Just as quickly as hope arrived, however, it vanished into the October afternoon. The Cardinals ripped off 17 unanswered points to jumpstart a 41-10 rally over the final three quarters while the Cavaliers crumbled under an all-too-familiar barrage of turnovers and penalties. As a result, Ball State blasted Virginia 48-27 in front of a sparse Scott Stadium crowd.
“Obviously today we didn’t play well. I mean it was embarrassing to have that happen here at home,” Virginia coach Mike London said. “That’s a good football team. I have to give them credit. But you can’t have that many penalties, you can’t turn the ball over, and you have to be able to do something to stop the run and particularly the passing game and put pressure on the quarterback. We didn’t do a very good job today obviously. We have a lot of work to do. We have to take ownership and move forward to get ready for our first conference game.”
If the Hoos are red-faced about their performance Saturday, no one is surprised. Despite piling up 459 yards of offense, the Cavaliers did far too many things to hurt their cause.
On offense and special teams, the team turned the ball over 4 times combined with a David Watford interception and fumbles by Kevin Parks, Jake McGee, and Anthony Harris. Those miscues contributed to 17 points for the visitors courtesy of field position.
On the flipside, the defense struggled to slow down the Cardinals. BSU piled up 506 yards of offense and did not have a single turnover as it pressed for 50 points. The pressure the defense had produced in previous weeks didn’t materialize either as the hosts came up with just 1 sack. To make matters worse, Virginia gift-wrapped 7 first downs thanks to penalties. The Wahoos finished with 13 penalties for 93 yards.
In other words, it turned out to be a dreadful and mostly inconsistent day for the Cavaliers.
“There were a lot of things that didn’t go our way. With the peanlties and turnovers and mental mistakes, we were shooting ourselves in the foot,” Watford said. “We had two touchdowns called back because of penalties. The defense gave up first downs because of penalties. It was just a tough day for us. We have to just keep working to correct these mistakes.”
The day actually started off well for Virginia before it turned so sour. For example, Ball State entered the game having scored a touchdown on its first drive in its previous five games. The Hoos stopped the Cardinals before they got to midfield and forced a punt. Tim Smith followed it up with a 36-yard punt return to set up the offense at its own 49-yard line. The Cavaliers put together a 9-play, 29-yard drive from there to collect 3 points on a 39-yard field goal by Alec Vozenilek.
BSU answered with a score of its own – a harbinger of thing to come – but the Wahoos orchestrated a second straight scoring drive to retake the lead. The exciting part was that UVa put together the 7-play, 58-yard touchdown march with a nice blend of successful running and passing plays, including a vertical shot up the sidelines. On 3rd-and-14, Watford lofted a pass up the home sidelines where Smith snared it away from a defender for a 46-yard play to the 2-yard line. Parks cashed in the big play on the next snap to make it 10-7.
After forcing another punt moments later, the offense again started to eat up yards. This time Watford beat Ball State with his legs, cranking out a 12-yard run early in the series before bursting into the secondary on a diving 27-yard touchdown run. That gave Virginia the aforementioned 17-7 advantage.
Of course, things unraveled from there with the costly penalties and turnovers. That left UVa with another disappointing loss – only its second ever to a Mid-American Conference school – and, once again, searching for answers. Last season, Virginia opened with a 2-0 record before a 56-20 loss to Georgia Tech started a tailspin of six straight losses.
“It hurts, but you can’t let it end the season,” McGee said. “We still have seven games at least. If you let this spiral out of control, it just gets worse. As leaders on the team, you have to keep guys together. If we can do that, we will be OK.”
London, meanwhile, must figure out a way to try to salvage the rebuilding project. After an 8-5 season and a Chick-fil-A Bowl appearance in his second season in 2011, things have taken a turn for the worse. The Cavaliers own a 4-11 record against Football Bowl Subdivision teams since that bowl bid.
“My goal is to make sure that we do everything we need to do and that’s what I’m committed to doing. I go to work every day with that mindset. The coaches we have here go in with that mindset. The players come to play. When they don’t play as well as we need to, this is the result of it,” London said. “They’re not quitting in that locker room in there. They want to come back again tomorrow to get ready for seven games left in the season. So, we’re 2-3. That’s where we are right now with a chance to get better. That’s all my focus and goal is to do.”
Final Stats
Postgame Quotes from VirginiaSports.com
Postgame Notes from VirginiaSports.com
what a crock of crap.. Same excuses over & over again. “we need to get better, we need to correct mistakes”. Here’s a novel concept, correct them in training camp & look like a D-1 unit!! London said it was embarrassing to have it done at home, what about Oregon? He didn’t say that was embarrassing, but it was.
It is a shame and embarrassment to see the Hoos play as bad as they have been playing and I guess the coaching staff is even more embarrassed than the fans are since they have 4 “Head Coaches” on staff and our players still don’t understand the fundamentals of the game. I have been a loyal Hoo fan for 52yrs. and I have finally had enough, I won’t waste another Sat. afternoon on a team that bad. We are not good enough for Div. I football. A-TownHoo
Someone tell London Pitt is in the ACC before he keeps saying get ready for the first conference game.
ML said get ready for our first conference game? I thought we had one last week at Pitt….. That lapse is rather disconcerting.
We are a hot mess. Buckle up for another long and painful nosedive of a season.
They left off that half the penalties were bogus and that they refused to call any on BSU. The reason we couldnt get to QB or stop the outside run was holding which for some reason was never called. Plus the Parks fumble that wasnt started the slide.
Same old stuff–excuses. We recruit talent, but simply can not “coach it up” to being a team with ability and discipline.
C’mon Mike. Our first conference game was over a week ago against Pitt. Attention to detail is what is killing this team and that statement sums it up in a nutshell.