How much of UVA Football coach Tony Elliott’s waffling over his starting QB about the reality that Anthony Colandrea is a sophomore, and Tony Muskett is a grad senior?
The young guy has a future; the older guy doesn’t.
Has to be an issue, doesn’t it?
“To be honest with you, the future really hasn’t factored into the decisions that I’ve made this week. I’m really focusing on trying to figure out how to win Saturday for these seniors and find a way to go out to Blacksburg to win next week,” Elliott told reporters at his weekly press conference on Tuesday.
ICYMI
- UVA Football: Elliott leaning toward Anthony Colandrea as starter at QB for SMU
- UVA Football: Tony Elliott has a decision to make as to who starts at QB
- UVA Football: Tony Muskett has to be the starter at QB going forward, doesn’t he?
Elliott tried to minimize Colandrea’s truly awful day in the 35-14 loss at #6 Notre Dame – AC was 8-of-21 for 69 yards and three INTs before being lifted at halftime – as “a bad really three minutes in the second quarter,” but the issues with Colandrea date back a few weeks now.
Colandrea, in his last three outings, is 40-of-73 through the air for 368 yards, one TD and seven INTs, and he hasn’t completed 60 percent or better of his pass attempts since Virginia’s 43-24 win at Coastal Carolina way back in Week 4.
But even with his struggles, you’d still have to figure that Colandrea is the quarterback of the future, with two years of eligibility, and no real competition on the current UVA roster.
You’d also figure that Elliott, assuming he’s around for the 2025 season – and his hefty contract buyout would suggest that to be the case – will want to hit the transfer portal for one or two QBs to, at the least, provide depth in the quarterback room, and maybe be able to give Colandrea a run at the QB1 spot in the spring and into training camp.
But that thinking is still three weeks away – the 2024 transfer portal formally opens on Monday, Dec. 9.
Meaning, Elliott’s focus is properly placed in the here and now, on #12 SMU on Saturday, and the regular-season finale at Virginia Tech on Nov. 30.
“With the way college football is nowadays and the transfer portal and all of that, you’ll fry a bunch of brain cells trying to think about what it’s going to look like in the future,” Elliott said. “I believe if I’m fair and just, and which I believe that a decision and how we proceeded this week is fair, you know, based off of kind of the body of work and where we are, that’s really been the focus. Then once the season is over, we’ll focus more on the future.”
The focus needs to be on getting Colandrea fixed.
“I don’t want AC to be thinking about next year. I need him to kind of get back going,” Elliott said.
“Really, it’s been focusing on the right now and not necessarily thinking about the future, because, heck, I don’t know what the future is going to look like next year anyway. It’s going to change, but really just trying to do what I believe is fair.”
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Chris Graham
