Virginia football season kicks off for the first time under new coach Bronco Mendenhall in a few short weeks. The season opener against Richmond at Scott Stadium is scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 3 at 3:30 p.m. It will also be streamed on ESPN3.
TheSabre.com introduced a new weekly football feature last week called “Ask The Sabre” where our staff responds to message board questions. This feature is brought to you by our newest sponsor Bundoran Farm, where you can Create Your Virginia Legacy.
The first “Ask The Sabre” article featured some culture style questions as Mendenhall’s first season approaches. Read it here. The second installment spreads out the questions a bit more. Here you go …
What do you view as the swing game of the 2016 football season? ~ hawkb
Associate Editor Chris Horne: At Duke. At best, I think Virginia is 3-1 heading into this game. At worst, 2-2. Duke is the first ACC game. It’s a road game. It’s winnable, and it leads right into a three-game home stand. A win gets the Hoos off to a good start in the ACC, potentially off to a 4-1 start to the season, and confidence heading into the challenging stretch of home games with Pitt, UNC, and Louisville.
What is the number one thing UVA has to do in order to compete with the top ACC teams each year? ~ hitnrun
Editor Kris Wright: Score more points. If you’ve read The Sabre much in recent years, you probably saw that coming. Virginia has had an ongoing problem with consistently putting points on the board. The Hoos have ranked in the bottom third of the national rankings in scoring averages for at least a decade. They’ve managed to crack 25 points on average just three times since 2008 and that was just barely as none of those teams reached 26. Since 2012, the top half of the ACC has averaged at least 27.7 points per game.
There are a lot of reasons why scoring has been an issue – field position, explosive plays, quarterback rotation, and red zone execution to name a few – but the end result has been low point totals. The good news is that BYU averaged 30.2 points or more over the last three seasons under Bronco Mendenhall and Robert Anae, who are both in the same positions here at UVA. Considering that Mendenhall’s defensive track record should be able to translate with the Hoos, scoring more points should make them more competitive with the ACC.
I recall BYU being a really tough team, hard hitting – fair number of hits bordering on late because they play to the whistle. Is that part of what the coaches are bringing to the table here – team toughness? ~ cathoofever
Editor Kris Wright: In short, yes the coaches are molding team toughness. They even name it ‘will development’ in practice to see who can push through challenges.
That’s not what we’re really getting at here though is it? Poster cathoofever did a nice job of softening the question, but I think there is a fair amount of concern among some Virginia fans with “Are the Hoos going to be dirty?” A couple of chippy matchups with BYU in 2013 and 2014 planted that seed. Some You Tube videos from games like the Memphis bowl matchup grew the concern. The Cougars played a physical and aggressive style under Mendenhall – that is clear. Did it go overboard too often? That’s probably up for interpretation, though watching BYU film, it didn’t appear to be an ongoing theme each week to me. For fans that are concerned that the ‘play to the whistle’ attitude might start to resemble the edge found around Bud Foster’s defenses at Virginia Tech, I think there’s going to be some of that here just because of the ‘never stop playing’ mantra in the style. I personally don’t think that’s a bad thing (note, I don’t mean late hits or anything like that, but just a physical presence and toughness) as long as players aren’t targeting helmets and knees or that sort of thing.
Malcolm Cook and the Hoos hope to get the defense going. ~ Kris Wright
One constant problem for Virginia last season was the inability to get pressure on the edge in the pass rush. Based on the personnel on the team and Coach Mendenhall’s previous teams at BYU, do you expect Virginia to be a blitz-heavy team, or will the team need to find edge players who can make things happen in the backfield? ~ HTrain90
Editor Kris Wright: I thought this question was interesting. I think the answer should probably be ‘selectively blitz heavy’ vs. ‘always blitz heavy’ – the latter being how you would describe previous UVA Defensive Coordinator Jon Tenuta’s scheme. In watching some BYU film, two different TV crews described the Cougars in completely different terms. On one broadcast, the announcer said that BYU didn’t blitz much and on another, a different announcer said that Coach Mendenhall likes to blitz a lot. That’s why I think throwing ‘selectively’ in there is the best way to go overall.
As for this year’s team, I think Mendenhall will need to create pressure with some schemes and strategies vs. just relying on an edge rusher to get it done like Eli Harold did at times. I think senior Donte Wilkins has the ability to get back there more than some nose tackles and I think Andrew Brown’s explosive first step will find a more comfortable role on the outside of a 3-4 instead of the inside of a 4-3 so there is some personnel to just go get the QB, but overall I don’t think there is a pure edge guy that go do it for four quarters. The good news is that Mendenhall has been noted for his creativity and game-planning to get pressure – the Cougars finished tied for fifth nationally last season with 40 sacks. You’ll see disguises (show on one side, but drop in order to rush from the opposite side), stunts (linemen or linebackers looping around another lineman), and overloads (more than one rusher through a gap) to get that done.
There’s been a lot of talk about how the 3-4 base defense being implemented will, at times, present as a 4-3, 4-2-5 or even a 3-3-5. Given OLB Malcolm Cook’s speed (we hear he may be the fastest player on the team) and experience in the secondary, should we expect to see a lot of him dropping into coverage? Who else will be asked often to “play outside of his position?” ~ SchmHoo
Editor Kris Wright: Yes, as I sort of alluded to in the previous answer, you will see outside linebackers like Malcolm Cook drop into coverage some times in Mendenhall’s calls. You’ll also see them push the pocket on a planned rush or blitz. Or set the edge as a contain player. Or stay at home for reverses and misdirection. Basically, the outside linebackers can have any number of responsibilities. From watching BYU on video, you’ll see those guys line up over the slot receiver a lot at the start of plays but then their duties vary.
As for guys like Cook ‘playing out of position,’ there are some candidates in guys like Mark Hall (defensive end at 260 pounds) or Chris Peace (a hybrid edge guy at 235 pounds) that maybe fit the bill.
Overview of uncommitted OL prospects with UVA offers? ~ Trigon
Associate Editor Chris Horne: A good number of Virginia’s offensive line targets have already committed, so don’t be surprised if more offers go out as high school seasons begin. First, some context. UVA has three commitments in the fold in 2017- Tyler Fannin (center/guard) and Chris Glaser Jr.(guard) are interior line prospects, while Bryson Speas is a tackle. Prior to the retirements of UVA linemen Eric Tetlow and Sadiq Olanrewaju as well as Jared Cohen’s decision to give up football, I’d heard that Virginia would take five or six recruits in total in this class. With the attrition, I definitely see six and maybe even seven. Former commit Harry Crider recently flipped to Indiana, so I expect the staff to try and take another interior line prospect in the class.
As of now I think Virginia’s best bets are three offensive tackle prospects, two of whom are in-state. Mekhi Becton, a 6’7″,300-pound senior out of Highland Springs (VA), has been to Charlottesville numerous times and has enjoyed those trips. He seems to have a great relationship with the staff. Becton is in no rush to commit and may end up taking all five official visits, though, so while UVA is in good shape this is far from a done deal. Virginia Tech is also in contention and Georgia, Michigan, Michigan State, and North Carolina are strong out-of-state offers.
Tyran Hunt, a 6’6″, 275-pound prospect out of Southampton (VA), plans to narrow his list soon. I see Tyran staying in-state, but my gut feeling right now is that Virginia Tech has the edge. UVA is definitely in the mix, though.
Virginia appears to be in great shape with 6’5”, 250-pound California native Ryan Nelson, who is featured in this EDGE article. Nelson is scheduled to visit Arizona and UVA in September. Right now, he says he will visit others later on, but I won’t be surprised if he commits next month. If all goes well on his official, I think UVA could get him. We’ll find out a lot after that trip.
