Fields Thriving in Leading Role

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — From the start of Malachi Fields’ football career at the University of Virginia, his stature made him impossible to miss on the field. His reticence, though, often kept him from asserting himself around his teammates as an underclassman.

“He was a mouse,” recalled Adam Mims, who coaches UVA’s wide receivers, “and that’s what I kind of challenged him on: being a better leader, not only physically on the field, but verbally. And he’s earned the right to lead on this team. I told him, ‘Man, if you lead, they’ll follow,’ and he’s done a much better job of that. And that’s why he’s one of the most well-liked, well-respected teammates, because he does what he’s supposed to do off the field, but he plays his butt off on the field too.”

It might not come naturally to Fields, but the 6-foot-4, 220-pound senior said he’s been “trying to develop that vocal side, because showing is always one thing, but some guys need to hear and see it.”

He’s thriving in this role. Through two games—both wins for the Wahoos—Fields has 16 catches for 248 yards. He leads the ACC in receiving yards per game and ranks second in receptions per game.

“He’s such a big body,” Virginia head coach Tony Elliott said. “He’s 6-4, 220 pounds and hard to tackle, and what you’re seeing is that he’s getting a lot of yards after contact, because [after] getting the ball in his hands he’s making people miss, something that we didn’t see a ton of last year but we knew he was capable of.”

Fields is “doing a much better job after the catch,” Elliott said, “of just running with a passion and a violence that we’ve been challenging him to do for his size.”

UVA safety Antonio Clary periodically matches up with Fields in practice, and that’s no easy assignment.

“Malachi can really do everything,” Clary said. “He’s a big guy, but he can move like a slot receiver. His hands are extremely strong, he’s physical. He’ll high-point the football, and he’ll go across the middle and catch it. He’ll do all the dirty work, blocking and everything. He’s just an overall great receiver that does everything well. And when he’s out there, he wants the ball. He has that alpha mentality.”

A graduate of nearby Monticello High School, Fields arrived at UVA in 2021 as an unheralded recruit. As a 12^th-grader, he’d won the 500-meter run, finished second in the high jump and the shot put, and placed fifth in the long jump at the Virginia High School League’s Class 3 indoor track & meet, so his athletic ability was unquestioned. He’d primarily played quarterback and defensive back at Monticello, however, so he had to learn a new position at Virginia.

That didn’t faze Fields. He ended up playing for the Hoos as a true freshman and acquitted himself well, catching 11 passes for 172 yards.

An injury limited him to one game in the Cavaliers’ abbreviated 2022 season, but Fields caught 58 passes for 811 yards and five touchdowns last year. In a typical season, those numbers would have attracted more notice, but another UVA wideout, Malik Washington, finished with 110 receptions for 1,426 yards, both single-season program records, and nine TDs in 2023.

“What Malik did was something that probably won’t be done for a long, long time,” Mims said. “Malachi had an incredible year last year, but he kind of got overshadowed. In my opinion, he’s an All-ACC, potential All-American receiver. He honestly left some stuff out there, and he and I have talked about that. There were about two or three [passes] that he dropped, and I know that he wishes that he could have got them back.”

Elliott said Fields “was one of the better guys in the ACC [last year], and the challenge this offseason was for him to go make his stake as the best in the league. And he’s played unbelievably the last two weeks and made some huge, huge plays.”

In UVA’s season-opening win over Richmond at Scott Stadium, Fields caught five passes for 100 yards, including a 41-yarder in which he laid out for the ball along the left sideline. Three days later, Elliott, a former Clemson offensive coordinator, was still marveling at Fields’ catch.

“I’ll say I haven’t seen a play like the one Malachi made, that diving play, since [Clemson’s] Mike Williams did it his freshman year against NC State,” Elliott said during his weekly press conference. “Unbelievable, full extension play. It’s wet. No gloves. That was a big-time play to be able to come down with that ball.”

The 100 yards receiving were a career high for Fields, but that mark didn’t last long. A week later, he caught a career-best 11 catches for 148 yards to help Virginia rally for a 31-30 win over ACC rival Wake Forest in Winston-Salem, N.C. On the fourth-quarter drive that put the Hoos ahead, Fields twice snared fourth-down passes from quarterback Anthony Colandrea. Neither catch was easy, but Fields’ concentration never wavered.

“We practice it every day,” Fields said, “so I’m just trying to make it as routine as possible. You’ve got to go out there and execute. Don’t make it bigger than it is.”

Next up for Virginia (2-0) is a non-conference game with Maryland (1-1). The former ACC rivals will meet at 8 p.m. Saturday at Scott Stadium.

A year ago in College Park, Md., the Hoos scored the game’s first 14 points, only to see the Terrapins rally for a 42-14 win. It was 21-14 after three quarters, and UVA unraveled in the fourth.

“I remember we came out fast, started fast, and then we got comfortable,” Fields said. “We can’t do that this year, so we’ve just got to come out fast, finish through the middle eight”—the last four minutes of the second quarter and the first four of the third—”and finish in the fourth quarter and never get comfortable.”

Its dramatic victory over Wake moved Virginia to 2-0 for the first time since 2019. Now the Cavaliers must show they can “handle success,” Fields said. “So we’re just learning from the win, telling the guys we can’t get comfortable, we haven’t arrived anywhere yet. Yes, we’ve won, which we wanted to do, but we have to learn from that and build on that and never get comfortable. “

An America studies major, Fields is on track to graduate next spring. He grew up going to UVA games at Scott Stadium, and playing in his hometown has “just been awesome,” he said.

Fields was among the fans who rushed the field at Scott Stadium to celebrate UVA’s 39-30 win over Virginia Tech in November 2019. Now he’s on the receiving end of the Virginia faithful’s support. Fields said he’s enjoyed “seeing the people that I used to see on a daily basis—high school coaches, high school teachers, elementary school teachers, friends and family—just all coming out. It’s just awesome being around this atmosphere.”

He’s played alongside several standout receivers at UVA, including Washington, Keytaon Thompson, the late Lavel Davis Jr. and Dontayvion Wicks. From them, Fields said, he learned that “you’ve just got to be a pro every day, show up, take advantage of each opportunity, take care of your body and try to instill these things in the younger guys and lead the younger guys and just come out ready to work every day.”

Virginia’s offense is averaging 463.5 yards per game, and about 70 percent of that has come in the passing game. Colandrea has completed 75.8 percent of his throws for 654 yards and five TDs. Fields has been his favorite target, but another receiver, Trell Harris, has nine catches for 129 yards and two TDs, and tight end Tyler Neville caught two touchdown passes against Wake. Harris and Neville are graduate transfers from Kent State and Harvard, respectively.

Opponents can’t afford to pay too much attention to Fields with Harris on the other side of the field, Elliott said, “because you’ve got to honor and respect the speed and his ability to make plays.”

On offense, Elliott said, the Hoos are looking to “really stretch you from sideline to sideline, goal line to goal line … I’m hopeful what that’s also going to do is create some lighter boxes for us to be able to run the football, because we didn’t run the football as effectively [against Wake] as we did in the first game, and I challenged the guys this week to come out and run the ball.”

Fields, a willing and gifted blocker, is a key piece in the running game too, which is no surprise. He’s happy to do whatever is required to help the Hoos win.

“He’s just a humble kid, an incredible young man,” Mims said. “He’s the type that you just want to be around. He’s got an infectious smile, infectious personality. He’s a yes or no sir kid. He’s everything that you want in a player. He does everything that you ask him to do, and as a coach, that’s literally all you want.

“Typically, you want to coach your better players the hardest, and he’s one that I can coach hard, that I can critique hard, and he’ll respond the right way. He doesn’t get in his emotions or his feelings or anything like that. When he gets challenged, he responds.”

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