Miami’s Van Dyke stoked for camp. ‘Talking about last year gets me so hyped for this year’

Call him a Heisman candidate. Suggest he’s another Joe Burrow or Justin Herbert. Remind him he’s the reigning Atlantic Coast Conference Rookie of the Year.

Just don’t get University of Miami quarterback Tyler Van Dyke ticked off — that is, if you believe you can defeat him.

“I just like when people don’t believe in me,’’ a smiling Van Dyke told the Miami Herald during a private conversation at the ACC media days as he reminisced a bit about last year’s NC State mini brouhaha (keep reading). “I like to prove them wrong.’’

It’s third-year sophomore Van Dyke’s team now, as it was all along after former star quarterback D’Eriq King sustained a career-ending shoulder injury in the third game last season against Michigan State. Van Dyke just didn’t know it then. He does now. And so do the rest of the Hurricanes as fall camp opens Friday morning on campus at Greentree Practice Field to prepare for the 3:30 p.m. Sept. 3 season opener against Bethune-Cookman.

Van Dyke said he’s still 6-4 and 224 pounds, but has decreased his body fat to 12 percent. Because of the Name, Image and Likeness laws allowing college athletes to earn money, Van Dyke will drive a BMW 750i “for the rest of his collegiate career through an NIL Deal with #SarchioneAutoGallery,” his marketing agent, former UM player Shawn O’Dare, posted on Twitter in April. He’ll also earn $65,000 in 2022 from Miami attorney and prominent UM booster John Ruiz’s company LifeWallet (mostly), “a small portion’’ coming from Ruiz’s Cigarette Racing Team, Ruiz said. That doesn’t include deals with several other companies.

The NFL seems just around the corner, but Van Dyke wants to keep it in perspective.

The NFL is “definitely a dream,’’ he said, when asked by the Herald about the prospect of his leaving early to enter the draft based on several first-round projections. “If I’m not a first-rounder, I don’t see the point in leaving. I see all the projections, but at the end of the day you have to prove it on the field. It all starts with the team.

“Where my feet are is where my head is at,’’ Van Dyke continued, echoing new coach Mario Cristobal and his impressive staff of assistants. “We’re going to have a really good season. Winning the Coastal [Division] is first and foremost, and then national championship in the end. I really believe we can do it.’’

Van Dyke played in 10 games last season and started the final nine, completing 202 of 324 passes (62.3 percent) for 2,931 yards and 25 touchdowns, with six interceptions. He finished eighth nationally in passing yards per completion (14.5), 11th in passing efficiency (160.1) and 14th in passing yards per game (293.1). UM had the nation’s No. 10 passing offense.

He ended the season with six consecutive games with at least 300 passing yards and at least three touchdown passes, becoming the first Power 5 quarterback to do so in a single season since LSU’s Burrow in 2019, when he won the Heisman Trophy.

Eagles fan

Van Dyke, from Glastonbury, Connecticut, worked with former NFL stars Peyton and Eli Manning, as well as some of the nation’s finest college quarterbacks at the Manning Passing Academy this summer. He said he grew up “a huge Eagles” and “Donovan McNabb fan.’’

“He was a role model for me just watching the games,’’ Van Dyke told reporters at the ACC media days, eliciting a response on Twitter from McNabb, who posted a video of the quarterback.

“You just never know who’s watching you,’’ McNabb said. “Be a pro at all times and stay on your grind.”

Known as a workout fanatic since his freshman year in 2020, Van Dyke thrives on pushing his body physically and mentally. He said ”probably 75 to 80 percent of the install of new coordinator Josh Gattis’s offense is in,’’ and that he has improved greatly in reading coverages and “understanding what the defense is going to do.”

This summer has been more organized with player-led 7-on-7s every Tuesday and Thursday and additional opportunities, though still limited, to work with coaches, per new NCAA rules.

“Sometimes in games last year reading coverages would get to me and I would kind of go blind out there and not really understand what was going on,’’ Van Dyke said. “There were a few times I saw it really well. I’m trying to get to that point where I’m really consistent.’’

Malik Rosier

Van Dyke still works with former UM quarterback Malik Rosier, now based in Tampa, about twice a month. “He helps me a good amount making sure my mechanics are really good and also mentally working on film study. I’d say my arm strength and accuracy have improved, especially throwing from my lower body. I really worked on driving my knee and getting my hips through.’’

Rosier, who coaches for the Mobile, Alabama-based company Quarterback Country, began working with Van Dyke last summer and also started working with freshman UM quarterback Jacurri Brown.

Rosier said Van Dyke is “bigger, stronger, faster and much more confident.”

“Last summer Tyler knew who he was but was also trying to figure out if he could play at the University of Miami,’’ Rosier told the Herald. “Now he knows he belongs. Tyler definitely has the talent to to win big awards like the Heisman, but that’s not his mind-set. He just wants to win games, win the ACC, win the national championship..

“He cares about his boys and winning.’’

Van Dyke believes in his teammates, citing a defense he contends will be far improved and an offense that will have several playmakers. He’s particularly high on his offensive line, and said a deeper running back corps — with Don Chaney Jr. expected back after knee surgery, Jaylan Knighton, Ole Miss transfer Henry Parrish Jr., Thad Franklin and blue-chip freshman TreVonte’ Citizen all in contention — will ultimately open more opportunities for him.

As for the pass-catchers, other than tight ends Will Mallory and Elijah Arroyo, Van Dyke wouldn’t get overly specific, saying, “We don’t really have much experience at the receiving position’’ after losing Charleston Rambo and Mike Harley. But he praised returning starter Key’Shawn Smith and said his close friend “Xavier Restrepo in the slot is going to be that security blanket for me making plays.’’

Cristobal’s take

“You build around your best players,” former two-time UM national champion Cristobal said the day he was introduced as Miami head coach in December after Manny Diaz was fired following a 7-5 season. “It’s obvious, watching from afar, watching film on the way in, there’s not a better quarterback in the country.’’

New UM quarterbacks coach/passing game coordinator Frank Ponce, who returned to his former South Florida home after last coaching at Appalachian State, described Van Dyke as “a very intellectual young man, always asks questions... and always wants to know why. He picked it up tremendously fast.’’

Unknown to Van Dyke and the rest of the college football world, he was on his way to becoming a star when he nervously started and shared reps with vaunted true freshman Jake Garcia in late September against little-known FCS opponent Central Connecticut State. In his first start, Van Dyke finished 10 of 11 for 270 yards and three touchdowns. Garcia also had an excellent performance (11 of 14 for 147 yards and two touchdowns), but was injured and sat out the rest of the season.

The next game in the ACC opener against Virginia, Van Dyke, sacked four times, began the first half 4 of 11 for 63 yards, then roared back to lead UM to 21 second-half points and go 11 of 18 for 140 yards and a touchdown in the latter half. The Canes came within two points on Van Dyke’s 24-yard, fourth-quarter touchdown scramble, but lost when their 33-yard field-goal attempt bounced off the left upright as time expired to give Virginia the 30-28 victory.

From there, it was equally painful, despite Van Dyke leading UM to 25 second-half points at North Carolina. The Tar Heels won 45-42, and the game ended with UM driving from its own 28 with 2:46 left and getting to the UNC 16 before his third-down pass was intercepted. Van Dyke had again started slowly, going 5 of 15 for 59 yards and two picks in the first half. Nonetheless, he immediately proclaimed that the Hurricanes loved each other and would “keep fighting” and “start faster.’’

The turnaround

That, they did. It was in a 31-30 win against No. 18 North Carolina State the next week on Oct. 16 that Van Dyke’s young career began to accelerate at a dizzying pace — perhaps accelerating a tad faster after NC State players, angry at Van Dyke’s words leading up to the game, told him, “We’re going to be on your butt the whole game,’’ he said, adding, when asked, that “the A-word’’ was used instead of “butt.’’

“That kind of got me a little bit mad,’’ said Van Dyke, who a few days before the game said nonchalantly that UM had scored 44 points on NC State the previous year and if UM came out faster in the first half the Wolfpack couldn’t stop the Canes.

“They kept swearing at me, the whole team when they were walking out and we were warming up,’ Van Dyke said after completing 25 of 33 passes (75.7 percent) for 325 yards and four touchdowns against the nation’s 11th-ranked defense.

He said the Wolfpack took his words “the wrong way’’ and “it inspired [our] whole team and then it inspired me. It just gave us a bunch of confidence. I didn’t mean to do that. But it worked out.’’

FSU

After that, his only loss — and it was a big one— came Nov. 13 at Florida State, where UM fell 31-28. Trailing 28-23, FSU took over at its 20 with 2:19 left, ultimately converted a fourth-and-14 from the UM 25 and went on to win. Van Dyke threw two interceptions and lost a fumble that led to an FSU touchdown. He finished 25 of 47 for 316 yards and four touchdowns.

“We’re going to get our revenge, I promise you that,’’ Van Dyke said at the ACC media days. “I think that just created a monster in us. I don’t think Coach Cristobal would be here if we won that game. And all the money they’re bringing to the program now and really trying to help our student-athletes succeed. That loss right there really created a monster for Miami.’’

The monster in Van Dyke had already been born.