UVA Football Report Card: Handing Out Grades for Virginia vs. Boston College

Matt Newton | Oct 7, 2024

Peter Casey-Imagn Images

Virginia continued its best start to a season since 2019 with a 24-14 comeback victory over Boston College on Saturday in Charlottesville. The Cavaliers are now 4-1 on the season and 2-0 in ACC play, not to mention a perfect 3-0 under Tony Elliott coming off a bye week.

As we break down what we saw from the Hoos in their win over the Eagles and what it means moving forward, let's hand out some report card grades for various players, position groups, and other categories to help evaluate Virginia's performance in week 6.

Offense

Passing Game: B
The Cavaliers certainly felt the losses of Chris Tyree, Trell Harris, and Suderian Harrison. The UVA receivers struggled to get separation and were not on the same page with Anthony Colandrea, especially early on, as Virginia punted on three-straight drives to start the game and didn't score a touchdown until the fourth quarter. But when it mattered most, they delivered. Colandrea connected with Malachi Fields from 30 yards out for the go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter. Andre Greene Jr. and JR Wilson stepped up and made four catches each. Virginia didn't light it up through the air, scoring only one touchdown and totaling 218 passing yards, but it was enough to win against a solid BC defense.

Malachi Fields: A
We must singularly mention Malachi Fields again because of his reliability, particularly in clutch moments. Fields finished with 63 yards on four receptions, none more important than his big-time 30-yard touchdown catch in the fourth quarter to give his team the lead for the first time. He also threw a 29-yard pass to Kobe Pace on a trick play, displaying some of his arm talent as a former high school quarterback. Boston College was keyed in on Fields from the jump given UVA's injuries at the receiver position, and he still played a key role in two of Virginia's best offensive plays in the game.

Anthony Colandrea: B
It's tough to put his low completion percentage (58%) entirely on Colandrea because of how many of his key receiving targets were out with injuries. Colandrea threw for 179 yards and had a perfectly-thrown ball on the touchdown to Fields, plus he used his legs to move the chains. We've got to mark him down for not being able to guide the UVA offense into the end zone on the red zone trips, but Colandrea deserves credit for not putting the ball into harms way. He threw zero interceptions and Virginia as a team did not turn the ball over in back-to-back games for the first time in five years. That's two games in a row that Colandrea hasn't had shiny numbers, but has managed the game well enough to win.

UVA Football: Five Takeaways From Virginia's 24-14 Win Over Boston College

Kobe Pace, UVA Ground Game: C+
Thanks to the Coastal Carolina game, Virginia came into this week with the third-best rushing offense in the ACC at 196 rushing yards per game. That means that this performance unfortunately falls below standard. The Cavaliers were unable to run the ball in the red zone or get significant yardage on first down runs. Virginia rushed 14 times on first down for a total of 50 yards. That's an average of 3.6 yards per first down rush, which isn't that bad, but 20 of those 50 yards came on a single carry by Pace in the fourth quarter. If you take that play out, UVA averaged 2.3 yards per first down rush and that's not good enough. It explains how Virginia faced an average of 8.2 yards to go on third downs, which helps explain the early punts.

But fortunately for the Hoos, we live in the real world where that 20-yard rush by Pace did happen. It opened things up for Colandrea's deep ball to Malachi Fields for the go-ahead score on the next play. Pace racked up 83 yards on 19 carries, or 4.4 yards per rush, and Xavier Brown matched that average with 22 yards on five carries. Pace had a 29-yard reception and Brown had a 16-yard catch. It wasn't the explosive ground game success that was seen in the Coastal win, but again, it was enough to get the job done.

Red Zone Execution: D
We've covered this a bit already, but it bears repeating. On five trips to the red zone, Virginia scored zero touchdowns and score nine total points. Now, one of those five trips shouldn't count because it was UVA taking a knee to win the game and that was also the case for one the failed red zone trips at the end of the Coastal game. But it's not that much better that the Hoos didn't score a touchdown on four trips inside the BC 20-yard line, kicking three field goals and turning the ball over on downs. The big play will always be the staple of the Colandrea-led Cavalier offense, but this team must learn to convert the red zone trips into TDs at a higher rate because 9/23 (39%) isn't going to get it done.

Overall Offense: B-
Virginia failed to execute in the red zone, had no consistency in its run game, and struggled to move the ball with key receivers out. But, the Cavaliers didn't turn the ball over, used the spark provided by the defense to make a few big plays happen at big moments, and successfully killed the clock at the end to seal the win. Plus, we have to shout out the offensive line, which got McKale Boley back from injury and was relatively successful in keeping Anthony Colandrea clean against the nation's leading pass rusher Donovan Ezeiruaku, who had one sack. BC had two sacks as a team, but Colandrea wasn't running for his life all day as he was so frequently last season.

VIDEO: Sanker, Colandrea, Pace & More React to UVA's Win Over Boston College

Defense

Defensive Line: A+
What's not to like about this performance by the Virginia defense line? The Cavaliers got three sacks from Kam Robinson, Kam Butler, and Chico Bennett Jr. and now have 10 sacks as a team through five games after registering only 11 sacks in all of 2023. UVA contained Thomas Castellanos fairly well and smothered his offense in the second half. Boston College likes to run the ball, averaging 176.2 rushing yards per game and 4.4 yards per carry. Against Virginia, the Eagles managed just 65 total rush yards on 29 attempts, averaging 2.2 yards per carry. Plus, Chico Bennett Jr. had the first interception by a UVA defensive lineman in a decade and it was thanks to a pass deflection by Anthony Britton, who was making his first-career start.

Pass Defense: B+
Some early breakdowns in coverage left receivers wide open for Thomas Castellanos, who is simply too good to have guys running free like that. A 34-yard strike to tight end Kamari Morales set up the nine-yard touchdown pass to Jaedn Skeete and then Castellanos found Morales wide open again two possessions later for a 29-yard touchdown. But after giving up those early chunk plays, UVA only gave up one big play in the entire second half (a 31-yard pass to Lewis Bond). Plus, the Cavaliers intercepted Castellanos twice. He had only two interceptions all season coming into this game. There were key pass breakups by Jam Jackson and Kendren Smith, who also had the game-sealing interception. It wasn't great early on, but the defense tightened up in the second half.

Forcing Turnovers: A+
Virginia has forced five turnovers in the past two games after having just two defensive takeaways in the first three games. The UVA defense was getting the necessary stops in the second half, but the Cavalier offense was still stalling, so more was needed. Anthony Britton disrupted the pass from Castellanos and Chico Bennett Jr. made his first career interception, which sparked the UVA offense. Then, Kam Robinson put pressure on Castellanos, who lost control of the ball and eventually Jonas Sanker scooped up the fumble and returned it 40 yards for a touchdown to put the Hoos up by 10. Virginia scored 14 points off of turnovers and that was the difference in the game.

Overall Defense: A
Virginia held Boston College to a season-low 14 points. The Eagles were shut out for the final 43 minutes and eight seconds of the game and they turned the ball over three times, all in the fourth quarter. After allowing touchdowns on two of the first three drives, the UVA defense locked in and made BC's drive chart look like this for the rest of the game: punt, punt, punt, interception, fumble, turnover on downs, interception.

By the Numbers: Breaking Down Virginia's Win Over Boston College

Special Teams: A
Daniel Sparks had an incredible game, delivering three punts that totaled 156 yards. That's an average of 52.0 yards per punt and he booted a 62-yarder. When Virginia was doing nothing but punting and not yet playing great defense, Sparks held it down and made sure his team didn't also lose the field position battle. He gets an A++.

The only blemish from a special teams perspective was a missed 47-yarder by Will Bettridge in the fourth quarter. It had the distance, but missed wide left. Bettridge made all three of his other field goals, which came from 35, 33, and 27 yards out. Those kicks kept Virginia within striking distance while the offense couldn't find the end zone.

Ethan Davies returned one punt for 13 yards. With Chris Tyree out, kickoffs got a little interesting and they got even more interesting with BC deciding to short kick early in the game, so we got to see a couple of short returns by Tyler Neville and Antonio Clary. Thanks to the UVA defense, Boston College didn't kick the ball off at all in the second half so we didn't get to see that aspect have a notable impact on the game. BC attempted no kick returns and had one punt return for 13 yards.

But again, it was a game without major special teams miscues for Virginia and that will almost always earn an A.

More Virginia Football News

By the Numbers: Breaking Down Virginia's Win Over Boston College

VIDEO: Sanker, Colandrea, Pace & More React to UVA's Win Over Boston College

UVA Football: Five Takeaways From Virginia's 24-14 Win Over Boston College

Defensive Takeaways Spark Virginia to Comeback 24-14 Win Over Boston College