The people in charge of UVA Athletics ought to be ashamed at their amateurish mishandling of the colossal failure that was the harebrained attempt to move a home football game to Brazil.
I guess for the last time, back on June 4, a day after the ACC announced that the UVA-NC State game that had been scheduled for Aug. 29 in Brazil was being moved back to the States, I submitted my umpteenth request under Virginia FOIA law for a copy of the contract that should be on file for the game.
ICYMI: UVA Football Brasil
- UVA Football: 2026 NC State game moving to Brazil? Massive FU to fanbase, if so
- UVA Football: No contract on file for a Virginia-NC State football game in Brazil in 2026
- UVA Football: Still waiting on a signed contract for UVA-NC State game in Brazil
- Update: Still no contract on file for UVA-NC State football game in Brazil
- Update on the home game UVA Football fans lost to Brazil: Still nothing
- UVA Football: ACC announces kickoff time for season opener in Brazil
- UVA Football: Brazil season opener that probably never was is no more
It took the UVA FOIA office 12 days to get back to me with word that “the University of Virginia has no records responsive to your request,” and now considers the matter “closed.”
So, no contract.
What’s particularly galling here is that PackPower247 was able to get a copy of the contract that NC State had on file related to the game.
The NC State side of the contract, dated Nov. 15, 2025, included a $2 million participation fee, 10 percent of net revenues from the sale of fan travel packages, not to exceed $500,000, and 20 percent of net revenues from sponsorships referred to the event organizer, Athlete Advantage – with a $1.5 million cancellation fee.
I’ll note here: I submitted the first of my several FOIA requests to UVA about this game on Nov. 24.
I’d love to know if UVA was to be in line to get more for its participation in the game because UVA Football was being asked to give up a home game to make things happen.
I would expect the cancellation fee to be the same for both schools.
Guess we’ll never know.
Are we to believe, because the FOIA office can’t find a record of a contract for a UVA Football game in Brazil, that, maybe, a part of the problem with this game not going off is that UVA Athletics just didn’t finalize its side of the deal?
Lack of attention to detail seems to be a point of contention with the messy divorce that Carla Williams initiated with UVA Lacrosse coach Lars Tiffany, who says he was offered an extension last summer, signed it in March, but then was let go in May, with the announcement from UVA Athletics being simply that he “will not return,” the implication being, he wasn’t fired, we just decided against re-signing him.
Tiffany is ruffling his legal feathers to try to get what he says he is owed from the contract he says he signed in March; I think we can suppose that the matter between the coach and the school will be settled quietly and outside of the public purview, and both sides moving on with their lives happily ever after, and whatnot.
Whatever we end up paying Tiffany to go away, let’s hope that the lack of a signed, sealed and delivered contract on the Brazil football game in the system doesn’t end up costing us even more.
Seriously, the Tiffany thing could end up setting the donors back around $1 million, and this football game fiasco could be another $1.5 million, at the least.
Do they have that kind of money just sitting around over there in the McCue Center to not be concerned about dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s?
I’m asking for friends who keep getting fundraising letters and emails asking them to up their contributions, that obviously aren’t needed.
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Chris Graham
