Graduate quarterback Chandler Morris took the snap from inside his own 10-yard line. A designed run sent him left, directly in front of a student section with little to cheer about since a first quarter blocked punt. Morris’ run did not change things.
The graduate signal caller gained six yards before dropping into a slide — a rush that would have set up a third-and-short for the Cavaliers (8-2, 5-1 ACC). But as he hit the ground, Morris took head-level hits from two Wake Forest defenders. The quarterback did not immediately get up.
“We’re a close team,” graduate linebacker James Jackson said. “So whenever somebody goes down like that, everybody’s worried.”
Second after second elapsed Saturday — coaches, staff and senior receiver Jamal Edrine huddled around Morris, obstructing any possible view of the injured Virginia helmsman. That same Cavalier student section was now left with a front-row seat to a movie it didn’t want to watch. And the 15-yard personal foul assessed to the Demon Deacons (6-3, 3-3 ACC) hardly compensated for what turned into a 16-9 home loss.
The theme? A Morris-less team failed to capitalize, missing opportunity after opportunity. Saturday was the first time the Cavaliers failed to score a single touchdown in a game since Oct. 29, 2022.
Morris was eventually helped off the field and into the tunnel as a crowd of 55,000 chanted his name. The Cavalier signal-caller — the one who had spent several weeks powering through a nagging shoulder injury — was headed to the locker room. The disaster extended beyond one drive. Morris went down in the second quarter, and Virginia had lost its quarterback.
Elliott, however, expressed cautious optimism.
“[Morris is] feeling alright,” Coach Tony Elliott said. “[He will] get some more tests early in the week, tomorrow and Monday. But anytime you get hit in the head or above the neck, you have to make sure that you take that with a lot of caution.”
But what would eventually become an atypical Saturday night affair for Virginia did not begin as such. Elliott and company played host to ACC foe Wake Forest for the second time in as many years, with the contest marking a record fifth night game at Scott Stadium this season. Virginia, undefeated in conference play prior to Saturday, had been prepared for primetime before — that is, until Morris went down.
Enter sophomore quarterback Daniel Kaelin. Kaelin transferred to Virginia this summer from Nebraska but saw little close-game action through the Cavaliers’ first nine contests. Though Morris left Virginia's matchup with Louisville in overtime, Kaelin took just one snap — a handoff to graduate running back J’Mari Taylor that went for a touchdown — before leaving victorious.
And unlike that Louisville game, the Cavalier story Saturday lacked the same happy ending — this was a tale of missed opportunity.
That first chance presented itself just minutes into the game, when junior linebacker Kam Robinson broke through the Demon Deacon punt protection to block an attempted Wake Forest kick. Virginia’s offense — at this point with Morris still at the helm — began at the opposing 24-yard-line. Anything besides a touchdown would constitute a disappointment. Four plays and nine yards later, the Cavaliers walked away with a field goal.
That same sense of missed opportunity plagued Virginia at the other end of the matchup. Kaelin and company had driven from their own side of the field into the Demon Deacon redzone. But the Cavaliers stalled at the Wake Forest five-yard-line with just seconds left, leaving the team one touchdown shy of another signature overtime thriller.
“As a team, we pride ourselves on not only getting points, but scoring touchdowns in the red zone,” Kaelin said. “That's what you've got to do to win. So definitely left a lot out there when we got in the red zone.”
Those two drives spoke to Virginia’s greatest Saturday struggle — the inability to convert on opportunities. In 12 drives, the Cavaliers left with three field goals and zero touchdowns. Despite entering the contest with the ACC's third-best scoring offense, Virginia looked foreign under its interim quarterback.
According to Kaelin, it was not an issue of preparation.
“I prepare every single week for those types of moments and situations,” Kaelin said. “So [I] felt pretty confident. Obviously, you know, there's a lot of things I left out there and I need to prove.”
And though the loss may set the Cavaliers back in the College Football Playoff rankings, Virginia’s focus remains consistent.
“We still have an opportunity [to reach the ACC Championship] ahead of us with the next two ball games, so let's not let this [result] beat us twice,” Elliott said. “We got humble pie. I mean, coaches, players, all of us, we gotta own it. We gotta go back to work, figure out where we can get better and stay together, because we still got everything ahead of us.”
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