Head Coach: Scott Satterfield is entering his 2nd season as the head coach of the Bearcats with a 3-9 record. He took over the program after a coaching change in the transfer portal era while moving up to a new conference so the job wasn’t easy. Satterfield also had a successful tenure at Appalachian State but had a rather interesting one with Louisville. He had a surprisingly successful first season with them to help them recover from the mess Bobby Petrino left, but immediately flirted with South Carolina after that season and offended the fanbase by doing so. This set up a long time standoff where the fans wanted him fired, but he kept winning just enough games and recruiting well enough to not be fired.
Program Outlook: The Bearcats program was always in an area where it could be successful but it just never was for a long period of time, finally in the mid-2000s something shifted and they progressively became a bigger player as they went. The result was huge, Cincinnati is now the only major part of Ohio that isn’t almost completely Ohio State fans. Their path hasn’t been easy, it’s been very unique in fact. They’re the only program to enter a power conference, to eventually get left out of the power conferences only to work their way back into a power conference. Luke Fickell got this program to operate like a power conference team inside a non-power conference and brought them to incredible heights. If it wasn’t for a blown 4th quarter lead, Cincinnati would be the last non-Nick Saban coached team to beat Georgia, they beat Notre Dame in South Bend and crashed the College Football playoff. There’s no reason they can’t eventually do it again.
How does the 2024 Roster look?: It’s going to be interesting to see how this roster develops. Entering last season it was expected that the offense would struggle to find their footing but the defense would be ok. The defense ended up struggling but the offense…that was a different story. The Bearcats offense was a statistical giant in terms of the yards they put up, especially on the ground. The issue? They were literally just bad at the things you needed to do to actually score. 3rd – 4th down conversions, RedZone, turnovers all of those key stats were a huge negative for the Bearcats. How they’ll fix this issue remains to be seen, the downfield passing attack needed work and Bearcats fans (including Matt) will groan about Satterfield’s play calling (all indications are he hasn’t given that up.) QB Brendan Sorsby a transfer from Indiana is the odds on favorite to win the job, he has a good arm and can run well enough to be a threat on the ground. He will need to work on being more accurate, he’s been pressed by Brady Lichtenberg a Luke Fickell recruit who’s stuck around. Lichtenberg played a little bit last year and improved as he played before getting hurt. The Bearcats are absolutely loaded at Running Back with Corey Kiner back to lead the way and they brought in an explosive option in Ohio State transfer Evan Pryor, he has all the potential in the world and was simply buried on Ohio State’s ridiculous RB depth chart. Leading receiver Xzavier Henderson is back and the Bearcats got some potential options to compliment him out of the portal. The offensive line returns all 5 starters they gave up a lot of sacks last season but that experience will likely help them improve. As hinted at earlier, the defense collapsed last season. They couldn’t stop much of anything. The defensive line will be helped by some transfers but the key player is Dontay Corleone who’s a stud, but he’s out indefinitely after they found blood clots in his lungs. We hope he will be ok first and foremost, but hope he returns to the field soon. The Bearcats are completely revamping their secondary via the portal to try to improve there. If they hit on the portal players this team could really improve.
Screenshot from fbschedules.com1
2024 Schedule Thoughts: The Bearcats don’t actually have too bad of a schedule. They open with Towson who went 5-6 in FCS last year and then they face Pitt in the River City Rivalry (bring the trophy back!) the Panthers are still rebuilding. Their biggest challenge in the non-conference slate might actually be the road game at Miami, the Redhawks beat them a year ago and they have a tough defense. The Big 12 schedule is still tough but it’s very favorable that they avoid top contenders like Utah, Arizona, Oklahoma State and Kansas. There’s quietly a path to bowl eligibility.
Vegas Projection: Cincinnati’s win total is set at 5.5 with the odds geared toward the over. Vegas is surprisingly optimistic that the Bearcats can rebound and reach a bowl.
2024 Best Case: It may have taken a year but now the Bearcats are ready to take on the Big 12 by storm. Cincinnati opens the season dominant winning their first 4 games easily. They take a loss to Texas Tech but rebound in a big win at UCF and they beat Arizona State for bowl eligibility. The Bearcats upset Colorado in a huge showdown before returning home and taking down West Virginia. They win 2 of the next 3 to wrap up the season with a 9-3 record and they win their bowl to finish the season with 10 wins.
2024 Worst Case: This isn’t how it’s supposed to go. The same problems plague the Bearcats once again. They win the opener but things are clearly wrong when they lose the next 3 games and get blown out by Texas Tech. They return home with a winnable game against Arizona State but end up losing that one. The Bearcats are blown out by Colorado and lose their next 4 to finish a disappointing 1-11. In a conference they thought they could contend for they find themselves at the bottom of it trying to find a way out.
Welcome to Updog Sports Talk 
Leave a comment