Unlike last season, when then first year Virginia head coach Bronco Mendenhall held a competition and didn’t announce the Cavaliers’ starting quarterback until August 24, there is zero question who will start the 2017 season. It’s senior Kurt Benkert, a “critical” figure to the Cavaliers’ 2017 success according to Mendenhall.

Barring an injury, Benkert will enter the 2017 season as healthy as he has been in two years. Last summer he was still recovering from August 2015 knee surgery, and during the 2016 season he suffered a separated left shoulder in the Cavaliers’ third game — a 13-10 loss at U-Conn. Despite the shoulder injury, Benkert played in eight of Virginia’s nine remaining games, starting seven.

How different a healthy Benkert will be from last year’s version remains to be seen. He’ll also have 10 games of starting experience under his belt and a full year in the program, being around the coaches and the players and mastering the system.

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