“I was so happy to see the ball go in,” Onyenso said. “I’ve waited so long for this.”
“I don't think the refs are quite sure, even, to be honest. So that's what makes it so tough to do, first of all, just lose a game on a [penalty kick] but lose one that was reviewed for eight minutes.”
While they did end up punching a ticket in the secondary selection process, for both teams it was a clear regression from last year’s performance.
“It’s one team at a time,” Swanson said.
“One word,” Harris said. “Exciting.”
“We let Virginia's pressure bother us,” Marshall Coach Cornelius Jackson said. “They're physical."
Less travel, less games, greater odds.
“We need to perform as if we’re playing a national championship every single game,” Neal said. "That way we’ll be at our best when our best is required.”
“Disappointing end to the season but Miami deserved it, especially on a day that we didn’t play our best,” Coach Ole Keusgen said.
“The way we reacted in the second half is not easy at this stage,” graduate midfielder Jesus de Vicente said.
The Cavaliers will have that chance to rebound soon, but Thursday night belonged to UMBC, another chapter in a historical matchup Virginia desperately wishes it didn’t recognize so well.
“It all worked out in a serendipitous way,” Kwiatkowski said.
“We try to do everything we can to honor those guys,” Jackson said.
“It’s a monumental day for Virginia and Virginia football.”
Despite limited high-caliber competition in their regular season schedule, Virginia has established itself as the way-too-early favorite to hoist a historic sixth national championship trophy come March.
“I’m telling you, that’s a good team,” Hampton Coach Ivan Thomas said.
“We played with fire, right? And we got burned,” Coach Tony Elliott said.
“We salute you."
Next up, Virginia will continue its time on the road Friday to face No. 15 North Carolina.
“That Lehigh match was a war,” Garland said. “It was a pretty intense match back and forth the whole way.”
