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Mendenhall: ‘Hill is steeper’ at UVA than originally thought

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uva football3In five years, those who like to do such things are going to be able to use this column about first impressions of the Bronco Mendenhall era of UVA football against me.

Because I’m here to say, the sky is falling, before it’s vogue to do so.

Actually, in the here and now, days after the first brush strokes on Mendenhall’s, ha, masterpiece, the 37-20 epoch-opening loss at home to FCS Richmond, it’s plenty vogue to pile on, if only because of what we’d been sold the past nine months.

I’m writing this 72 hours later, after Mendenhall’s first post-loss weekly press conference, which was all about tamping down expectations from #HoosRising down into the direction of #HoosKeepingScoreAnyway?

“The brutal fact and the reality is I think everyone, players, coaches and maybe even — and certainly fans were hopeful this would be an immediate turnaround and an instant and an overnight success. There’s going to be a hard work of reality now that this culture is, there’s an engrainment and some habits that have come with losing and lack of success. I have a clearer idea now of what that looks like, but remain really optimistic,” Mendenhall said early in the presser.

We were all reminded early and often that Mendenhall had experience turning around a losing program at his previous stop, BYU, which had endured three straight losing seasons before he took over in 2005 and took the Cougars to a bowl in year one, and in year two had BYU winning 11 games.

Virginia is coming off four straight losing seasons, and a stretch of eight sub-.500 finishes in the last 10 years. The 2015 Cavs finished 4-8, but were largely competitive even in defeat, taking Notre Dame to the final 12 seconds, blowing two late leads to in-state rival Virginia Tech, losing one-score heartbreakers at Miami and at Louisville, and beating Duke and Georgia Tech in Scott Stadium thrillers.

One could argue that the cupboard left behind by predecessor Mike London and his staff was pretty bare, but the holdovers include the top two tacklers in the ACC (Micah Kiser and Quin Blanding) and arguably the conference’s most versatile tailback (Taquan Mizzell), along with a rising senior starting QB (Matt Johns) who, sure, was beaten out for the starting job by a transfer (former ECU quarterback Kurt Benkert), but still, Johns as a backup is a guy who threw for more than 2,800 yards and 20 TDs last season.

Which is to say, it’s not like Mendenhall is starting from square zero here. While there’s a reason London ended up getting canned, there were as many people who believed it was as much about London and his staff having trouble getting the talent they were able to recruit to Charlottesville lined up right as it was that they just hadn’t been getting enough talent onto the field in the first place.

The biggest issue the past two years, to me, was the inability to finish out games, so when the talk around Mendenhall was that his approach would emphasize fitness, one, and two, would include detailed analysis of game situations that would ensure nothing of a surprising nature would undermine efforts at key moments, that was meeting the need head on two-fold.

And then you hear Mendenhall on Monday making the same excuse over and over and over: that the culture of losing that had defined the program under the London regime took over when adversity struck early Saturday afternoon.

“It’s been 11 years since I’ve seen something like that, after taking over BYU, after they had three losing seasons. It was really foreign. At first it was difficult to identify but then there was the reality of, Oh, this is what they know,” Mendenhall said. “That was a reality of the threshold to have the players, and maybe even the community, revert back or be used to that is kind of something that I saw. It was like in slow motion. I think that’s to be expected. While I was hopeful that the roots and new strategies or the new habits would have been deeper, that is where it is.”

It is where it is. Wow, just wow. In one week, we’ve seen things go from, we’re so focused on doing things right that we’re going to practice how we run through the tunnel during pre-game introductions, to, well, hold your horses.

“I’m certain that we will have success. When and how much, that will remain the question,” Mendenhall said. “But the kids are willing, discouraged and, again, their ability to reframe, I think they were as hopeful as anyone that this would be an immediate turnaround. But it’s going to take time. And how much I’m not certain. But again, I am positive that it will happen and that the scheme, strategy and coaches that are here will be able to pull that off. But lots and lots of work ahead, steep learning curve still to come. The path doesn’t get any easier, nor will it. But undaunted in terms of the approach.”

If you think this sounds like the new head coach throwing in the towel one week in, then you’re with me. Because what he had to say Monday sure comes across as, no matter how much we do to get these kids to do what we tell them to do, this group is a lost cause.

Now, if recruiting was going gang-busters, and help was on the way, if not next year, because how much can a true-freshman class really help in football, but surely by year three or four, then that would be one thing.

But, ah, not so much on that front. The 2017 class has 17 commitments, 10 of them three-stars, according to Rivals, no four-stars, no five-stars. If the cupboard is considered bare now because of a dearth of top-flight talent, it’s going to be replenished with more of the same second-shelf talent that Mendenhall and his staff will have to develop.

The early returns on player development being what they are, is this going to be a long five years?

“First is getting to know and ensure I know our existing personnel and what they’re capable of. And fall camp was one indicator, and while I’d like to say I was skilled enough to say I had an exact idea, I had a strong idea, but my idea is different now after seeing Saturday,” Mendenhall said. “And so who touches the ball, who’s featured on rushes, where the coverage can be, all those things now start to shift in terms of percentage and scheme to then allow the current players to have the best chance to execute. And after that’s seen, then and only then will I know if there’s any other significant changes that have to be made. But I know more now than obviously I did before the game. And the reframing is that the hill is steeper and longer than what I had thought at the beginning, but that doesn’t mean the outcome can’t be any different.”

Virginia is a 23-point underdog heading into its first road game of the season, late Saturday night at #24 Oregon, which mauled the Cavs in 2013 in a 59-10 final that could have easily been 159-10 if the Ducks hadn’t taken the foot off the accelerator early in that one.

The one positive to the Week 2 matchup, and I’m stretching here, a lot, to find one, is that Oregon has to guard against looking past UVA, and also has to assume that whatever they may see on the tapes from that game will end up on the cutting-room floor in Bryant Hall before the trip out west, particularly on defense.

Indeed, Mendenhall has made it clear that he plans to dial back the playbook on defense, after watching his unit wonder around on its side of the line of scrimmage like so many zombies in the loss to Richmond, which put up 524 yards of total offense in the upset.

Another positive: hey, the defense has experience playing against a tempo offense.

That’s as far as I can go in trying to see silver linings. First impression here is that Mendenhall and his group suddenly lost the ability to evaluate talent in the air crossing the Mississippi and wasted the spring and fall camp running conditioning drills and hashtagging each other, which of course is harshly negative, but what else do we have to go on right now?

“We have to model what and how you carry yourself in terms of preparation of winning football games, period,” Mendenhall said. “And that’s regardless of whether it’s in Scott Stadium or on the road. And so again, every single brick has to be put in place just right or it will manifest somewhere else as we get a few layers up. And so I’m confident we can do that, and eventually that breakthrough will happen. Again, the biggest unknown now is time, but man, the resolve and certainty to me hasn’t been deterred at all. I’m just really clear it’s going to be harder longer than what I originally thought. And I think that’s fair just to be open with you.”

The difference between this and Mike London telling us that he and his group were just going to get back out there and coach ‘em up is … what, exactly?

Column by Chris Graham

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