SoFla Guide Editors
The Miami Hurricanes are still No. 1 in the new AP Top 25, and they didn’t exactly tiptoe their way into keeping it. The Canes blasted Pittsburgh 52-23 at Hard Rock Stadium on Oct. 24, ESPN reported, while the rest of college football’s elite kept tripping over its own shoelaces. Behind Miami, Ohio State climbed to No. 2 after BYU took a tumble, according to Field Level Media.
A No. 1 debut that looked like a highlight reel
This was a big one for Miami Gardens. The win over Pitt was Miami’s first game as the nation’s top-ranked team since the 2002 season, according to ESPN’s game recap.
The offense treated the occasion like a party. Quarterback Darian Mensah completed 31 of 37 passes for 387 yards and four touchdowns, ESPN reported.
Head coach Mario Cristobal, never one to oversell, summed up the 29-point rout this way to ESPN: “A really good conference win. Solid play.”
Solid. Sure, Coach.
The crowd had some serious star power, too. Members of Miami’s 2001 national championship team, including Ed Reed and Andre Johnson, were in attendance, according to the Hurricanes’ official athletics site. Not a bad group to have watching your first game at No. 1 in more than two decades.
Malachi Toney keeps breaking his own records
If you grew up anywhere near Liberty City, you already know the name. Malachi Toney, a sophomore wide receiver listed from Liberty City, set a Miami school record with 16 receptions against Pitt, finishing with 194 receiving yards and three touchdowns, according to miamihurricanes.com.
Pitt, apparently, has seen enough of him.
The performance also pushed Toney past 2,000 career receiving yards, according to the Hurricanes’ site. And he’s only a sophomore. As a freshman in 2025, he led all FBS freshmen with 84 receptions, finished the season with 109 receptions to lead all of FBS and set Miami’s single-season receptions record, and was named both ACC Rookie of the Year and ACC Offensive Rookie of the Year, per the official site.
Cristobal didn’t hold back on this topic. “There’s not a guy in the country more dependable than Malachi Toney,” he told The Miami Hurricane.
Toney, for his part, credited the work that happens long before kickoff. “It’s relentless. You play this game before this game. You play it Tuesday and Wednesday,” he told The Miami Hurricane.
Meanwhile, everywhere else: chaos
Miami’s spot at the top came out of one of the wildest stretches the poll has seen. The Canes rose to No. 1 on Oct. 18 after a 43-35 double-overtime win over Florida State, on a Saturday when five of the previous top seven AP teams lost, according to Canes Warning. That was the first time in the poll’s 90-year history that had happened, the outlet reported.
And the madness didn’t stop. Over the three-week span ending Oct. 25, 10 AP top-10 teams suffered losses, with three teams ranked No. 1 or No. 2 losing to unranked opponents, according to the AP wire via KSAT.
The latest casualty was BYU. The Cougars, ranked No. 2 the prior week, fell six spots to No. 8 after a 39-31 double-overtime loss at UCF on Oct. 25, Field Level Media reported. That opened the door for Ohio State to move up to No. 2.
Longtime Canes fans will notice something about that matchup at the top. Miami’s last stint at No. 1 came during the 2002 season, before the national championship game against Ohio State, according to Canes Warning. Now the Buckeyes are sitting right behind Miami again. File that under “things that make 305 group chats very loud.”
What it means for South Florida
Miami is one of only three undefeated teams left in the FBS, along with No. 6 Utah and No. 7 UCLA, as of Oct. 25, according to The Miami Hurricane. In a season where top-10 teams keep going down, staying perfect means something.
It also means every opponent will be gunning for the team at the top. Mensah sounded like he’s embracing that. “It’s motivating, for sure,” he said, according to ESPN’s game recap.
For local fans, the storyline writes itself: a hometown kid from Liberty City breaking records at Hard Rock, a quarterback playing near-perfect football, and the 2001 legends in the building to see it. With the rest of the top 10 looking shaky, the Canes are the steady ones for now, and South Florida is enjoying every minute of it.
