AMHERST — After escaping with its first win of the season on Saturday, a 35-31 victory over FCS Central Connecticut State, UMass football turns its attention to a week four tilt against Miami (OH) at 3:30 p.m. The game will be broadcast on ESPN +.

The Redhawks are the defending MAC champions, but they currently sit at 0-3 after a 13-6 defeat at the Big Ten’s Northwestern, a 27-16 home loss to the Big 12’s Cincinnati and a 28-3 beatdown at independent Notre Dame. Miami is last in the country with only 8.3 points per game, but it’s the only MAC school to face power conference teams in each of its first three games.

This is UMass’ fourth of five games this season against future conference opponents. The Minutemen lost 28-14 to Eastern Michigan, 38-23 to Toledo and 34-3 to Buffalo. They’ll wrap up their MAC tour on Oct. 5 with a trip to DeKalb, Illinois to face Northern Illinois, who made waves earlier this season by knocking off then-No. 5 Notre Dame.

“Obviously, (Miami) is perennially one of the better teams in the MAC, so we know all about their ability,” head coach Don Brown said on Monday. “It’s nice to be able to go there and we’ve got a win under our belt.”

Miami and UMass played last season in the Minutemen’s home opener, a 41-28 win for the Redhawks in Carlos Davis’ first career FBS start that was infamous because it lasted nearly nine hours. Storms caused kickoff to be delayed for over two hours, and the game was stopped again in the first quarter for about three and a half more hours. It finally finished at 12:28 a.m.

“Not a fun experience,” Brown said after the game. “Here you are in the first home game, and there’s not a soul in the bleachers.”

UMass and Miami played all four years the Minutemen participated as an affiliate member of the MAC (2012-2015), with the Redhawks taking three of the four matchups. Miami head coach Chuck Martin notched his first career win against UMass in the 2014 game, another crazy contest that saw Miami come back from a 41-14 deficit in the first half to win 42-41 in the final minutes.

Blake Frohnapfel drove UMass down the field as time ticked down and the Minutemen had the ball on the Miami five-yard line with three seconds left, but instead of spiking the ball for a game-winning field goal, he passed it to Shadrach Abrokwah, who was pushed out of bounds at the two-yard line with no time left.

“Everything that unfolded, it was almost like if Disney would make a movie, you’d say that was kind of dumb, that could never happen,” Martin said. “But it happened.”

This week is homecoming for Miami and its final non-conference test before its MAC slate kicks off on Oct. 5. Brett Gabbert, brother of former NFL quarterback Blaine, returns for his sixth season in Oxford with 42 starts and two MAC championships under his belt. No other quarterback in college football has been the starter at one program for longer. In last year’s game in Amherst, Gabbert threw for 302 yards and four scores.

Like many MAC schools, Miami lost lots of talent from its conference title team to bigger teams through the transfer portal. Last year’s leading rusher Rashad Amos is now at Ole Miss, last year’s leading receiver Gage Larvadain is now at South Carolina and 2023 All-MAC First Team defensive lineman Caiden Woullard is off to Oklahoma.

Wide receiver Cade McDonald, who scored against UMass last season, leads the Redhawks by a large margin with 292 receiving yards. Reggie Virgil is second on the team with 121 yards and running backs Javon Tracy and Kevin Davis have caught a combined 17 passes through three weeks.

Jordan Brunson, Dylan Downing, Keyon Mozee and Davis have split carries so far this fall, though none have excelled. Miami is averaging just 58 rushing yards per game through three weeks. Miami returns four starters from a strong offensive line unit in 2023, including All-MAC Second Team tackles Will Jados and Reid Holskey.

Gabbert broke his leg in an ugly play on Oct. 21 last year, but Miami won their final four regular season games and the MAC title without him on the strength of Amos and their defense, which allowed just 15.6 points per game, good for fifth in the country.

That unit is led by 2023 MAC Defensive Player of the Year Matt Salopek, a sixth-year linebacker who ranked third in the country with 144 tackles last year and leads Miami with 26 tackles this year. Senior Ty Wise was a second team selection in 2023 and has racked up 17 tackles, three TFLs and a sack so far this year.

All-MAC Second Team selection Brian Ugwu stuck around and leads the defensive line. In the secondary, fellow second-teamer Yahsyn McKee has graduated but FWAA Freshman All-American Raion Strader returns.

Though UMass is coming off its first win of the campaign, the Minutemen have dealt with several persistent issues in 2024.

UMass ranked top-10 in the country in penalties in 2022 and 2023 and sits near the top again this year after committing 15 penalties for 135 yards against CCSU.

“Penalties, you know,” Brown said on Monday as he dipped his head in disgust. “I’m just losing my mind.”

Through four weeks, the defense has allowed 11 plays of 30 or more yards and only 13 teams have allowed more. UMass has just two sacks (only one team has fewer) but has been sacked 15 times (only four teams have more).

And while the Minutemen hung with their three MAC opponents through the first 40 minutes of those games (26-37 margin), they were blown out in the final 20 minutes (14-56 margin), including a second-half shutout at Buffalo.

Apart from a dud in the Buffalo game, Taisun Phommachanh has turned in solid performances and shown his dual-threat abilities. He’s averaging 211 passing yards per game would be leading the Minutemen for rushing if not for the negative yardage accrued on sacks.

UMass announced last week that No. 1 receiver Anthony Simpson is no longer with the program after just three catches for 16 yards in an injury-curtailed first three weeks of the season. Simpson broke out last year with 57 catches for 792 yards and was the only returner to catch a pass for UMass in 2023.

FCS Eastern Washington grad-transfer Jakobie Keeney-James has stepped up in Simpson’s absence to turn in several career performances and lead the team with 256 yards and two touchdowns.

“Jakobie, he’s been a guy I can count on since he first got in here,” Phommachanh said Monday. “We first hit it off back in the springtime, January, and we’ve just been building our connection and growing our connection each day.”

Redshirt sophomore Jacquon Gibson has also broken out to catch 16 balls for 193 yards.

UMass’ threesome of Jalen John, Brandon Campbell and CJ Hester have all struggled in the rushing attack, with John taking about half the carries but averaging an unspectacular 3.5 yards per carry.