if it wins out.

Will it take that miracle finish to save Diaz’s job?

The question almost seems moot.

Miami winning out seems an impossible climb right now, for a team and a head coach. And a climb that got that much steeper with Saturday’s heartbreak in Chapel Hill.