Home Report Card: Final grades for Virginia-Georgia Tech from Week 7
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Report Card: Final grades for Virginia-Georgia Tech from Week 7

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jelani woods
Tight end Jelani Woods. Photo courtesy UVA Athletics.

The Virginia offense, as you would guess, graded out great with its 48-point effort in Saturday’s win over Georgia Tech.

The defense, which gave up 40: meh.

But that offense. Wow!

Pro Football Focus gave the O a season-high 88.1 grade. You’d expect that for a group that put up 636 total yards, and a season-best 240 yards on the ground.

QB Brennan Armstrong (PFF grade: 90.3), who somehow wasn’t voted ACC Quarterback of the Week for the fifth time in 2021, threw for 396 yards and four TDs, completing 29 of his 43 pass attempts, and ran for 99 yards and four TDs on 12 official attempts, which included a 14-yard loss on a sack that college football counts against rushing, for some reason.

One fun number from BA: Tech blitzed him 18 times. Armstrong was 13-of-16 for 201 yards and four TDs on those dropbacks.

Keep blitzing the guy. Dare ya.

Dontayvion Wicks, who was voted ACC Wide Receiver of the Week, and Keytaon Thompson each had 87.0 PFF grades. Wicks caught six passes on 10 targets for 168 yards and two TDs. Thompson had nine catches on 11 targets for 89 yards, and also gained 65 yards on seven rushing attempts.

Tight end Jelani Woods (PFF grade: 82.0) had three catches on three targets for 63 yards.

Olusegun Oluwatimi (PFF grade: 75.2), Chris Glaser (PFF grade: 74.6) and Ryan Nelson (PFF grade: 71.4) each played all 73 offensive snaps.

Jonathan Leech (PFF grade: 66.6) and Bobby Haskins (PFF grade: 60.6) each played 71 snaps.

Breaking down the run game: the Cavaliers ran the ball 20 times between the tackles, gaining 165 yards, for nine first downs and two TDs.

Easily the best effort from the run game in 2021.

Defense

The 61.2 PFF grade wasn’t the worst of the season, so, there’s that.

Georgia Tech gained 570 yards – 300 through the air and 270 on the ground.

The scores came in bunches – the first two Tech possessions, as the Yellow Jackets raced out to a 13-0 lead, then the final two, as they rallied from a 48-27 deficit in the final 1:16 to make the final score look respectable.

The D line got 14 pressures and one sack, pretty much on par for 2021 for Virginia.

Joey Blount had the best night of the unit. His PFF grade was 92.1 for his output, which included eight tackles, an INT and a pass breakup.

Linebacker Elliott Brown graded out at 67.5. Brown had three tackles, a sack and four QB pressures.

The best coverage guy was Anthony Johnson (PFF grade: 69.2), who had a pass breakup and allowed just one completion in four targets.

Safety Coen King (PFF grade: 56.7) allowed one completion in five targets.

The picked-on list was highlighted by Nick Grant (PFF grade: 61.6), who allowed seven catches on eight targets, one of the catches going for a  TD, and De’Vante Cross (PFF grade: 39.3), who allowed six catches on nine targets, two of the catches going for TDs.

Breaking down the run defense: Georgia Tech ran 25 times between the tackles for 165 yards, eight first downs and one TD.

Story by Chris Graham

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