Colandrea "Pushing" Muskett in Fall Camp, Does Virginia Have a QB Battle?
Virginia has nearly reached the midway point of fall camp, but according to head coach Tony Elliott, he is no closer to officially naming a starting quarterback now than he was a few weeks ago at ACC Kickoff, when he indicated that there would be a quarterback battle between Tony Muskett and Anthony Colandrea. When Elliott was asked after practice on Monday what his biggest takeaways were from Saturday's scrimmage at Scott Stadium, he quickly gave an answer which implied that the true freshman Colandrea has actually closed the gap between him and the senior transfer Muskett.
"The biggest takeaway is that Colandrea is pushing Tony [Muskett]," Elliott said on Monday. "I was anxious to see what it was going to look like. Over here on the practice field, Tony was putting a little bit of separation and then we put the ball down live and you saw Colandrea be Colandrea."
That Colandrea enjoys the spotlight and seems to elevate his game at the biggest moments has been a consistent theme for the true freshman from St. Petersburg, Florida since he arrived on Grounds as an early enrollee back in January. The UVA coaching staff has frequently spoken highly of Colandrea's moxie and he displayed electric playmaking abilities with his arms and legs in the spring game. Elliott's comments seemed to indicate that Muskett was cementing himself as Virginia's starter during the first two weeks of fall camp, but that Colandrea's performance during Saturday's scrimmage has given Elliott enough reason to delay making that official call.
Some may view these comments as reflecting negatively on Muskett since Colandrea "pushing" Muskett for the starting QB job must mean that Muskett is regressing just as Colandrea is progressing, right? Wrong. There has been no indication out of fall camp that Muskett has done anything less than exactly what the Cavaliers expected from him thus far. This development only means that Elliott and company aren't ready to officially hand Muskett the keys since Colandrea has also been extremely impressive.
This is a good thing for Virginia. It's always better to have a highly-capable backup quarterback in the event that something should happen to the starter. And it's not common that a team enjoys the luxury of a quality backup - even one as youthful as a true freshman - unless that player is legitimately competing for the starting quarterback job in preseason practice. It's still expected that Tony Muskett will be officially named the starter soon, with Anthony Colandrea right behind him on the depth chart.
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