Virginia had already taken control by the time NC State briefly nudged the scoreboard back into view on Saturday afternoon. But what happened next at a packed Scott Stadium was the kind of answer that can define a season.
After backup quarterback Will Wilson scored on a designed run up the middle with 4:59 left in the third quarter, then followed with a two-point conversion, the Wolfpack had trimmed Virginia’s lead to 24-8. For a moment, there was a pulse on the visitors’ sideline.
Then the Cavaliers buried it.
Over the next 12:15 of game time, Virginia put together a program-record 23-play touchdown drive, a grinding stretch that swallowed the rest of the third quarter and nearly half of the fourth before ending in a one-yard touchdown run by Xay Davis. The possession covered the distance from Virginia’s own 25-yard line and mixed 18 runs with five pass attempts, with 21 of the 23 snaps producing positive yardage.
It was the kind of march that doesn’t just chew clock. It announces something.
Virginia converted four fourth-down tries on the drive, leaned on a starting offensive line that had drawn national attention for its combined 31 seasons of collegiate experience, and kept finding answers on the ground while sprinkling in just enough passing to keep NC State from selling out completely.
“As the drive went longer and longer, they could feel it,” Tony Elliott said postgame. “To be honest, I didn’t even know it was 23 plays when we were in it. It was just [about] finding a way to keep the ball away from their offense and either flip the field or find a way to go score points on that drive.”
The Cavaliers’ quarterback, Beau Pribula, added some humor to the physicality of it all. He ran for gains of nine, three, six, and eight on the drive and later joked, “I wanted to get off the field as fast as possible,” before adding, “Because those guys up front are old. They can’t take a beating like that.”
The line wasn’t exactly the one taking the hits. Virginia’s front five allowed just one sack, and four of the five starters finished without giving up a pressure. That protection helped the Cavaliers pile up 258 rushing yards, with Pribula doing plenty of the damage himself.
He logged 120 rushing yards, the most of his career, on a workload that included 12 designed runs and two scrambles. Virginia’s other backs combined for 138 yards on the ground.
“That’s who we are, in a sense,” Pribula said. “That’s what we’re able to do.
It just opens up so many things when you have guys like that up front that are so experienced, and they’re so level-headed, and they’re so easy to work with. We can run the ball, and then we can do a bunch of different things off that.”
Virginia finished the job with a 34-8 rout, adding one last field goal late in the fourth quarter. The win snapped a four-game losing streak against NC State that dated back to 2018, and it also came with another line for the record book: it was the earliest calendar-date victory in program history.
The setting mattered, too. This was Virginia’s first game in Charlottesville after the season-opening shift from Brazil, and Scott Stadium sold out for the first time since 2008. The place was loud before the Cavaliers ever started hammering away on that marathon drive, and Elliott said the atmosphere matched the kind of scene he had imagined when he arrived.
“Several years ago, when we showed up here as a staff, [the pre-game environment against NC State] is what we envisioned that it felt like pre-game,” Elliott said. “When you come in on the buses, you see people everywhere, tailgating.
It’s hard to describe, but you know it when you feel it. It felt like how the guys played.
They fed off that energy. It proves to everybody what we’re capable of here at the University of Virginia.”
In Other News...
Virginia Tech Now Has A Rivalry Threat Worth Watching Closely
Beau Pribulas emergence has added a fresh layer to Virginia footballs season, and it comes at a time when the Cavaliers are trying to sort out what kind of threat they can be down the stretch. In the win over NC State, Pribula showed why his skill set matters so much to the offense, giving Virginia a quarterback who can stress defenses with his arm and his legs and make a game feel different snap to snap.
For a program with bigger tests still ahead, that kind of production is hard to ignore, especially as the schedule turns toward matchups that can shape how this season is remembered. Virginia Tech may have its own business to handle with VMI this week, but developments on the other side of the rivalry are worth watching closely, because Pribulas rise gives Virginia another element that could matter when the stakes get higher later in the fall. [Read more 🡒]
Virginias ACC Quarterback Outlook Comes With One Big Early Question
The ACCs quarterback picture already looks unsettled heading into the season, with 11 programs going shopping in the transfer portal and only a handful of teams bringing back a proven starter. Early Week 0 action gave a first glimpse at how some of those moves might play out, and it also helped sharpen the discussion around the leagues top options at the position entering Week 1.
For Virginia, the intrigue is less about what happened on opening weekend and more about how the Cavaliers fit into that larger quarterback conversation after their own first game. The league picture will keep shifting over the next few days as teams sort through early performances and upcoming tests, and Virginia will spend its off week watching those developments before it returns to the field in Week 2 against Norfolk State. [Read more 🡒]
Virginia Just Uncovered A Scary Defensive Possibility
Virginias win over NC State came with a reminder that the Cavaliers may still be scratching the surface on defense. Even while missing several key players, the group held the Wolfpack to 8 points and got quality snaps from other linebackers, showing a level of depth that can travel with them into tougher stretches ahead.
Kam Robinsons absence was part of that performance, and his eventual return only adds another layer to what Virginia is building. With the defense already proving it can function at a high level when pieces are missing, the next question is how much more disruptive it can become once one of its top linebackers is back in the mix. [Read more 🡒]