Mario Cristobal updates injury status of Tyler Van Dyke, plan for Jake Garcia

Coming off a blowout 45-21 home loss against Duke, Miami has a lot of questions to answer and they start at the quarterback position. Head coach Mario Cristobal lost starting quarterback Tyler Van Dyke to an injury during the game and then saw backup Jake Garcia commit five turnovers as the game slipped away.

Ahead of a roadtrip to face Virginia this week, Mario Cristobal starting his Wednesday press conference with an update on the status of Tyler Van Dyke as Saturday draws closer.

“Tyler has improved a bunch,” said Cristobal. “Status still unknown, we’ll determine that a little bit later.”

While no decision will come on his injury at this time, Cristobal did offer more insight on the process while updating the plan for Jake Garcia to stay ready throughout the week if his number is called again.

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“Jake has practiced really well,” said Cristobal. “So we feel confident, obviously, in the room. But we’ll have an update hopefully by Friday as we get closer to game time.”

More on Tyler Van Dyke status

Tyler Van Dyke received X-Rays in the locker room Saturday after injuring his shoulder, but Cristobal was unable to say whether he would be healthy enough to play this week when asked on Monday.

“Don’t know yet,” the coach said. “I know he was sore after the game and obviously he didn’t finish the game. We’re doing everything we can to get him ready. In the meantime, we have a lot of faith in both Jake (Garcia) and Jacurri (Brown) to go play football for us.”

The loss Saturday marked the fourth in the past five games for Miami, which will hope for a positive injury update to Van Dyke ahead of Saturday. So far this season, the quarterback has 1,728 yards passing, 10 touchdowns and four interceptions.