LAST SPRING, Satellite Ball room’s impending closing produced an outpouring of student grief. The Facebook group, “Coran Capshaw, Save Satellite Ballroom!” still has over 1,000 members almost five months after the concert venue closed. It wasn’t the only musical tragedy, as one student noted in a post to the group, “Losing Satellite would be bad enough anyway, but it’s worse now that Starr Hill closed last summer.” With Satellite’s closing, things looked bleak for the Charlottesville music scene, yet this loss is a potential opportunity for the University Programs Council.

With Starr Hill and Satellite’s passing, new venues have popped up and old ones have stepped up to try to fill the void left by Starr Hill and Satellite Ballroom. Starr Hill’s old location is the new home of Si, which promises to host “regional music” along with dance music and DJs, according to the The HooK. Gravity Lounge has started hosting a larger variety and greater number of concerts. Yet, as many student music lovers will attest, there is still ample room for more.

One of the biggest problems for music venues is balancing capacity and atmosphere. Gravity Lounge is a great space, but it fits a very limited audience. The Charlottesville Pavilion on the Downtown Mall has the capacity for big concerts, but it lacks the intimacy of the old venues and is further limited by its seasonal schedule. Starr Hill and Satellite Ballroom were so popular because of their intimate setting that was still large enough to entice well-known artists. Currently, according to Musictoday’s Chris Warnecke, there are no local venues that hold 400-1,000 concertgoers. In addition, during the Pavilion off-season there is no place for bands that could draw 1,000 or more fans but wouldn’t fit with the more formal atmosphere of the Paramount. Hosting acts from Of Montreal to They Might Be Giants to Girl Talk, Satellite Ballroom drew artists that simply have no place to play if they come back to Charlottesville.

Well, not exactly no place. This is where UPC comes in. Clay Reese, Director of UPC’s PKG Concerts Committee, takes the responsibility quite seriously, saying in an interview that his committee is “committed to filling the Satellite void.” UPC has access to a number of on-Grounds venues, which would otherwise be unavailable to artists. In addition, Reese says, a “UPC survey conducted last semester showed that students greatly prefer on-Grounds venues.” Reese cites the Amphitheater and Old Cabell Hall as two venues that are especially valuable in this effort. Reese promises “several shows for late fall and early spring” that will showcase this commitment to medium-size artists.

This is an effort worthy of the student funds from which UPC draws, yet it is still too low on their list of priorities. Instead, UPC also subsidizes student tickets for shows that are already coming to Charlottesville. For the upcoming Jay-Z and T.I. concert at John Paul Jones Arena, student tickets are $20 cheaper than the normal ticket price. That subsidy, plus “additional service charges,” is made up by UPC, according to Reese. In total, UPC is fronting over $20,000 to subsidize 1,000 student tickets. In other words, each one of you, every student at the University, is paying $1 for your fellow students’ Jay-Z tickets, even if you aren’t attending. (In the interest of full disclosure, I will be attending that concert. Thanks for the discount.)

How could your dollar be better spent? Though there is certainly value in making concerts more affordable, just making all students pay for concerts that only some will attend doesn’t seem like the wisest system. Some may argue that bringing new artists to Grounds has the same effect, but shelling out to attract new artists to Charlottesville is vastly different than simply making some tickets cheaper for an act that is already coming.

On the whole, UPC has a tough task: to find its niche in a very competitive entertainment environment. Students already have seemingly limitless entertainment to choose from at home. We can go to Clemons Library and check out, for free, almost any movie known to man. Or take a trip to the movie theaters on the Downtown Mall or down Highway 29. If we want to attend a concert, Gravity Lounge, Si, John Paul Jones Arena, Outback Lodge, the Charlottesville Pavilion and the Paramount Theater are all options. Yet this vast spectrum is still missing the type of entertainment that Starr Hill and Satellite Ballroom had to offer.

Medium-sized music venues are perhaps the most glaring omission from Charlottesville’s entertainment menu, but certainly there are others. This is the great potential of UPC. By filling in the entertainment gaps and providing more options for students, UPC can improve the University experience for Wahoos of all tastes and passions.

Isaac Wood’s column appears Mondays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at i.wood@cavalierdaily.com.

FOR ALL the painstaking deliberation that goes into planning the federal budget, there’s only one side of fiscal policy that voters truly respond to en masse: those nasty little things called taxes. Nobody likes paying them, and no doubt politicians hate talking about them. Even in an extraordinary year such as this, with a mess on Wall Street and talk of temporarily nationalizing American banks, the bottom line is that citizens want to know what price tag they will bear.

Since this is a presidential election year, taxes have moved to the fore of political discussion. Both Sen. McCain and Sen. Obama have spent months crafting policies that will be sustainable and functional. Wait, did I say functional? I meant palatable, of course. Anyone running for public office these days understands that winning an election isn’t about finding long-term solutions to problems; it’s about giving the people what they want, right now.

The reason for this knee-jerk reaction to taxation is that it is perhaps one of the most fundamental economic interactions between government and civilian. Sure, people would like their elected officials to provide them with benefits such as job security, but most recognize this is an indirect responsibility of a government — if it is to be considered a responsibility at all. An administration presiding over a period of high unemployment is unfortunate; one that inflicts high taxes on its citizens is committing blasphemy.

With this in mind, it is understandable that neither candidate will be upfront about raising taxes, especially on the middle class. Yet the reality is that our government needs money badly, regardless of who is elected. For the Democrats the reason is obvious: They propose universal healthcare, better welfare benefits, federal investment in alternative energy research, etc. All of this will require a substantial amount of cash. Republicans (or at least true conservatives), on the other hand, argue that they can reduce the tax burden simply by cutting spending and waste. A noble goal, sure, except for one fatal flaw: At my last check, the U.S. was roughly $10,300,977,985,808.25 in debt. For those whose eyes just glazed over, as mine did, that number is about $10.3 trillion. I could write another column citing all the reasons why continuously deferring our financial obligations is toxic. Suffice it to say, officials have gotten comfortable with the idea of not having to pay for their follies. Perhaps the War in Iraq was absolutely necessary, and maybe giving health insurance to everyone is a great initiative. But isn’t it possible that people and politicians alike might be much more discerning if they knew the true cost of such measures? Unfortunately, that price almost certainly won’t be realized until our generation is the one paying it.

Just for fun, let’s pretend for a moment that either McCain or Obama had the gall, once in office, to enact some sensible fiscal policies. The need for reduced spending is clear, but what might the tax side of the equation look like? With the goal of maximizing revenue in mind, the typical gut reaction is to institute a major hike in rates, plain and simple. Two things complicate this picture though. The first is simply the intricacy of the tax code, due to the progressive marginal rate system and the plethora of credits offered. Raising taxes across the board would require a bit of playing around with the numbers if it was to be meaningful at all.

The second thing is a much bigger problem, and that is the Laffer Curve concept. As ECON 202 alumni can proudly recall, this little idea is pretty straightforward. Simply put, at a certain tax level, raising rates won’t increase revenue for the government. Generally this is because as income decreases relative to increased production (due to punitively high taxes), people and companies are less likely to do extra work. That means there is less income to tax, and as a result, of course, less is collected. Another consideration is that once taxation on the wealthiest Americans reaches a certain point, those with the money will find it expedient to hire accountants and attorneys to find tricks to downsize their bill. A similar Laffer effect occurs with raising the corporate income tax. Rather than just pay up, companies will often move operations to countries offering a more “hospitable” business environment.

Indeed, it’s all enough to make your head spin. It just goes to show that when Democrats disparage “tax cuts for the wealthy” or Republicans justify slashing rates by promising to cut spending, nothing is ever as cut and dry as they would have you believe. It would help everyone if policy advisors spent more time researching different methods to see which ones worked best and less time fine-tuning campaign messages. The catch is that such an approach won’t win any elections until we as a people say “enough is enough.” Securing our future depends on us holding our politicians to higher standards than we currently do.

Ross Lawrence is a Cavalier Daily associate editor. He can be reached at r.lawrence@cavalierdaily.com.

Employees of the University Medical Center and Medical School are no longer permitted to receive gifts from companies that do business with the University Health System, according to a new University policy.

Steve Wasserman, Medical School assistant dean for research, said the policy is designed to eliminate financial conflicts of interest for employees and to “create an environment in which patients, funding agencies and the general public are convinced that there are no external influences on what you are doing in the various missions you are fulfilling for the University.”

Wasserman said pharmaceutical companies and device manufacturers, among others, in the past would offer gifts such as pens, notepads and tote bags to employees. Wasserman added that companies also often provided lunch for employees as a “way to buy access to faculty and residents … to talk about their companies’ drugs.” This too, will be prohibited under the new policy.

Urology Prof. Raymond Costabile said there has been concern over the past few years that advertising directly to service providers will influence the delivery of medical care and the products being prescribed.

“I like to know that my doctor’s giving me what I should get based on her expertise rather than being influenced by the pen she used that morning,” Costabile said.

Costabile added that the best support for this concern comes from the actions of the companies themselves, which continue to spend money on Health System employees.

Costabile said the policy includes a stipulation that will allow companies to continue donations of items that are considered educational — such as books for medical residents, Wasserman noted — as well as free samples of drugs for patients.

“If it is of nominal value and there is a definite advantage a patient can get from it … then that’s still allowed,” Costabile said. “We have to work with vendors and want to work with them, but we have to do it in a way that’s best for patients and students and research efforts.”
Wasserman added that gift-giving is universal in the business world, but there are more risk factors in the medical industry.

“The stakes are much higher when you’re dealing with clinical care, clinical research and biomedical research, which is supposed to result in new therapies coming out,” Wasserman said. “We want to make sure these are not tarnished.”

The University is one of a number of institutions that have prohibited this type of activity, Wasserman said, following health systems at institutions such as Yale, Stanford and Pittsburgh.

Costabile said he expects other medical institutions across the country to implement similar policies.

The University is considering retrofitting the Ivy Stacks Storage Facility in order to increase storage space for the University Library’s collection. Library shelves are currently filled almost to capacity.

Ivy Stacks, the University Library’s off-Grounds storage facility, was opened in 1994 “to enable us to keep shelving books,” University Deputy Librarian Diane Walker said. “At that point the shelves in all the libraries on Central Grounds were full.”

Since 1994, 750,000 books have been moved to the off-Grounds facility, filling Ivy Stacks to capacity, Walker explained.

“Those are mostly low-use materials,” including duplicate journals and other materials that don’t circulate often, said Warner Granade, circulation manager for Alderman Library.

Ivy Stacks contains older materials, Walker said, “but as a research library, it’s our responsibility to keep them and to continue to make them available for researchers that might want them in the future.”

Though Ivy Stacks has been filled to capacity for about three years, Walker said, the University continues to receive new books daily. During the last year, University libraries added a total of 61,056 volumes, with Alderman Library receiving 18,032, Granade said.

“We are not [sending books to Ivy Stacks] anymore because there’s no space for us to send them there,” he said. “So we’re just being tighter and tighter in Alderman.”

Books are being placed on their sides on top of shelves and piled on tables, Walker said.

“If you walk in the libraries, you will see … that the shelves are almost full to capacity,” Granade said.

Materials are also being shelved in enclosed areas of Alderman Library “where people can’t get to them,” Walker said; however, like the materials in Ivy Stacks, they are still available through a delivery system. People can request items through the Virgo online catalog and pick them up at a library of their choice.

“Usually we can do that in less than 24 hours,” Walker said.

To create more space, Walker said, “the University is considering a request now to seek state funding to allow us to retrofit Ivy Stacks.” The proposal involves replacing the traditional shelves, which feature an aisle between rows of shelves. Ivy Stacks would instead use “compact shelving,” Walker explained, where shelves are placed on rails so entire ranges of shelving are compressed against each other. Aisles are opened up as needed and otherwise remain closed.

“That will allow us to put twice as many books in Ivy [Stacks] as we now have there,” Walker said, adding that this plan would cost the University much less money than would be required to construct another building. If the plan is approved, it will begin in July 2009, and probably take about a year, she said.

With more space, the libraries would be able to move overflow books out of the libraries on Central Grounds and continue adding to the collections, Walker explained. The overall aim is to expand shelving off rather than on Central Grounds, Walker said.

“One of the reasons that we’re doing this is because our goal is to keep as much space in the libraries as possible for students to be able to use the libraries for studying and work,” she said.

Student-athletes nationwide are graduating at a higher rate than ever, according to a recent study released by the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

The NCAA found that student-athletes who enrolled in college between 1998 and 2001 graduated at an average rate of 78 percent, NCAA spokesperson Erik Christianson said. This represents a 2-percent increase compared to student-athletes who enrolled in college between 1995 and 1998.

The federal government also produces its own graduation rates, based on a calculation developed by the U.S. Department of Education. Its 68-percent rate for athletes is a much lower than the number found by the NCAA, but it is still the highest federal rate ever, Christianson said, and is 2 percent higher than the rate for the general student population.

The NCAA study calculates the graduation success rate, or the GSR, of student-athletes from Division-I athletic programs across the country. The NCAA’s graduation-rate calculation differs from the federal government’s calculation because it counts student-athletes who successfully transfer to another university, whereas the federal findings do not include transfers.

According to the NCAA Web site, “the GSR also allows institutions to subtract student-athletes who leave their institutions prior to graduation as long as they would have been academically eligible to compete had they remained.”

At the University, student-athletes are graduating at a much higher rate than the national average. According to the NCAA findings, 86 percent of University student-athletes who entered the University between 1998 and 2001 completed their four-year degrees.

Jim Booz, associate athletic director for academic affairs, said University student-athletes have been performing academically above the national average for quite a while.

“We’ve performed at a very high rate for a very long time, [so] I wouldn’t say that we’re seeing a huge improvement or increase as opposed to the national average increasing,” Booz said.

While the national rate is higher than ever, Christianson said the push for academic improvement among student-athletes is not over.
“There’s still some room for improvement in some areas,” he said. “And we see some progress.”

For example, female student-athletes who entered college between 1998 and 2001 had an average GSR of 88 percent, whereas male student-athletes had an average GSR of 78 percent. Women who played basketball graduated within six years at a rate of 82 percent, whereas men who played basketball graduated at a rate of 62 percent. College football players graduated within six years at an average of 66 percent.

Certain schools also did not perform as well as others. According to the NCAA findings, the University of Maryland men’s basketball team, for example, had a GSR of 10 percent for student-athletes who enrolled in their first year between 1998 and 2001. To help improve lagging teams, Christianson said, an academic reform package was implemented three years ago.

The reforms put in place minimum GPA requirements and measures for academic progress. There are penalties for teams that do not meet the minimum academic progress rate requirements, such as overall team GPA, Christianson said. Punishments include restrictions on practice time and tournaments, losing scholarships and, in more extreme cases, exclusion from post-season tournaments, he said.
Booz said University student-athletes are held to the same standards as all other students at the University.

“There is a minimum GPA depending on their year in school,” he said. “They have to meet the very same academic requirements that any other student at the University does, but there are also NCAA requirements they have to meet” in order to maintain NCAA financial aid eligibility.

Because University academic requirements are generally more stringent than the NCAA requirements, Booz explained, University student-athletes who are in good academic standing almost always meet NCAA eligibility.

But just because the University is above the national average does not mean it is not striving to improve, Booz said.

“Our goal [is] to graduate 100 percent of the athletes,” he said. “So if you come here to participate in athletics for four years, you commit yourself to your academics for four years as well.”

Booz said the Office of Academic Affairs has contributed to reaching this goal by providing student-athletes with tutoring and mentoring services. Graduate and undergraduate students from all departments are hired to tutor student-athletes if athletes feel they need assistance with certain subjects, Booz explained, and some athletes can be paired with graduate students to work on time management skills and establish weekly goals.

“At the University of Virginia there has been a commitment to academic success of our student-athletes by the expectation that is placed on student-athletes to perform academically just like any other student,” Booz said.

In today’s world of budget cuts and environmental concerns, colleges and universities are becoming increasingly interested in implementing new technologies that are environmentally friendly and financially viable. One such technological approach, virtual computing, could help to meet the educational needs of students at the University, said James Hilton, University vice president and chief information officer.

Virtualization, which involves sharing software services via computer networks instead of having them installed on individual personal computers, “takes advantage of the power people have on their laptops,” Hilton said. The availability of such software is important because there are many specialized applications students need that are only available at certain locations on Grounds, such as in the Scholars’ Lab in Alderman Library.

“Many students who major in engineering [or] math use an application called Matlab,” Hilton said. “Matlab is available only at certain public computing sites. We would like to be able to virtualize delivery of Matlab to students who need it.”

Virtual computing would give more flexibility to students, while ITC would control software, Hilton said.

“Currently, the University buys a license to purchase a finite number of Matlab copies to put in the public computing labs,” Hilton said. “We could control access so that students anywhere at anytime could access the software without having to come into a lab.”
Computer security would also benefit from the introduction of virtual computing, Hilton said.

“One of the advantages of virtualization is that the software stays safe and sound on the server so that software companies don’t have to worry about the unauthorized proliferation of the software,” Hilton said.

As institutions such as the University have become increasingly interested in virtualization, a new niche in the software industry has developed. According to Benjamin Baer, vice president of marketing at Pano Logic, a virtual software company, virtual computing developed because of overcapacity concerns.

“You have a huge amount of servers providing a large amount of infrastructure [and] 20 percent of the capacity of the servers is being used most of the time,” Baer said. “We want people to be able to maximize the use of their servers.”

Baer also said virtualization systems can be cheaper than traditional desktop computers and can offer environmental benefits.

“Our solution draws only three watts of power,” Baer said. “Most PCs use 5 to 10 watts even when they are not running. In addition, you don’t need moving parts — CPUs, operating system, hard drive, etc., — so you use less packaging.”

The biggest downside for computer virtualization, Baer said, is in performance.

“There are certain cases where virtualization doesn’t work very well,” Baer said. “For example, 3-D design programs and voice-over-IP don’t work as well as they would on PCs. It’s hard to synchronize those applications in real time with virtual computing.”

Students studying in the Scholars’ Lab expressed interest in virtual computing as a way to have more flexibility in their working environment.

“I think that would be a great idea,” fourth-year College student Jennifer Beiner said. “I hate coming into the lab … having to use special software.”

Fourth-year College student Andrea Gomperts, meanwhile, said she has to use an application for her psychology classes that currently is only available on the University computers.

“To get that on your own computer, it costs about $150,” she said.

University research suggests individuals with greater sensitivity to bitter tastes are less likely to develop a dependence on nicotine than those with a lower sensitivity to such tastes.

“If a person is a [sensitive] taster, then that person is less likely to become a smoker,” said lead investigator Ming Li, professor of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences. “In other words, [being a] taster is kind of protective and [being a] non-taster is kind of like a risk factor.”

Li explained that the research project consisted of two components, the first of which was published in the Journal of Medical Genetics and the second of which was published in the American Journal of Human Genetics. The first component of the research focused on genetic analysis of DNA samples taken from more than 2,200 human subjects over a period of nearly 10 years, Li said. The individuals taking part in the study were classified as tasters, non-tasters or intermediate, Li said. If a person was classified as a non-taster, he or she was more likely to become a smoker.

The second component of the research introduced a mathematically based methodology that provided a novel method of detecting gene-gene interaction for other human genetic researchers, Li said, and was used to analyze genetic data on two taste receptor genes, known as TAS2R16 and TAS2R38. The researchers found that these two genes interact with each other in the development of smoking dependence. This component of the research extended the finding of the first report, and together the research offers a “complete story,” Li said.

Jamie Mangold, a former research assistant in Li’s lab who was primarily involved in the first component of the study, commented that the development of the research between the two publications focused on the role of the taste receptor genes.

There was evidence in earlier research, Mangold said, indicating that people who are more sensitive to bitter substances are less likely to be smokers and drinkers. Mangold said she looked through the literature and thought that taste could be a major factor.

“With publication of the first paper, we kind of decided that the TAS2R16 gene was not a primary player … but after the second paper we realized that the TAS2R16 gene may also be important through its interaction with TAS2R38,” Mangold said.

Li explained that older methodologies could only handle either binary traits, such as whether a person did or did not have a disease, or continuous traits, such as height. Moreover, Li said, these methods could not account for all the variables that may affect an individual’s characteristics, such as age, gender and ethnicity.

“With our method, you can correct [the algorithm] for all [factors] that you think may affect this disease,” Li said.

Xiang-Yang Lou, assistant professor of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences and first author of the second paper, said his portion of the study showed a relatively small, but still noticeable, relation between the two interacting genes and nicotine dependency. Lou explained that this is likely because smoking is a complex, multivariable behavior; however, he emphasized that the findings in his report were noteworthy because they had a low level of statistical error for the relatively small quantities with which they dealt.

“This new method is better than [the previously] existing method and able to detect even a relatively small difference,” Lou said. “Genetic researchers are very interested in finding these kinds of interactions these days.”

While the two components of the project were largely independent efforts within the research group, Lou noted, the second paper referred to data that had been examined in the first.

In contrast to the size and longevity of the sample for the first project, Lou said he used data from more than 600 families in a simulation of the algorithm to validate the new method and data from about 400 families in the final nicotine dependence study.

Ultimately, Mangold explained, the new findings may prove valuable for future medical use.

“This in particular would be a useful way to screen out for those who would be more susceptible,” Mangold said. “So early on before smoking behavior begins, if one is screened for this genotype, we may actually be able to predict who may become dependent and then actually target more preventive programs toward them.”

The Honor Committee approved a bylaw last night that gives the Committee more jurisdiction over honor offenses that occur in the School of Continuing and Professional Studies.

The bylaw allows the Committee to apply some or all of its standard procedures to investigate honor allegations that originate from all SCPS courses, including ones offered online.

According to the old bylaw, SCPS cases were to be investigated by the regional director of the SCPS location in which an offense took place. Under the new bylaw, the Committee retains the power to decide who will investigate a case — the Committee or the regional director. All trials will be held in Charlottesville, which is not a new policy.

Committee Chair Jessica Huang explained at a previous meeting that the new bylaw seeks to ensure fair honor proceedings for all students. For instance, she said, it would be in the best interest of a student taking an SCPS course online who does not live within close proximity of the regional center to have the Committee, rather than the SCPS regional director, investigate his or her case.

SCPS has locations in six regional centers: Central Virginia, Hampton Roads, Northern Virginia, Richmond, Roanoke and Southwest Virginia.

—compiled by Stephanie Kassab

If Virginia decided to pay homage to the 2007 season Saturday, it did a good job of doing so. The 2007 Cavaliers were known nationally for pulling out close games in dramatic fashion, and that’s exactly what happened at Scott Stadium as the Cavaliers knocked off No. 18 North Carolina 16-13 in overtime.

“That was an awesome win for our team,” Virginia coach Al Groh said. “I’m tremendously proud of our players, and I’m happy for them that they got a chance to celebrate the way they did.”

There wouldn’t have been any celebrating for the Virginia players and fans, however, if the offense had not come up with an 82-yard touchdown drive with 2:18 left. Sophomore quarterback Marc Verica — who was ineffective at times before that drive — completed seven straight passes and drove the Cavaliers down to the 2-yard line. Though Verica threw an incomplete pass on second-and-goal, senior running back Cedric Peerman ran the ball into the end zone for a touchdown, and after the extra point attempt was tipped but went through, Virginia had tied the game with 47 seconds left on the clock.

“Every quarterback — his dream is — your team is down, fourth quarter, there’s only two minutes or so left in the game, and you’ve got to drive 80 yards to win,” Verica said. “That was the challenge that faced us. We just seized the moment, and we didn’t buckle under the pressure.”

In overtime, after Virginia won the toss and elected to start on defense, the defense came through and held the Tar Heels to a field goal. Once Virginia got the ball, it just took four plays to score: a 2-yard rush by Peerman, a 19-yard reception by senior tight end John Phillips, another 2-yard rush by Peerman and, to cap it off, yet another 2-yard rush by Peerman. This rush came as the game-winning touchdown that caused Virginia students to rush the field.

“This win is definitely in the top three that I’ve been in,” Virginia senior linebacker Clint Sintim said. “I can’t remember a time where we’ve won a game in overtime against a quality opponent like this.”

The end of the game, however, was not the only time the Cavaliers demonstrated their true ability. In the first quarter, the defense allowed North Carolina to rush for 85 yards — of which sophomore running back Shaun Draughn had 80 — but held the team to 81 net rushing yards the rest of the game, forced two interceptions by junior quarterback Cameron Sexton and recovered a fumble.
“The first drive was horrific on my part, and I’m sure a lot of other guys didn’t play up to form either,” Sintim said. “But we were able to bounce back. The defense was stout throughout the game and made big stops when we needed to.”

Several Cavalier defenders had to step up in the absence of sophomore cornerback Ras-I Dowling and senior linebacker Antonio Appleby.

“We took two hits right in the first series with a couple of our best players going out,” Groh said. “For [junior] Darren Childs, [sophomore] Mike Parker and [redshirt freshman] Chase Minnifield to step up the way they did against a quality program was just awesome. We’re proud of those guys for being true to the character of the team.”

The team’s character was also apparent at the game’s conclusion, when team captain Peerman presented the game ball to Groh, who rallied the team after a 1-3 start and now has the Cavaliers 4-3 and in contention for the Coastal Division title.

Receiving the game ball will be “something I’ll cherish for a long time,” Groh said. “When somebody like Cedric Peerman wants to do that, not only him individually, but as a representative and captain of the character and heart of the team, it’s very meaningful and very appreciated.”

As Virginia surmounted its improbable comeback and students streamed onto the field at Scott Stadium Saturday following the team’s 16-13 overtime victory against North Carolina, my foot was lodged firmly in my mouth for two reasons.

One was that no one is allowed to cheer in the press box, and my shoe was the best object available to absorb my gleeful hollering. The second, though, was a horse of a different — and darker — color. In the two weeks that preceded this game, Virginia had been rolling, and I was predicting failure against UNC and beyond.

So the Cavs beat up Maryland — a fluke! Then they trounce East Carolina — the Pirates are overrated anyway!

I was 90-percent certain UNC would get the better of Virginia Saturday, and 50-50 that it would be by two scores or more. Early in the first quarter, after Virginia went three-and-out and North Carolina went three-and-in — as easy as 1, 2, 3, and … they’re in the end zone — I was 100-percent on both.

How did Virginia do it? How does an offense that has scored one field goal — off two UNC turnovers, mind you — for the first 57-plus minutes stampede for a shiny 82-yard touchdown drive in the next minute and a half? Since when did Marc Verica become Joe Montana?

Furthermore, how does a secondary missing its best cornerback, sophomore Ras-I Dowling — who suffered a back injury in the first quarter, Virginia coach Al Groh said — contain one of the best receiving corps in the country? The last time Groh lost Dowling mid-game, Virginia gave up three touchdowns in barely more than a quarter – to Duke.

The only way I can understand this win is to agree with Groh that, just like last year’s team that won five games by two points or fewer, these boys have guts. It comes in the form of inside linebacker Jon Copper telling anyone on the sideline who would listen that his team was going to win, Groh said, and backing up his words with 16 tackles. It’s running back Cedric Peerman getting hammered at the line of scrimmage but refusing to go down or jumping up and screaming with passion after grinding every inch of a 4-yard gain. It’s outside linebacker Clint Sintim racing after the quarterback like a rabid dog after a flank steak again and again.

“A common theme that’s developing with this team, an identity that’s being forged in the last couple weeks, is just a tremendous amount of resolve and just toughness just to push through these adverse situations,” Verica said. “The resolve of my teammates and the coaches has just been awesome the last couple weeks.”

And it’s resolve that, frankly, these guys shouldn’t have. They should be looking over their shoulders at the team that could have been with nine players out of action because of academic, legal or personal issues. They should be yearning to get to 2009, when the current youth can be rejoined by quarterback Jameel Sewell, among others on academic suspension. After they lost to Duke by 28 points, the Cavaliers should have cashed it in for 2008 as so many fans did.

But Groh and co. wouldn’t let that happen. All week, the team spoke of the phrase Groh kept repeating: the one-game season. Next season, they said, was North Carolina.

And looking at the actual 2008 season, each game truly has been a tale of its own. Trying to make sense of what Virginia has done in its first seven games is like trying to merge seven pages from a connect-the-dots book into one unified picture.

The most beautiful part of this win, though, is that this game was make-or-break. Of Virginia’s five remaining games, three are on the road: against Georgia Tech, Wake Forest and Virginia Tech. If Virginia had dropped this one to the Heels, Wahoos would have felt distraught about the team’s bowl chances.

“The difference between where that number goes on the left-hand column or the right-hand column is so small,” Groh said. “We’d be saying the same thing about how so many players just fought their hearts out and made plays and played well today if we would’ve had one less point [at the end of regulation].”

Because of that tiny difference, though, there are more people who can feel more comfortable in their positions. Verica is now without question a legitimate ACC quarterback. Offensive coordinator Mike Groh silenced all those critics who were wetting their whistles to again blast him on radio shows and message boards. After the debacle that was Peter Lalich and the catastrophe in Durham, if Groh’s job was in jeopardy, he might have just saved it.

And, one game past the midpoint of the season, I finally feel secure in hopping on the U.Va. bandwagon. The last two weeks, I refused to acknowledge that Virginia was a legitimate team in the ACC. But no more. I’m on the bus.

Of course, now that I say that, Virginia is liable to drop every game the rest of the way.

But, that’s my favorite part about it: Even if the Cavs do go winless, they’ve still got four wins at season’s end. After all that transpired culminating in the 3-31 loss to Duke a little more than three weeks ago, that’s three more victories than a lot of people thought they would have.