'That's what that $4 million is all about': Behind Carson Beck, Miami delivers a drive for the ages

GLENDALE, Ariz. — On the sideline, Michael Irvin, the Pro Football Hall of Famer who has lived and died with every Miami snap this season, squatted with his head in his hands. ACC commissioner Jim Phillips rocked nervously. Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps, a Canes fan, and Pro Football Hall of Famer Ray Lewis, a Miami legend, traded looks of disbelief.

There was 3:13 left on the clock in the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl. Miami had frittered away a litany of opportunities to break Ole Miss, but instead, tight end Dae’Quan Wright danced across the goal line to give the Rebels a 27-24 lead, and the Canes now had one final drive to keep their magical playoff run going, to return home to South Florida for the College Football Playoff National Championship.

Two months earlier, after an agonizing overtime loss to SMU that nearly kept Miami from the playoff, receiver Keelan Marion had gathered his teammates and urged them to keep the faith. Now, he huddled up with the offense and repeated the same message.

“Three minutes left for the rest of our lives,” Marion told his teammates. “Right here, we take it back home.”

What followed was a 15-play, 75-yard touchdown drive capped by a scramble into the end zone by quarterback Carson Beck that will now take its place in Miami lore, the moment that storied Canes program clawed its way back to the mountaintop.

“You see what happened,” Marion said afterward, his jersey stained with grass and sweat. “That’s where we’re headed. Back home.”

Miami practices its two-minutes drive each Wednesday — a good-on-good drill against the first-team defense. The message offensive coordinator Shannon Dawson delivered as the Canes took the field for that final drive was simply a reminder: None of this is new.

“We drill this against our defense every week,” he said. “That’s the hardest defense to do it against. We’re built for this. Let’s go score.”

Miami’s march back to Hard Rock Stadium for a chance to secure its first national title in 24 years started at the Ole Miss 25-yard line, with Beck in the backfield staring down the Ole Miss defense and, after two years of seemingly endless criticism, a moment of redemption.

“That’s your moment right there,” Dawson told him. “Go make a play.”

Beck’s first pass was a deep ball to Marion that fell incomplete. He followed it with an 8-yard completion to Marion. Miami then faced the first of three critical third downs on the drive.

In the first round of this playoff, the Canes had been a woeful 3-of-12 on third down against Texas A&M, but they rode a dominant defense to a 10-3 win. After that, Dawson tweaked his approach on early-down playcalling, he said, to avoid so many third-and-longs, and upped the focus on third-down work in practice. It had been the overwhelming focus of Miami’s efforts the past two weeks.

On Thursday, the Canes converted 11 of them — their most in a game since 2020.

Mark Fletcher got the carry on the first third down of the final drive, moving the sticks after pushing ahead for 4 yards. The ground game had been relentless against Ole Miss behind an offensive line that wasn’t so much opening holes for Fletcher as it was simply shoving the Rebels’ defense downfield.

“We just said, let’s end the game on our terms,” center James Brockermeyer said. “That’s what we did.”

Beck’s next throw fell incomplete, then on second down, he hit CharMar Brown for a short gain. Again, Miami faced a critical third down.

On the sideline, Phillips nodded his head.

“They’re going to win this,” he said.

It was a confidence echoed in Miami’s huddle.

“Never a doubt,” Fletcher said. “You could see the look in Carson’s eyes.”

Before the snap, Beck told Marion to watch his defender. If he came down into press coverage, Beck was looking Marion’s way.

“Then my job is to win,” Marion said.

Sure enough, corner James Braxton pressed, and Beck launched a pass to the sideline that careened off Marion’s hands. Immediately, Marion grabbed at his face mask, begging for a flag.

“He literally grabbed my whole face,” Marion said. “I’d been telling [Braxton] all night he can’t mess with me. He can’t guard me.”

The flag came, and the 15-yard penalty set up Miami with a first-and-10 at the Ole Miss 46.

After a short completion, Beck dropped back on second down and was immediately chased from the pocket. As he scrambled to his right, he saw Malachi Toney along the sideline and zipped a pass. Toney snagged the ball and tapped his foot along the grass for what was initially called a catch, but replay showed his heel touched out of bounds.

Miami faced another third down, and Beck delivered another dagger.

“Open zone, the ball came,” said CJ Daniels, who hauled in a 7-yard catch to covert the first down, “and I had to come through for my teammates.”

Beck threw incomplete on each of the next two plays, however, and Miami faced third-and-10 at the Ole Miss 35 for what Dawson said was “ultimately the most critical play of the drive.”

Marion found Beck before the play and begged for the ball.

“I’m hot,” he told his QB. “I’m ready. I’ve got the adrenaline running. Now let’s go.”

Marion ran a dig route, and Beck hit him in stride. The play went for 17 yards.

Another 11-yard completion to Marion took Miami to the Ole Miss 8, and the Miami legends along the sideline were ready to explode.

“Guys kept fighting, kept believing, kept pushing, kept pushing,” former Miami receiver Reggie Wayne said afterward. “That’s what that $4 million [paid to Beck] is all about.”

After a short run by CharMar Brown, Dawson dialed up a pass play called “Seahawk.”

The play was supposed to go to Toney on a dig route. If that was covered, Beck was supposed to have a receiver crossing along the back of the end zone. If that failed, the tight end was on a delay and set to serve as a safety valve.

Ole Miss played it perfectly.

“I came back to the cross, came back to the dig, they’d doubled it,” Beck said.

Beck danced in the backfield, and eventually the pass rush broke through.

“The D-end came in screaming,” Mauigoa said. “I was blocking him until [guard Anez Cooper] bumped me off. The guy looped around me, and he was all the way around me. He almost got to Carson and I was like, ‘Oh s—.’ I sprinted over and hit him, turn back and Carson’s wide open to the end zone. I’m like, ‘There he goes.'”

Beck scrambled to his left, and with Ole Miss in man coverage, there was nothing but green grass ahead of him.

“I started celebrating before I got to the end zone,” Beck said. “It was one of the best moments of my life. I basically blacked out.”

Brockermeyer caught sight of Beck scrambling from the corner of his eye and grinned.

“I didn’t think he had it in him,” Brockermeyer said. “He’s got sneaky speed. But seeing him in the end zone, it’s something I’ll never forget.”

Said teammate Jakobe Thomas: “Seeing Vanilla Vick take off in the end zone the last couple of seconds. It was amazing to see.”

Beck had just 16 scramble plays during the regular season, but Dawson had urged him to use his legs more over the past two games. Now, he’d turned that advice into the biggest touchdown of Miami’s season — even if Dawson wasn’t exactly celebrating.

“It was just relief,” Dawson said. “I was just glad I didn’t have to call another play.”

For much of the past two years, Beck had been dogged by criticism — first at Georgia and then with the Canes.

In the end zone scrum after his touchdown, however, Fletcher found his QB and offered an emphatic evaluation: “You’re the GOAT.”

“That was a defining moment,” Dawson said after the game. “Carson deserves that moment probably more than anybody I’ve ever been around. He stepped up when we needed him the most, and that’s what a true leader does. He’s been through a lot. There’s a lot of people that have doubted him. He’s one of the winningest quarterbacks to ever play the game, and he doesn’t get the credit or the respect he deserves. Maybe now he will.”

In the locker room after the game, Beck sat slouched at his locker, surrounded by a trio of teammates singing his praises.

“Who’s Fernando Mendoza?” one shouted, suggesting Beck had eclipsed Indiana’s Heisman Trophy winner as the game’s top QB.

“Regardless of what I do, people are going to doubt me,” Beck said after the 31-27 win. “I’m worried about the people on this team and my family and these coaches. Everybody that’s been through the entire thing with me. Everybody on the outside, they can stay out. I don’t care.”

There is still a game left, of course. That final 15-play touchdown drive didn’t deliver a national championship. But it did exorcise so many demons that have haunted this program since the last time the Hurricanes hoisted the trophy following the 2001 season, and it was the latest reminder that this group is ready to script a new legacy.

“It almost seems like the tougher it gets, the better we play,” head coach Mario Cristobal said. “And it’s a testament to them, to their resilience and their will.”