Miami continues to find itself on the outside looking in for a spot in the College Football Playoff despite a 10-2 record powered by a defense that ranks among the best in the country in stop rate.
What is stop rate? It's a basic measurement of success: the percentage of a defense's drives that end in punts, turnovers or a turnover on downs. Defensive coordinators have the same goal regardless of their scheme, opponent or conference: prevent points and get off the field. Stop rate is a simple metric but can offer a good reflection of a defense's effectiveness on a per-drive basis in today's faster-tempo game.
Stop rate is not an advanced stat and is no substitute for Bill Connelly's SP+, FPI or other more comprehensive metrics. It's merely a different method for evaluating success on defense against FBS opponents. Here's the current leaderboard at the conclusion of the regular season:
The Hurricanes moved up to No. 6 in stop rate at 75.8% in the final regular-season stop rate standings following a 38-7 rout of No. 22 Pitt on Saturday. They held Pitt star freshman Mason Heintschel to 199 passing yards, forced punts on six of 10 drives and improved to 4-0 against ranked opponents on the year.
But will that be enough to stay in the hunt for an at-large bid in the eyes of the CFP committee? The Hurricanes will not play for the ACC title and are squarely on the bubble.
Miami handled its business on defense in November following its overtime loss at SMU, allowing 10.25 points per game over its last four with a stop rate of 83.3%, and is one of five teams along with Ohio State, Indiana, Texas Tech and Washington that hasn't given up 28 or more points in any game this season.
First-year Miami defensive coordinator Corey Hetherman and his staff rebuilt their secondary with portal additions this offseason and paired it with one of the top pass rushing duos in the country in Rueben Bain Jr. and Akheem Mesidor. They put together a unit that ranks top 10 in run defense and yards per play, 11th in passing yards per dropback and has put up 34 sacks and 20 takeaways.
"That defense has put together as good of a résumé as anybody in the country," Miami coach Mario Cristobal said after the Pitt win.
A few more updates to note regarding these updated stop rate standings:
Washington State moved up to No. 20 in the stop rate standings after clinching bowl eligibility with a 32-8 win over Oregon State. Considering what this coaching staff was up against with their Year 1 rebuild, that's pretty darn impressive. Defensive coordinator Jesse Bobbit came with coach Jimmy Rogers from South Dakota State and took over a unit that returned zero full-time starters after losing seven to the transfer portal and the rest to graduation. After North Texas and Washington scored 59 points against Washington State in back-to-back weeks, the Cougars held the rest of their opponents to 12.6 points per game on average with a stop rate of 80.5%.
Arizona (No. 19) and East Carolina (No. 25) joined Washington State in moving into the top 25 of the final regular season standings while Buffalo, Michigan and Pittsburgh dropped out this week. The Wildcats achieved a remarkable turnaround under DC Danny Gonzalez after finishing 108th in stop rate a year ago, and props to first-year ECU DC Josh Aldridge for helping coach Blake Harrell upgrade the Pirates' defense during another 8-4 campaign.
Nebraska fired first-year defensive coordinator John Butler on Monday after a rough finish with losses in four of the last six games. The Huskers had a top-25 stop rate defense under Tony White in 2024 but slid to 80th this season at 60%.
Only five FBS programs managed to win six or more games with bottom-25 stop rate defenses: Delaware (114th), Duke (117th), Navy (119th), NC State (121st) and Georgia Southern (125th). And yet, the 7-5 Blue Devils are about to play in the ACC championship game with a chance to reach the playoff.
Air Force narrowly edged out UAB to finish last in this season's stop rate standings. This was an incredibly close call with the Blazers finishing with a stop rate of 42.34% and the Falcons finishing at 42.31% after both 4-8 teams were victorious in their regular season finale. UAB's defense played seven more drives against FBS opponents on the year and got three more stops. UMass went 0-12 but achieved a stop rate of 46.7%, good for 132nd in FBS.
Note: All data is courtesy of ESPN Research. Games against FCS opponents and end-of-half drives in which the opponent took a knee or ran out the clock were filtered out.