Trend Report

What’s up?

Offensive line and tackle play. The most pleasing aspect of Saturday’s game for Virginia fans must be the play of the Cavalier offensive line. This much maligned crew entered a game where most observers expected the UVa road graders to be dominated by Maryland’s veteran front seven. After failing to record a sack in its first two games of the year, Maryland’s defense posted 9 sacks in the last three games and delivered 20 tackles for loss (6.6/game). Virginia’s line held a Maryland club averaging 4.83 TFL/game to just two while surrendering a single sack. QB Marc Verica was pressured just four times in the game and on the season the Cavaliers are 25th in the nation, yielding five total sacks (1 per game) and 9th in the nation by allowing just 2.80 TFL per game

Wide receiver/tight end blocking. We noted last week in our Maryland Defensive Scouting Report that a key to Virginia’s success last year against the Terps was downfield blocking by the tight ends and receivers. We saw some improvement last week against Duke but against a much better defensive unit this week the Hoos made a significant leap. They produced four big running plays of 35, 19, 13 and 13 yards.

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