Beau Pribula finally has the job he was chasing.
Virginia announced Saturday that the former Penn State quarterback has won the Cavaliers’ starting role, beating out Pitt transfer Eli Holstein. Pribula arrives in Charlottesville after one season at Missouri, following three years in Happy Valley.
Pribula’s path to this point has been anything but straightforward. He redshirted as a true freshman in 2022 and spent much of his Penn State stint behind now Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Drew Allar, who held the QB1 spot for the Nittany Lions.
Near the end of the 2024 season, just before Penn State began its College Football Playoff run, former head coach James Franklin and Pribula agreed that a transfer was the best move. Pribula entered the portal without having picked up a CFP win at Penn State and landed at Missouri.
The move gave him a real chance to play, and he took it. Pribula started all 10 games he appeared in for the Tigers.
He dealt with an ankle injury in October, but was medically cleared before the season ended and returned to action. In that lone Missouri season, he completed 67.4% of his passes, throwing for 1,941 yards and 11 touchdowns on 182 completions.
Now he gets another fresh start, this time in the ACC, where Virginia is coming off an 11-3 season. The Cavaliers haven’t had a double-digit win year since 1989, and their last finish above .500 came in 2019 at 9-5.
The quarterback battle in Charlottesville didn’t drag on long, but Pribula has been through a longer one before. At Missouri, the starting job was unsettled for a while, and even in Week 1 Tigers coach Eli Drinkwitz used both Pribula and Sam Horn to see who fit best. Drinkwitz said he leaned on game action, not just offseason work or fall camp, to make the call.
Holstein, meanwhile, will serve as Virginia’s primary backup in 2026. He is listed as a senior on the Cavaliers’ roster, redshirted his true freshman season at Alabama in 2023, and spent two seasons with the Panthers.
For Pribula, the move gives him one last shot at being a college starter. And there’s one more wrinkle waiting on the schedule: Virginia is set to face Virginia Tech in the regular-season finale on Nov. 28, with Pribula also lined up to see former Penn State coach James Franklin later in the year.
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