It wouldn’t be a Virginia football game at home this season without some fourth quarter drama.
For the fifth time in six games at Scott Stadium this season, the outcome hung in the balance in final moments. The Cavaliers held on once again to down Duke, 42-34, on Saturday. All four of UVA’s wins this season have featured either a score or a stop in the final two minutes or overtime; the only loss in these one-score games at home came against Notre Dame, which scored a touchdown with 12 seconds remaining to escape with a 34-27 win.
The Hoos were happy to get another victory, no matter how tense the final moments get.
“Again, Cardiac Cavs, I don’t know what you want to call us,” UVA coach Mike London said. “It’s just one of those things where the guys just hung in there again and played a tough game. We played a good team. The game went back and forth. It’s just one of those games where there were big plays, explosive plays, long passes. Things occurred during the course of the game where you could turn and felt the pressure of another close game but the guys have been in close games, as you guys know. We executed and did what we needed to do to win a good football game against a good football team. I’m happy for the players. They were tough and resilient and that is something that we’ve been talking about all year.”
“We talked about it a lot, just the past couple of years playing Duke so tight,” Virginia senior Ross Burbank said. “I don’t know what it is with us and them. We always have crazy tight games, lot of offense, a lot of scoring. It’s just great to knock a team off that we haven’t beat in a couple of years. It’s nice. Really enjoyable.”
This one didn’t look like it would be so close for three quarters. The Hoos jumped out to a 21-0 lead in the first quarter, the most points they had scored to start a game since 2007 when they put up 27 in the first quarter against Pittsburgh.
It was clear from the opening drive that Virginia intended to be assertive against Duke, which had allowed 45, 30, 66, and 31 points in the four games prior to Saturday’s matchup. The Cavaliers succeeded on a misdirection screen pass to Daniel Hamm for a career-high 48 yards and then capped the drive with a little trickery. On first down from the 15-yard line, Matt Johns turned and threw a backward pass that looked like a receiver screen but quickly turned into a double pass when Olamide Zaccheaus connected with tight end Evan Butts for the score.
It looked like the same play from last season’s win against Pittsburgh where receiver Miles Gooch completed a double pass to tight end Zach Swanson to set up a touchdown. This one against Duke seemed to provide a jolt for the offense.
“It definitely fires us up when we hit a big play like that,” Burbank said. “It kind of demoralizes the defense and gives the offense and whole team a little bit of spark. It definitely set the tone for the offense.”
The offense went on to post 502 yards of offense. Johns completed 24 of 33 passes for a career-high 344 yards, the second 300-yard game of his career (the first came against Duke last year when he had 325 yards). Zaccheaus finished with 89 receiving yards, 20 rushing yards, and his passing touchdown. Taquan Mizzell scored two touchdowns and recorded 61 rushing yards along with 43 yards receiving. T.J. Thorpe tallied 25 yards rushing and 58 yards receiving.
The 7-0 lead that started with the double pass grew to 21-0 on touchdowns from Thorpe on a 26-yard run and Mizzell on a 3-yard run. Even after Duke’s DeVon Edwards returned a kickoff 94 yards for a touchdown, the Cavaliers grew their advantage to 28-10 (on a 36-yard touchdown catch by Mizzell) and 42-20 (Zaccheaus on a 50-yard touchdown catch on a deep bomb pass) in the second and third quarter respectively. When Zaccheaus crossed the goal line on the long TD play with 2:03 left in the third quarter, in fact, it looked like Virginia was going to skip all the late-game drama this time around.
“You’ve got to remind everybody that the game is still going on no matter what the scoreboard is,” Cavalier senior Mike Moore said. “If we’re winning by 20 points, the game is still going on and there’s time left on the clock so you keep reminding people the game is still going on.”
Indeed, Duke had other ideas. The visitors inserted Parker Boehme at quarterback and he engineered a pair of touchdown drives in the fourth quarter. Boehme found receiver T.J. Rahming twice on his first drive of the quarter, first for a 40-yard gain and then again for a 12-yard touchdown. After UVA’s offense went three-and-out, Boehme hooked up with Rahming again. This time the reception covered 47 yards and Boehme eventually finished off the drive with a pair of runs to get the touchdown that made it 42-34.
The Blue Devils got two more chances in Virginia territory over the final seven minutes, but came away empty handed each time. On the final drive of the game, Duke opened with a 49-yard passing play for Anthony Nash to get the ball to UVA’s 14-yard line. Incomplete passes on three of the next four downs, including an intentional spike on third down to stop the clock, ended any chances at a tie.
Until those two drives cranked out two touchdowns, the Blue Devils hadn’t done much on offense. Through three quarters, they had 285 yards but just 20 points. Other than the Edwards’ kickoff return, they had only one other touchdown in the first three quarters.
Linebacker Micah Kiser and safety Quin Blanding led the defensive effort. Kiser recorded a career-high 17 tackles, while Blanding added 11 stops too. The Hoos also got 2 sacks from defensive end Trent Corney as well as an interception and forced fumble by cornerback Darious Latimore. Defensive back Wilfred Wahee chipped in 3 pass break-ups, including one on the final Duke pass of the game.
“A win is a win,” Kiser said. “We wished we could have put them away a little sooner with a 22-point lead in the fourth quarter, but we found a way to win and we won and we’ll have a good night tonight.”
We did everything we could on offense in the 4th to give the game away. Again POOR play calling and coaching. Up 42 20 With 2nd and 3 at the 30 with 13 min we run one poor blocked run then throw the ball DEEP 2 times WHY. Run the ball and try and get the 1st or throw the screen. Then up 42-34 at the 42 with 7 min after 2 straight good runs want to pass with NOBODY in the backfield. Why not at least have a blocker or a release option. Result loss of 11 yards so we have to punt again.