2021 G5 Preview: Cincinnati Is A Playoff Team
The Bearcats have a very real case for national contention.
ICYMI: This is a part of The Outside Zone’s full 2021 G5 preview series, which last looked at Appalachian State. You can find a master list for all of the previews here.
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Also, a content note here. We’re onto the final two G5 previews this week. Today’s, and BYU on Friday. Once this series is done, I’m going to hibernate until the season starts, returning on Friday, Sept. 3 with a watch guide for the first week of college football (there may also be something on week zero, wink wink).
I’m doing that for one big reason: It gives me time to build up a little bit of a historical backlog. I’d like to do some more lookback pieces during this season, but last year I realized that I never really had the time in-season to do those. Given that I’m also working a full-time job now, I think that doing these ahead of time will be helpful both to ensure that there are always three articles a week on here and to give myself a bit of a break during the season. I care about the quality of this newsletter, and giving myself a little lighter workload during the season is going to be really helpful for making sure that I can keep the quality high.
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If a G5 team is going to make the four-team version of the College Football Playoff, it’s going to be this Cincinnati group. The stars have aligned, the schedule is primed, the roster looks uniquely built for this, and the Bearcats have the clout to do it. You could not draw it up any better than this.
I know I’m hitting the same lede as everyone else here, and I know that the largest appeal of these G5 teams is their separation from the corruption at the top of the sport, but I also know that Cincinnati has a real, actual chance to do something that’s never been done before this season. It’s hard not to talk about it.
I don’t imagine that many are lacking for background here, but I’ll touch on it briefly anyway. Why is this Cincinnati team so uniquely positioned to do what no G5 team has done before it?
Well, it starts with the 2020 season, which is never a good sign, but actually works out pretty well here. Cincinnati’s unbeaten 2020 regular season, conference title win, and near bowl victory over Georgia really shouldn’t matter a ton for determining how this team is viewed, but it does, in a positive way. A good 2020 season could inspire a higher start in the polls this year, and a greater awareness of what UC is doing amongst the extremely oblivious mainstream CFB media that needs to be force-fed content to pick up on it.
Also nice: people know who Cincinnati is. It plays in a conference with big names, it has a well-known former blue blood assistant as its head coach, and the team has been really good in the past. A good Cincinnati isn’t as hard to believe as a good Coastal Carolina or Louisiana, again for the sake of people that don’t pay attention.
Of course, the biggest part of all of this is still the 2021 campaign. Cincinnati has as strong a schedule as Clemson, Ohio State, or Oklahoma, all of which are playoff contenders, and will get the opportunity to notch, at a minimum, probably four or even five ranked wins. Road trips to Indiana and Notre Dame and home bouts with UCF and SMU are all winnable and should come against ranked foes, as will the AAC title game. The AAC still won’t get the respect that it deserves, and Cincinnati will really have to roll through it, but if it does, this doesn’t seem impossible, at least not in the same way that it usually does.
Of course, to make this happen, Cincinnati is still going to have to win these games. That brings us to…
The roster. And boy, is it something. Head coach Luke Fickell’s recruiting at UC has been spectacular, and while it was obviously already starting to show last season, this year’s team really does look like a P5 team in depth, in player type and the makeup of this roster. Cincinnati is strong on the lines, has elite playmakers in all of the skill spots and returns a quarterback that was absolutely fantastic at the end of last season in Desmond Ridder. There are a few players to replace – namely OT James Hudson and safety pairing Darrick Forrest and James Wiggins – and one big coach with DC Marcus Freeman moving onto Notre Dame, but man, this group is still just loaded.
In fact, in some places, I think the turnover may even be to UC’s benefit, like at halfback. Gerrid Doaks was a good player and led the team in both yards and carries last season, but Jerome Ford looked special against Georgia, busting runs like this that we just didn’t really see from Doaks. Cincinnati is primarily a zone running team, and with a back as quick as Ford (a former four-star recruit) and good blocking tight ends in Josh Whyle and another former four-star, Leonard Taylor, split zone looks like this should still be a very reliable staple.
Of course, replacing three starters up front throws a bit of a wrench into that, but transfer James Tunstall was very good at Stony Brook, while Jeremy Cooper and John Williams, the other two projected new starters, are former three-stars that do have at least some experience. And again, it’s zone running with Ford at halfback, and one of the nation’s best quarterbacks to keep the defense honest. I’m pretty sure it will be fine.
Now, keeping that quarterback upright is a little more of a question, but I think Mike Denbrock (the offensive coordinator) is pretty well-positioned to keep Ridder out of trouble, as it Ridder, who proved an adept scrambler last season. Most passes come from the gun with an extra blocker, and UC likes to those throws pretty quick, because it can win those one-on-one battles on slants and quick routes with two very good receivers in Alec Pierre and Michael Young.
The deeper passes are usually saved for play action looks, which makes for a very difficult assignment for opposing safeties. It’s already not a great time to cover these receivers down the field with Ridder throwing to them, and doing so with the constant threat of a handoff to one of the conference’s most explosive backs doesn’t exactly make it any easier. Cincinnati isn’t likely to have one of the truly great offenses in college football this season because that still just isn’t Fickell’s style, but the Bearcats should take some steps forward in explosiveness this year. If they can maintain that Tresselesque efficiency to keep opposing defenses on the field for as long as possible, the core of this group’s strength is firmly intact, even with some new pieces in the two-deep.
Of course, the real strength here is Fickell’s defense, and if the offense can keep the pace generally slow, I really don’t see any reason to be worried about regression on this side of the ball, even with the departure of those safeties and Freeman.
The line returns star end Myjai Sanders and former blue-chipper Malik Vann, while adding another one-time big-time recruit at tackle in Virginia transfer Jowon Briggs – who should rotate plenty with senior Curtis Brooks in this three-man front. The linebacker room welcomes back three vets in Ty Van Fossen, Joel Dublanko and Darrian Beavers, and the secondary still has what may be the best cornerback group in America in Ahmad Gardner, Coby Bryant and Arquon Bush.
Even the safety replacements, Ja’von Hicks and Bryan Cook, while not as experienced as their counterparts, are fourth-and-fifth-year seniors, respectively.
Put all of that experience into one of the best-designed defenses in America, and I just don’t see any significant drop-off here either. Maybe a fall out of the top five is in the cards, but I think that anything beyond that is being far too hard on Fickell and new DC Mike Tressel. The 3-2-2-4 system that Cincinnati runs, with three-down linemen, two-down linebackers and then two box safeties behind them in front of the actual secondary is brilliant for defending modern RPO offenses, and I think it remains brilliant with this much talent and experience, even if it may suffer a few more big plays with a slight step back at the safety spots.
This play is a great example of what makes this defense so good against these modern systems. The front linebackers can play the run first, but with no run here, they’re free to key on the QB as spies or drop into soft zones across the middle. Behind them, that second layer can eliminate intermediate passing into the middle of the field. If you trust your corners with man coverage on the perimeter, as Cincinnati should, there’s just no good way to pass on these guys.
Even short passes to the perimeter, which would be a strength against this defense hypothetically, falls apart because those outside corners can pass assignments off to the box safeties when a route ducks inside, staying to take on those routes to the perimeter.
Add in the ability to bring varied pressure from those linebackers and box safeties, while still dropping six or seven defenders into coverage, and you really have what I would consider the best defense in America right now. Freeman or not. This group won Cincinnati a lot of games last season and will do so again this year.
That brings us back to the operative question, though. Cincinnati is going to win a lot of games. Can it win all of them? Can it beat Indiana and Notre Dame teams that are, at least on paper, more talented? Can it roll through a good AAC to the extent needed to generate style points?
I can’t answer any of that yet, but I can say definitively that the pieces are here. This is the most talented and most well-coached G5 team of the playoff era, it has a strong schedule, and it has the history to give it a boost. An unbeaten Cincinnati would absolutely deserve a shot. Does it get it?