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The defense broke out in Miami’s first scrimmage. Now the Canes’ offense wants to answer.

The buzz coming out of the Miami Hurricanes’ first preseason scrimmage Saturday was almost all positive about the defense.

The defensive line is better than it was a year ago. There were interceptions from the secondary. Altogether, it sounded like a win for the defensive side of the ball.

With another scrimmage coming up Saturday, the offense is now eager to answer.

“That’s the goal,” offensive lineman Jalen Rivers said. “If they say the defense won, we’re going to prove that we’re going to win next time, so we’re watching the film, getting better and we’ll prove that tomorrow.”

Saturday will mark two weeks until the start of the regular season and the Miami offense is, understandably, still a work in progress.

The offensive line could change again before Week 1 if star tackle Zion Nelson is able to return from offseason knee surgery at some point in the next few weeks. The depth chart could be shuffling at running back after two of the Hurricanes’ top five tailbacks went down with injuries in the last few weeks. Quarterback Tyler Van Dyke is still looking for a few more reliable targets, too, to complement wide receiver Xavier Restrepo and tight end Will Mallory.

Van Dyke was happy with Miami’s ability to move the ball down the field last weekend, but said the priority this weekend is “being more explosive.”

“We were just kind of moving the ball down the field, which is not a bad thing,” the sophomore said. “We just want to get that explosive-play rate up and make those deep shots down the field before the season starts.”

Last Friday, coach Mario Cristobal said scrimmages hold “a lot” of weight in determining playing time for the upcoming season and this second one will be particularly important because the Hurricanes will start shifting to game preparation late next week, the coach said.

“We want to find out who’s for real,” Cristobal said. “We want to test guys, and we want to see who stands up to the challenge and who needs more work. We’ll always work with a guy, but it’s time to really find out who steps up. But it has to be challenging. We’ve got to create a team of full-speed players and full-speed players that play that well all the time, so the camp has been geared to that. We’ve made some progress. We still have a long ways to go, but we feel excited about that.

“There’s still plenty to work on. We’re trying to squeeze 10 years into seven months, and that requires a lot of time and a lot of stuff. We’re not there yet.”