CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The Turnover Chain has been a part of Hurricanes sideline celebrations since 2017, but players won’t get to celebrate with the jeweled Cuban Link chain this season.
Miami won’t be using the Turnover Chain this year, coach Mario Cristobal confirmed Thursday morning.
“I don’t judge,” Cristobal said. “It’s just really not part of what we’re doing. It’s not good, bad or indifferent. It’s just not part of what we’re doing.”
The Turnover Chain, which had multiple iterations over the past five seasons, spawned numerous imitations across college football, including Oregon State’s Turnover Chainsaw.
“It’s no knock on anybody or anything,” Cristobal said. “It’s just not our way. It’s not our culture.”
Cristobal, a Hurricanes alumnus who won a pair of national titles with the team as a player, said while the Turnover Chain is a part of the program’s history, the team is moving in a different direction under him and his staff.
“Certainly history is history, and whether it’s positive, whether it’s inconsequential, whatever it may be, it’s still history and part of your program,” he said. “We’re just moving in a direction that right now doesn’t involve it. That’s really the best way to address it.
“Let’s put it this way. We’ve been working so hard and paying attention to so many other things that, in my opinion, are much more critical to winning football games and having success that it really hasn’t been a subject or a topic. We won’t be using it.”
Fourth-year defensive lineman Jahfari Harvey earned the chain once last season after picking off a pass and returning it for a touchdown against North Carolina, but he said the team is not concerned with whether they’ll get to wear the jewelry after big pays.
“I’m happy I got it, while I was here,” Harvey said. “It’ll always be part of our history, but we’re focused on working right now.”
Although the Turnover Chain was created while Mark Richt was UM coach, the idea for the blinged-out-accessory was credited to then defensive coordinator Manny Diaz, who ended up succeeding Richt as head coach. Diaz was fired in December 2021, and Cristobal replaced him immediately after.
