Virginia football has only started 8-1 twice in program history. One of those times was in 1990, and the other is 2025. The difference this season is that Coach Tony Elliott has his Cavaliers sitting in first place in the ACC, with a 5-0 start to ACC play.
For the first time since 2021, Virginia is bowl eligible and in the running to compete for an ACC title or perhaps even more. That is astonishing for a program averaging fewer than five wins per campaign over the last 10 seasons.
But, as Elliott himself would say, success cannot be accomplished alone.
There are seven protagonists fueling the gargantuan turnaround through a transfer portal soiree — Elliott, Williams, executive consultant Scott Pioli, general manager Tyler Jones, football chief of staff Justin Speros, deputy athletics director Kevin Miller and even Board of Visitors Rector Rachel Sheridan.
But how did these seven characters take the Cavaliers from ACC bottom feeders to ACC championship contenders, making incredible progress over one offseason?
“I think that all circles back to Scott Pioli, Tony Elliott and Carla, really picking the right, magic players and the right ingredients," Sheridan said in an interview with The Cavalier Daily. “If you look at where we were last year, this time, it's almost impossible to see how we could have gotten so far, so fast.”
As Williams explained on the “Inside Virginia Athletics with Carla Williams” podcast in July, there are only two options — ride the wave of change, or get left behind.
“You could experience the change and not adjust, or you could accept the change and look for the opportunity to really flourish,” Williams said.
The wave of change began with the start of the partnership between Williams and Elliott in late 2021. Speros also joined Virginia at the same time as Elliott, becoming his director of scouting. Speros’ role, according to Virginia Athletics, is to oversee the evaluation process for high-school recruits and portal recruits.
But with college football undergoing an evolution, more members beyond Speros were needed for the core cast.
Enter Jones, who joined in the 2023 offseason as the program’s first general manager. In this role, he handles front office responsibilities such as player contracts, essentially operating Virginia like an NFL franchise. But unlike the NFL, there is no collective bargaining agreement or contract standards.
Jones said his NFL peers called his job “impossible.” They were shocked by Jones having to negotiate with players again and again over multiple transfer windows.
“When I talk with NFL GMs, they just laugh at me,” Jones said on “Inside Virginia Athletics” in July.
Next, they needed the funding, which is where Miller came in. He took over all VAF funding oversight in the fall of 2023. In Miller’s tenure thus far, Virginia has received four “transformational” donations. Miller and Sheridan helped raise millions of dollars so Jones’ front office can splurge in the portal and generate success on the field.
“Building your front office, keeping staff, investing in the right staff in terms of a player evaluation are probably the … investment areas that I'm excited to put a plan together with Carla's guidance on,” Jones said.
From Jones’ arrival through the 2024 season, pieces of that plan had fallen into place. However, the next major move was to grapple with NIL — an arena in which Virginia had fallen behind. This changed when Jones, Speros, Williams and her fellow leaders finally got in on the action.
“December [2024] was the first time that our football program fully participated in NIL, and that speaks volumes because it's been happening for three years,” Williams said.
However, fundraising and NIL alone would not suffice. Virginia needed to turn financial investments into on-field success — and it did so by professionalizing football operations.
When the House settlement was approved June 6, another leader was needed, and Sheridan found one in her connection with Scott Pioli, a three-time Super Bowl winner as the vice president of player personnel for the New England Patriots. Pioli is one of the best in the business, as evidenced by his five NFL Executive of the Year awards.
“[I] always thought [Pioli] should have been at U.Va.,” Sheridan said. “[I] always had that sense that there was this kindred spirit between the way he operates and the way we like to operate at U.Va.”
Pioli’s path to Virginia began in Nantucket, Mass. Sheridan and her family spend summers there and are neighbors with Pioli. As the families grew close and the NCAA landscape underwent unprecedented transformation, Sheridan’s friendship with Pioli blossomed. This relationship often included talks about Virginia Athletics, and eventually, the possibility of a consulting position.
“We kept talking to [Pioli] over and over again about, you know, ‘U.Va. wants to do things the right way, and U.Va. could use Scott,’” Sheridan said.
Pioli took Sheridan’s advice and officially joined the Cavaliers as a consultant following the 2024 season. Working with Jones and Speros, Pioli used his NFL expertise to help evaluate potential recruits. He quickly became enamored with Elliott’s program.
“[I] really admired not only the job that [Elliott] did, but how he did his job, and all the people that were with him and around him and how they felt about him,” Pioli said on X.
But culture can only go so far. To bring on a football mind as bright as Pioli’s, the stars needed to align — and it just so happened that Pioli knew Williams as well. That relationship was essential in convincing Pioli to join Virginia Athletics.
And so, Pioli became the final piece to the puzzle of the front office with Jones and Speros — who was named chief of staff and assistant general manager in 2025. That triumvirate, along with Elliott, Williams and Miller, put their football minds and hefty wallets together to craft the most important development for the program, which is the success of Virginia's 32 transfer portal additions.
From that cohort, Virginia picked up productive starters on the offensive line and at quarterback, running back, wide receiver, defensive tackle, defensive end, linebacker, SPUR, cornerback and safety. And now, that group has led the Cavaliers to a 8-1 record, good for first in the ACC.
“I'm really excited about where we are,” Sheridan said. “And if you ask me, even six months ago, I don't know that I would have thought we could be this good.”
Elliott knows what it takes to be “this good.” He spent a decade at Clemson, winning multiple national championships. But winning is impossible alone, and only recently did the Cavaliers complete their cache of stars.
“You got to have a plan, and then you got to have the humility to adapt to your plan based off of what what fits you,” Elliott said.
But even greater than success on the field is that the success is associated with the University at large. People are proudly talking about this football team. And this year, there are cheers aplenty as the “Good Ol’ Song” rings throughout the Commonwealth.
“I do think in many ways, sports is the front porch of the University,” Sheridan said. “It's something that alumni all over the country can reconnect with, and when we're playing well in football, it's just palpable. I feel like you can feel it around Grounds … There's just an excitement.”
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