The Virginia Cavaliers dropped their second game of the 2026 season down in Tallahassee. A look at what’s trending up and down after what was an ugly day for the ‘Hoos.
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Good starts
The ‘Hoos have opened the scoring in every game they’ve played up to this point. After forcing a quick stop on FSU’s first shot on offense, Beau Pribula capped a seven-play, 63-yard drive with a wide open touchdown pass to Dashawn Martin. Martin now owns four touchdowns on 11 catches. Good things have happened when the offense has
gotten him the ball in space. Unfortunately, his touchdown grab minutes into the game was one of very, very few bright moments throughout the day.
Daniel Sparks
Sparks was the best player on the field for the ‘Hoos in this game. As the offense continued to sputter, UVA’s longtime punter kept things alive from a field position standpoint. On his seven punts, four were downed inside the 20 yard line with an average of 57 yards per attempt. He also booted one for 73 yards.
You know a game stunk when we’re throwing a punter into this category, but Sparks had one of the best performances you could ask for given the situation. Things could have gotten way worse, way earlier, had he not continued to pin FSU deep.
Quarterback chatter
Tony Elliott was asked after the game if Holstein going into the game was ever a thought, to which he said yes, but that staff was primarily working to try and fix the problems plaguing the offense and also mentioned how throwing Holstein into the game might not have necessarily been the fairest thing to do. “I don’t know if at that time it was the best situation,” Elliott said. “It might have been, but I don’t know if that would have been fair to him either.. if you’re struggling to protect, putting another quarterback in the game.”
Holstein has shown his accuracy in the short time he’s been in the game. Yes, UVA would lose the mobility of a guy like Pribula if they were to make that change at some point, but with a handful of capable running backs, you could argue this offense is starving for more of a passing game than an added rushing element at this point in time.
Elliott doubled down that Pribula is still QB1 early Tuesday during his weekly presser ahead of this weekend’s game against Syracuse, but this FSU result will at least have fans paying closer attention to the efficiency of the passing game these next couple weeks.
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Fisher Camac
Camac had another solid game given the context. He racked up five tackles to go with an early sack on Ashton Daniels, along with a deflected pass to round out his day. With the injuries to multiple guys along the defensive line, it’s been Camac filling in and moving to different spots up front to try and combat the shrinking depth. His snap counts are up noticeably because of it, per Pro Football Focus. He averaged around 31 snaps per game a year ago; that number is up to 42 this season. He’s eclipsed 50 in games against WVU and now FSU.
Jekail Middlebrook
Despite the offense’s struggles, Middlebrook was a big factor in keeping things alive where he could. He ran 10 times for 65 yards, averaging 6.5 per touch. He hauled in multiple passes as well for 24 yards, including a wonky deflection where he made a great effort after the fact to pick up a first down. He didn’t set the world on fire by any means; if anything, the offense should have found more ways to get him the ball with how things went.
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Penalty decisions
It certainly wasn’t a decision that put the nail in the coffin to lose UVA this game, but it was a notable moment on Saturday. At a time when FSU was ahead by only seven points, Tony Elliott elected to decline a holding call that would have given the Noles a 2nd-and-forever outside of field goal range with 1:18 left in the half, opting to take the chance at the 3rd-and-21 instead. A 14-yard run by Ousmane Kromah immediately after helped set up a 44-yard field goal to make it 17-7 as the half eventually closed.
Elliott mentioned postgame that his reasoning for declining the penalty stemmed from wanting to be aggressive, opting to trust his defense on that third down and get the ball back to the offense with a few extra seconds on the clock from one less down to go chase points before the break.
Theoretically, it makes sense if your offense is humming, but the Cavaliers at that point in time had done little to suggest they were going to march down the field with a little over a minute left and hunt a field goal. And with how the momentum shifted on all sides of the ball, the idea of getting the game to the half as quickly as possible seemed advantageous, especially with UVA set to get the ball to start the second half.
Sometimes the aggressive call works, sometimes it doesn’t. And that mindset has absolutely worked in other instances. That’s football at the end of the day, but it sure didn’t help things this time around.
UVA’s running quarterback problem
I know it might come as a surprise, but Lamar Jackson wasn’t the guy playing quarterback for Florida State the other day; that was Ashton Daniels.
It might as well have been Jackson, though, as Daniels scored five rushing touchdowns on the day, breaking FSU’s school record for most QB rushing touchdowns in a game. The ‘Hoos, like against WVU and Michael Hawkins, never found an answer to slow down the opposing QB from running wild for four quarters. Hawkins rushed for 123 yards and three touchdowns; Daniels scampered for 136 and those five.
I think we all figured after how awful the defense was at allowing so many QB runs in the WVU game that things would surely get patched up, and that it would never happen to that extent for the rest of the season. Instead, UVA made a below-average quarterback look like an All-American and struggled to tackle anyone with the ball throughout.
John Rudzinski and this defense need to find answers here fast with a trip to SMU to face Kevin Jennings, who is plenty capable as a runner himself, now two weeks away.
Avoiding sacks
Pribula was sacked 10 times on Saturday.
10 times!
And for as bad as that was to watch, I struggle to automatically throw all blame towards the offensive line. From the WVU game, to Delaware, to this past weekend, we’ve seen a combination of predictable play calling, which puts the offense in obvious passing situations on third down (which means defenses blitz them to oblivion, and they definitely have), Pribula and the O-line struggling to get on the same page with how to protect against those looks before the snap, receivers not winning their matchups to the tune this offense needs them to, and finally, because of how quickly things were breaking down, Pribula bailing early and not looking downfield on plays where the O-line actually does decent enough protecting him.
The ‘Hoos had allowed nine sacks through four games coming into this one and after exceeding that number to bring the total to 19, UVA now ranks dead last among all Power Four teams in sacks allowed and owns the third-worst mark in all of FBS.
Beau Pribula’s accuracy
Statistically, Pribula came into this game as one of the more accurate passers in the country. Games against Norfolk State and Delaware dressed those numbers up for sure, but most probably expected UVA to find at least a moderate level of consistency in the passing game Saturday.
What happened was consistent inconsistency.
Pribula went 14-of-32 for 168 yards and the one touchdown while missing multiple throws that could’ve sparked UVA in dire moments. An overthrow on a Middlebrook wheel route that could have resulted in a touchdown, in addition to an early fourth quarter ball that was too tall for Xavier Brown on the goal line being the most notable examples. Sure, there were some bad drops where good passes weren’t rewarded, but there were way too many missed opportunities in a game where the margins were already slim to begin with versus a half-decent team.
The ease of the remaining schedule
Boy, does this schedule look different now compared to what it did just a few weeks ago. The ‘Hoos return home to face Syracuse this Saturday night and, as of now, sit as a 9.5-point favorite. A trip to SMU follows, while road games against a dangerous Wake Forest team and in the house of horrors at Virginia Tech still loom later in the year. North Carolina is much improved enough to put up respectable efforts at Clemson and this past weekend against Notre Dame, and Duke might be one of the most slept-on teams to this point.
Seasons become lost causes faster than they ever have nowadays with how offseason player movement is. A few early-season losses don’t mean UVA is at a point of no return by any means, but a few more performances like we saw Saturday and things could get very dicey towards the backend of this season. These next two games are critical to right the ship and remain competitive into the later stages of October and November.
