Next Phase Underway for Cavaliers

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

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — For the University of Virginia football team, the first of many summer practices wrapped up a little before 5 o’clock on Wednesday afternoon. Afterward, his players gathered around head coach Tony Elliott, who complimented them on the energy with which they’d started the session.

Elliott noted, however, that their energy had flagged late in the practice, and he reminded his team that games are often decided in the fourth quarter.

Players are always excited about the first practice, Elliott noted Wednesday evening during a media availability in the Hardie Center, “and they couldn’t sleep last night. It’s like Christmas.”

Training camp is a marathon, though, and the challenge is sustaining that enthusiasm.

“We gotta have that same energy every single day,” Elliott told his team before the first practice. “So every day we walk through the door, it’s gotta be that day one energy. To get to where we want to go, that’s what it’s going to take.”

The Wahoos, who recorded a program-record 11 victories last season, want to get back to the ACC title game and win it this time. In last year’s championship game, UVA lost in overtime to Duke. A victory would have sent the Hoos to the College Football Playoff.

“I think there's a newfound sense of hunger in this football program,” center Drake Metcalf, one of three returning starters on UVA’s offensive line, said Wednesday night. “This last season we left a little bit of meat on the bone, quite a bit of meat on the bone ... We’re definitely hungry, and you can tell all the guys have that kind of sense about them right now. Not a sense of arrogance, but a sense of hunger.”

𝐃𝐀𝐘 𝐎𝐍𝐄.#GoHoos 🔶⚔️🔷 pic.twitter.com/LO0zzWlgTQ

— Virginia Football (@UVAFootball) July 29, 2026

Most of the team has been together since January, when the offseason strength and conditioning program started. Then came spring practice, followed by more workouts with the strength and conditioning staff. The next phase for the Hoos, who open the season Aug. 29 against NC State at Scott Stadium, is training camp.

“This is my sixth camp, and all I know is camp is a process,” offensive guard Noah Josey told the team after practice Wednesday. “It’s day to day.”

Camp is “a repetitive thing,” Metcalf said, “but it honestly just brings us all to life again when we come out here and get to put on the cleats and get back on the field and compete against each other. So it’s just like a fresh breath of air, and it was really special to be able to get out there with the guys again today, and we looked really good.”

If the first practice is akin to Christmas for the players, the ones that follow, many in the heat and humidity of a Charlottesville summer, can be more of a grind.

“Going into this thing, you just have to remind yourself it's going to be hard,” Metcalf said. “It's designed to be hard. The structure is going to be very difficult and taxing. I’ve been here since like 6:30 this morning and haven't gone home, and my home's like two miles down the road. So it's one of those things where you have to go into it knowing this is going to be tough, but ultimately it's going to make sure that you're battle-tested ... to be able to know, when it’s third-and-1 or it’s fourth-and-1 and you have get your nose dirty in there, you're going to be able to do it, and you're going to be able to trust the guys to the left and to the right of you.

“So, it’s just all a mentality at the end of the day, being able to do it, because our bodies are trained. We’ve put in the work in this offseason. It's more so up here with the mind”—Metcalf pointed to his head—"and just knowing you're going to make it through this, especially for the young guys. You're going to make it through this. It's going to be tough, but you got this. We're going to drag you along with us if we have to.”

When his team gets back on the field, Elliott said, what “I'm looking for is first just the core values, getting back to our practice standards. The coaches are focused on the install with the scheme and the fundamentals. I'm looking at the fundamentals of the practice and the organization, the structure, the efficiency.”

He also wants to see how his players handle adversity.

“Not necessarily when we start practice,” Elliott said, “but those last 20 minutes of practice when we're in the fourth quarter, what's the body language? What's the conditioning level? Does it sound the same way as the beginning of practice? So there's specific things that I'm looking for when I go out there on day one.”

ON THE FAST TRACK: In a crowded room of tailbacks, Jekail Middlebrook has gained some separation.

“He’s earned the right to go out there first,” running backs coach Keith Gaither said last week.

Middlebrook, a 5-foot-10, 198-pound senior who wears jersey No. 21, is a transfer from Middle Tennessee State who enrolled at UVA in January. He totaled 1,228 all-purpose yards for MTSU last season.

He’s a newcomer to Power-4 football, but Middlebrook could be “just as good as J’Mari Taylor,” Gaither said. “He's from that same cloth. He may not be as flashy, but he does everything well. Schematically, he understands football, and he can catch it out of the backfield. He's an every-down guy. Runs behind his pads. He's got the ability to be an all-conference player in the ACC.”

Taylor, who began his college career at North Carolina Central, an FCS school, rushed for 1,062 yards and 14 touchdowns at UVA last season and made the All-ACC first team.

Middlebrook said he and Taylor, who’s now with the NFL’s Jaguars, follow each other on Instagram. From studying videotape of Taylor, Middlebrook said, he’s learned “the right things to do.”

Elliott said he’s been impressed with the way Middlebrook carries himself. “He’s just unassuming, kind of flies below the radar a little bit,” Elliott said, “but then when he steps on the grass, he’s just steady. He just makes plays, he just finds a way.

“And this is kind of where evaluations can be tricky, because you see tape, and I saw some really good things [from Middlebrook] on tape, but until you get them and you get to work with them, you don't really realize what you have. And so this was one that I'm like, man, I knew there was something there, but he's got even more than what I was anticipating.”

Middlebrook, who’s from Atlanta, doesn’t say much, Elliott said, but always wears a smile.

“You can't coach him hard enough,” Elliott said. “He loves to be coached. His body language is always the way it needs to be.”

Middlebrook said his goal in the spring was “to earn the coaches’ trust and be consistent every day. With the depth that we have in the room, I had to come on my A game every day.”

He’s one of six scholarship tailbacks in the program. The others are transfers Peyton Lewis (Tennessee) and Solomon Beebe (UAB) and returners Xavier Brown, Noah Vaughn and Xay Davis.

To be atop the depth chart “feels good,” Middlebrook said, “but I'm getting pushed every day. It's competitive depth. Every day is a job interview. So just going out there with those guys, they're pushing me, I'm pushing them. I feel like we're just all clicking.”

This is by far the deepest and most competitive group he’s had at Virginia, said Gaither, who’s in his fifth year on Elliott’s staff.

“Now, I’ve got to do a good job of managing it,” Gaither said. “And like I told them, they’ve got to trust me that I'm going to put the right people in for the right plays and while taking care of them for as a health standpoint.”

Turn us up @beauprib ‼️#GoHoos 🔶⚔️🔷 pic.twitter.com/3cc5ep8wjl

— Virginia Football (@UVAFootball) July 29, 2026

ON THE MEND: Among those who were not full participants in the first practice were linebacker Kam Robinson, defensive end Matthew Fobbs-White, safety Corey Costner, offensive lineman Jim Harris Jr., wide receiver Isaiah Robinson and kicker Tim Hamann.

All are progressing well, however, and aren’t expected to be sidelined for extended periods, Elliott said.

Offensive lineman Kevin Wigenton II, who started three games for Virginia in 2025, has requested another year of eligibility, and he’s waiting for the NCAA to rule on his appeal.

In the meantime, Wigenton is allowed to practice with the Cavaliers, and he was in uniform Wednesday. “We’re kind of working him back into shape,” Elliott said.

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