When it comes to offseason chatter for the Virginia football team, one of the big topics of conversation this year has focused on the traditional running game. Cavalier coach Bronco Mendenhall launched some of that discussion himself in April when he said that part of the offense “is more violent, more productive, and more physical” than he had seen in his tenure.

With kickoff now merely weeks away and practice starting this week, it’s time to see if that spring assessment can carry through to the preseason and 2021 schedule. That’s the starting point for the latest “50 Thoughts Before Virginia Football Kickoff” article – What Does Virginia Need To Be Better In Traditional Running Game?

For the purposes of this article, the traditional running game means carries by running backs. The Cavaliers obviously have had some success in the Mendenhall era with quarterback runs and specialty/deception runs (think Keytaon Thompson, Joe Reed, etc. rotating in the backfield to take the ball or end-arounds with someone like Olamide Zaccheaus). The more straight-ahead style runs with running backs, however, had some effectiveness with Taquan Mizzell, Jordan Ellis, and Albert Reid early in the coaches’ tenure, but the yards per carry numbers were still well outside the top 100 for individual backs. There have not been many gains in that regard nor the same volume production in recent years.

Mendenhall stated it as such: “As you already know, the traditional runs for our running backs haven’t been our strength, but our quarterback runs have been very good. When we put those two things together, that’s kind of become our running game. So we would love to see some more production from traditional runs, while we keep the creativity of our quarterback runs.”

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