By the Numbers: Breaking Down Virginia's Big Win at Wake Forest

Matt Newton | Sep 8, 2024

Virginia Athletics

Virginia reversed some lopsided historical trends in its fourth-quarter comeback victory at Wake Forest on Saturday night. The Cavaliers had lost their last five games against the Demon Deacons, but managed to beat Wake for the first time since 2007 and earn their first victory in Winston-Salem since 2002. Virginia now leads the all-time series with Wake Forest 35-17, a series that dates back to 1889.

UVA improved to 2-0 for the first time since 2021 and this marks just the third time since 2013 that the Cavaliers have won their first two games of the season. The other two instances came in 2021 and 2019.

The 14-point deficit Virginia erased was the largest comeback for the program since October of 2021, when the Cavaliers came back from down 17 points to beat Louisville on the road.

Virginia won its ACC opener for the first time since 2020 (Duke) and won its ACC opener on the road for the first time since 2019 (at Pittsburgh).

See the chart below for a breakdown of the stats from Virginia's victory over Wake Forest:

Virginia	Stat	Wake Forest
430	Total Offense	544
73	Rushing Offense	141
2.6	Yards Per Rush	3.5
357	Passing Offense	403
77%	Completion %	63%
10.8	Yards Per Completion	14.9
3/3	Red Zone Attempts	6/6
17	Red Zone Points	30
3/14 (21.4%)	3rd Downs	5/15 (33.3%)
3/3	4th Downs	2/4
27:50	Possession Time	32:10
5-50	Penalties-Yards	4-35
2	Turnovers	1
6	Sacks By	1
6	Tackles For Loss	5
5	Big Plays (20+ Yards)	75

Here are some key individual stats from the game along with some more notes:

Anthony Colandrea completed 33 of 43 passing attempts for 357 yards and three touchdowns. His 33 completions were a career-high and most by a Cavalier quarterback since Brennan Armstrong against Pitt in 2021. Colandrea's three touchdown passes matched a career-high.

Malachi Fields went over 100 receiving yards for the second-straight game, catching 11 of the 13 passes that went his way for 148 yards. 46 of those 148 receiving yards came after the catch. His 11 receptions and 148 receiving yards were both career-highs.

Of the 43 passes attempted by Colandrea, 33 were caught and only one was dropped. Trell Harris was responsible for that one drop, but made up for it by catching seven passes for 91 yards and a touchdown. His seven receptions were a career-high.

Eight different players caught a pass for Virginia in the game, including five players with at least four receptions. Tyler Neville caught all four passes that targeted him and two of those receptions went for touchdowns. That was the first two-touchdown game of his career and Neville is the first Cavalier tight end to catch two touchdowns in a game since Tom Santi did so against Duke in 2007.

Grady Brosterhous executed a quarterback sneak for a touchdown with a little over two minutes remaining. That score was the first of his career and stood as the game-winning touchdown after Will Bettridge converted the PAT to give UVA the lead.

Antonio Clary led the Cavaliers in tackles with 11 for the second-straight week and recorded his second-career sack. Jonas Sanker also posted double-digit tackles with 10 and posted his first-career sack. Trey McDonald made a career-high nine tackles and recorded his first-career sack.

The Virginia defense racked up six sacks, most in a single game since posting eight sacks against Georgia Tech in 2022. UVA had 11 total sacks in the 2023 season.

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