“My heart hurts for the guys in the locker room,” UVA head coach Tony Elliott said, “because they battled through a lot to get to this point … I’ve got to do a better job as a coach, along with the staff, of helping them to make the transition to understand that when you have success, you can’t take your foot off the gas, you can’t become complacent. Every play, every drive until the game is over, you’ve got to be looking at: How can I get better? How can I improve? How can I rely on my fundamentals even more?”
Virginia’s defense has been ravaged by injuries and suffered more attrition Saturday. The Cavaliers came up with four takeaways, but they also gave up 203 yards rushing.
UVA’s offense went into the break on a high note. On the final play off the second quarter, wide receiver Malachi Fields outleaped two BC defenders in the end zone and came down with a 39-yard Hail Mary pass from quarterback Tony Muskett, and Bettridge’s extra point pushed the Hoos’ lead to 21-7.
In the final two quarters, however, Virginia totaled only 39 yards, as BC applied constant pressure to Muskett.
“It snowballed on us in the third quarter,” offensive coordinator Des Kitchings said, “and we never regained momentum.”
For Muskett, it was his first game since Sept. 2, when he hurt his non-throwing shoulder in the season opener. Against Boston College, he completed 22 of 34 passes for 247 yards and three touchdowns, with one interception. Muskett was sacked five times for 34 yards in losses, but he also ran the ball effectively at times.
“He showed the competitive spirit that he has,” Elliott said. “I was anxious to see how he was going to pull the ball down and run. And I thought he showed no hesitation, no fear. I even saw him lead with that shoulder a couple of times. I thought he made some big-time throws.”
On Virginia’s final possession, Muskett threw a high pass intended for true freshman wideout Jaden Gibson on the first down. Then came another incompletion. On third down, he hit Gibson for a seven-yard completion, but BC pressured Muskett on fourth down, and he threw an incompletion.
The Cavaliers practice their two-minute offense almost daily, and “we just need, I just need, to be better,” Muskett said. “I’ve got hit Jaden on the first throw and then we got to figure out how to get first down in the next three downs. So I take full responsibility for that. As a quarterback, I have to make sure we get down there and get a touchdown to win the game.”
Wideout Malik Washington, who had a chance to become the first player in program history with four straight games of at least 100 yards receiving, finished with 97 against BC on nine catches. Washington had a touchdown catch, and Fields and tailback Mike Hollins also had one each.
On defense, the Hoos came into the game without ends Paul Akere, Kam Butler and Ben Smiley III and safety Lex Long, among others, and they lost cornerbacks Dre Walker and Malcolm Greene to injuries during the game. But Rudzinski refused to use the defense’s lack of depth as an excuse.
“That’s part of the game,” Rudzinski said, “and that’s what a good coach and a good team will do. You find a way with the resources you have. It’s a life lesson that we want these young men to take with them. When it gets tough and you might think, ‘I don’t have this, I don’t have that,’ what a great man does is he goes and finds a way, and that’s going to be the mentality as we go forward. I’m proud of these young men for as hard as they fought. I bleed for them and feel for them, too, because we want to win. But wanting to is one thing. Now we’ve got to produce that result.”
Penalties hurt the Cavaliers against NC State, and they struggled with their discipline again Saturday. They were penalized 11 times for 90 yards. (BC was flagged five times for 36 yards).
After the game, Elliott said, he told his players that Virginia is “learning some very hard lessons as a football program. Football, it’s a hard game and it only gives you what you earn. It doesn’t give you what you deserve. It just gives you what you earn. And if you have 11 penalties and you don’t execute, then you’re gonna get what you earn. And unfortunately, when you have those things, typically that earns you a loss.”
Butler had season-ending surgery Thursday, Elliott said, but UVA hopes to have Akere, Smiley and Long back soon. He wasn’t sure about the extent of the injuries suffered by Walker, a true freshman who had a first-half interception, and Greene, a transfer from Clemson.
