The Deacs have done it again. For the 4th straight game, Wake Forest has blown out their opponent, this time destroying the Virginia Cavaliers 51-7.
Just like the Stanford and Cal games, this one was basically decided in the 1st quarter. On Virginia’s first possession, the Cavaliers managed to gain 7 yards before being forced to punt. When Wake got the ball, they scored their first touchdown of the game in about a minute, after a 33-yard pass to Carlos
Hernandez and a 2-yard touchdown run from Ty Clark III. Even if Wake didn’t score in the final 57 minutes of the game, that 1 touchdown would have been enough to put the game into overtime. But the Deacs did score again—many, many times.
Wake put the nail in the coffin on the final possession of the 1st half. With a 17-0 lead, defensive tackle Zach Lohavichan stuffed a 4th and 1 attempt on the Wake 6 yard line to keep UVA off the board in the first half. The Deacs took over and took the ball 87 yards down the field and kicked a field goal to take a 20-0 lead with just 10 seconds remaining in the half. The Deacs weren’t satisfied with that lead, however, and they came out and put 24 more points on Virginia in the 3rd quarter to take a 44-0 lead before the Cavaliers scored their first (and only) points of the game.
I am running out of ways to talk about how dominant this team is. Carlos Hernandez had another incredible game with 8 catches for 136 yards and 1 touchdown. Gio Lopez continued to play at a Heisman level with 293 total yards, 1 touchdown, and no turnovers. Lopez did suffer an apparent knee injury after a late hit in the 3rd quarter, but he seemed to be in good spirits and walking relatively fine after the game. Hopefully that was not anything too serious.
The real star of the show was the Wake Forest rushing attack—the Deacs ran the ball 51 times for 309 yards and 5 touchdowns. It was a “by committee” effort, as the Deacs had 6 players run for over 20 yards. That is the most rushing yards Wake has had in a game since going for 334 yards against Duke in 2019. The defense was also phenomenal—Wake held the Virginia offense to just 16 rushing yards and allowed the Cavs to convert on just 1 of their 12 3rd downs. These Deacs are just absolutely destroying teams.
The month of October of 2026 may go down as the best month of football in program history. The Deacs won 4 straight ACC games by a combined score of 187-31. They outgained their opponents in those game by an average of 489 yards to 263 yards. Even more impressive, the defense only allowed 155 TOTAL rushing yards in those 4 games—the Deacs played an entire month of ACC conference games allowing 1.58 yards per carry.
As fans, we got to enjoy an entire calendar month of football without having to worry at all in the 4th quarter about the result of the game. The closest team to the Deacs at the start of any 4th quarter in October was NC State, who trailed 31-17—Wake scored and increased their lead to 21 points just 4 minutes into the 4th quarter of that one. This team is doing things that I don’t think anyone has ever seen a Wake Forest team do before.
The Deacs now sit at 7-1 overall and 5-1 in the ACC. With SMU losing to Syracuse, Wake is now alone in 2nd place in the conference and in great shape for a potential trip to Charlotte for the ACC Championship Game at the end of the season. If the Deacs keep blowing teams out like they did in October, the ACC Championship Game may be too small of a goal—this is a team that could legitimately play, and even host, games in the playoffs this year. There are still plenty of games left to be played, but this is shaping up to be a very special season for Wake Forest.
Go Deacs!
