Cam Ward tops 15,000 career passing yards in Miami Hurricanes' 50-15 rout of South Florida

Miami's Cam Ward threw for 404 yards and three touchdowns while becoming the 13th player in NCAA history to top 15,000 career passing yards to help the eighth-ranked Hurricanes rout South Florida 50-15 on Saturday night.

Ward tossed TD passes of 6 yards to Isaiah Horton, 5 yards to Xavier Restrepo and 76 yards to Sam Brown, the latter putting Miami (4-0) ahead for good late in the second quarter. Damien Martinez rushed for three TDs, including a pair of 1-yarders that finished long drives that built the lead to 36-15 in the third quarter.

Receiver Sean Atkins had 11 catches for 125 yards and also threw a 12-yard TD pass to quarterback Byrum Brown for USF (2-2).

The Bulls led 15-14 with 2:36 remaining in the first half after getting field goals of 58 and 51 yards from Nico Gramatica and 45 yards from John Cannon to give an announced crowd of 58,616 hopes an upset was in the making.

Ward entered the night needing 89 yards to reach 15,000 for his career and got there on a 22-yard completion to Horton late in the first quarter. Moments later, he threw 6 yards to Horton for a touchdown that finished an eight-play, 90-yard drive that gave the Hurricanes a 14-9 lead.

The only other active college quarterback with more than 15,000 passing yards is Oregon’s Dillon Gabriel, whose career total entering Saturday was 15,779 in 53 games at three different schools. Ward reached the milestone in the 48th game of a career that began at FCS Incarnate Word, where he threw for 6,908 yards in two seasons.

The 6-foot-2, 223-pound quarterback spent the last two years at Washington State, passing for 6,968 yards there. He's thrown for 1,439 yards in Miami’s first four games to become the first to start a stint at the school with four consecutive 300-yard games and hike his career total to 15,315.

Ward finished Saturday night 24 of 34 passing with one interception on a throw that glanced off the hands of Restrepo in the first quarter. Jordan Lyle finished Miami's scoring with a 90-yard TD run in the closing minutes.

USF, in its second season under coach Alex Golesh, gave a Top 10 opponent problems for the second time in its last three games. The Bulls got Miami's attention when they played No. 4 Alabama close before a fourth-quarter collapse left them with a 42-16 loss.

It was 14-13 going into the fourth quarter against the Crimson Tide, though, and Saturday night they only trailed 22-15 after Cannon missed a 31-yard field goal that would have trimmed the deficit to four just before halftime.

Ward threw for five touchdowns and Miami amassed a school-record 750 yards total offense in the previous week's 62-0 rout of Ball State. His three TD passes against USF raised his season total to 14.

The takeaway

Miami: The Hurricanes passed what amounted to their first real test after opening the season with lopsided wins over Florida (41-17), Florida A&M (56-9) and Ball State (62-0). Now, they turn their attention to the start of Atlantic Coast Conference play.

USF: Golesh clearly has the Bulls, who begin the American Athletic Conference portion of their schedule next week, headed in the right direction after inheriting a team that went 1-11 two years ago. The one-time Tennessee offensive coordinator led a six-win turnaround to 7-6 in 2023.

Poll implications

Miami, which has scored 209 points in its four games, figures to protect its standing in the Top 10.

Up Next

Miami hosts Virginia Tech in ACC opener next Friday.

USF has its AAC opener at Tulane next Saturday.

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