I am sorry to report that the Virginia Cavaliers disappeared on Saturday. The team mysteriously vanished shortly after the start of the fourth quarter of their contest against North Carolina. The Cavaliers (2-5, 1-2 ACC) matched the Tar Heels (6-1, 3-0 ACC) through two quarters but failed to show up in the second half of a game that eventually ended in a 26-13 victory for coach Larry Fedora’s blue-and-white-clad bunch.
Saturday afternoon in Chapel Hill, North Carolina was not the first time that Virginia called it quits after the first half. Failure to play the entire 60 minutes of regulation is becoming a defining feature of the 2015 Cavaliers — a team racing to the bottom of the ACC Coastal division.
Just one week ago, I praised the Virginia coaching staff for their halftime adjustments in a thrilling, come-from-behind 3OT victory over Syracuse. Today, the Cavaliers settled back into their usual habit of emerging from the tunnel, lacking the necessary energy to compete in the second half.
We are now seven games into the season, and Virginia has outscored their opponents in the second half twice — against William & Mary and Syracuse. The Cavaliers also matched Pittsburgh’s second-half point total, 9-9.
And it hasn’t even been close. Not including points scored in the three overtime periods against the Orange, opponents are outscoring Virginia by at least 52 points in the second half.
But the post-halftime situation was looking brighter Saturday for the Cavaliers against North Carolina. In the third quarter, Virginia yielded only a 29-yard field goal by senior Nick Weiler and was down just 16-13 with 15 minutes to play before then disaster struck. The Cavaliers imploded in a magnificent fireball of futility.
The fourth quarter was much uglier than the final box score shows. The Tar Heels scored 10 unanswered points to put the game away, and Virginia committed four turnovers in the final 15 minutes of play — three of which were interceptions by junior quarterback Matt Johns.
All of the fourth-quarter blunders add up to one massive missed opportunity for the Cavaliers, who had been doing all of the right things through the third quarter. They were running effectively against a North Carolina rush defense that is Charmin-soft and limiting the second-highest scoring offense in the ACC. But Virginia threw it all away, both literally and figuratively, with one of the lousiest quarters of football I have ever seen.
The fourth quarter against the Tar Heels figures to be the final nail in the coffin for Virginia in 2015. Now the Cavaliers must win four of their remaining five games against Georgia Tech, Miami, Louisville, Duke and Virginia Tech to reach the elusive mark of six wins required for bowl eligibility. This is not going to happen for Virginia — not with the Cavaliers inability to play two full halves of football.
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