You didn’t see the shutout coming. Seriously. Your concern was that Duke would slice and dice the Virginia defense the way opponents had been doing for weeks.
Even in the 34-33 win at Louisville last week, the Cardinals ran for 233 yards – and they don’t have anybody near as good as Mateo Durant, who came into Saturday’s game in Charlottesville ranked fourth in the nation in yards (788 yards, 131.4 per game).
Durant had a modestly decent game, gaining 82 yards on 17 carries. But after the first quarter – he had 54 yards on six attempts in the opening 15 minutes – Durant was a non-factor.
“They’ve been working their guts out. I’m grateful for that, and our intent was to continue to build consistency and capacity, and that’s what we saw today,” UVA coach Bronco Mendenhall said after the 48-0 win.
This wasn’t the same defense that gave up 699 yards and 59 points in the loss to North Carolina, didn’t force a Wake Forest punt until garbage time in the fourth quarter in a 37-17 loss to the Demon Deacons.
Even Miami and Louisville put up yards in points in losses that came down to missed field goals on the final play.
Duke figured to follow the trend. Coming in, the Blue Devils had been averaging 31.5 points and 496.8 yards per game, the total offense figure ranking third in the ACC.
In addition to what Durant was doing on the ground, Gunnar Holmberg was completing 72.5 percent of his passes, taking advantage of opponents having to stack the box to try to stop the run.
Virginia didn’t have to do that on Saturday, getting its stops with its 3-3-5 – three down linemen and three linebackers along with five defensive backs.
The 3-3-5 had been getting exploited with opponents attacking the A and B gaps between the tackles.
Didn’t see much of that on Saturday.
“We have seen it, in my opinion, each game since UNC,” Mendenhall said. “Has it been perfect? Nope. Have there been lapses? Yes, but I have seen that trend. I’m thankful for their work, their efforts, but really, coaches can only coach. Players let themselves be coached, and our team is responding well, and I’m happy for those kids to have that kind of success today.”
The only question in the fourth quarter was, could the backups preserve the shutout?
Duke had a first-and-goal at the UVA 1 inside of three minutes left. A run on first down went for a no-gain. On second down, backup QB Riley Leonard fumbled the snap, and UVA recovered and was able to run out the clock.
“Man, it means the world. I mean definitely, just as a defense you never want anyone to cross the endzone. When we’re at home and defending our turf and right now, just to see that shoutout, I mean all the hard work throughout the week pays off,” said linebacker Nick Jackson, who had a team-high 11 tackles, four of them for losses.
As to what was different this week?
“We’re just playing more physically, we’re playing with more passion, we’re having fun out there,” Jackson said. “We just got back to going out there and having fun, we’re celebrating, having fun, just doing our little things. It was fun out there, we’re making it fun again.”
Story by Chris Graham
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