The Replay: Virginia

The stereotypical Hollywood movie would have you believe that Boston College head coach Jeff Hafley walked into his locker room at halftime of Saturday's game against Virginia with a fiery speech that inspired a downtrodden group of players. The Eagles were losing by 14 points after wide receiver Malachi Fields out-jumped BC's prevent defenders on a fluke play, a Hail Mary pass from quarterback Tony Muskett, that negated a potential game-tying two-for-one around halftime.

The half should have ended one play earlier when defensive lineman Shitta Sillah sacked Muskett into an intentional grounding penalty, but the 10-second run-off in the final minute had itself not occurred after Sillah's helmet fell off. Gifted one last play, Muskett stepped into one last chance play with a less-than-10 percent success rate.

The result sucked the air out of Alumni Stadium one week after a two-for-one opportunity opened Louisville's lead to insurmountable levels, but deep within the connected hallway between the football stadium and its neighboring Yawkey Center, there was no Knute Rockne halftime speech telling BC to win one for the gipper, nor was Hafley standing up and talking about how life is a game of inches.

"Speeches only go so far," Hafley said. "What you're saying to get [the team] all fired up to run out of the tunnel, it doesn't last. It's who they are in [their hearts] and how resilient and how much trust and belief they have in their team. Yeah, we made some adjustments, [but] we have to coach at halftime, and I thought we did that. We picked up the tempo on offense, and on defense, I felt very confident in what we were going to do."

What was - or what wasn't - said might not inspire the next round of sports blockbusters, but it was enough for BC to finally put its collective foot down on an opponent after four weeks of battering ram discussions. The 1-3 Eagles seized the moment and converted the opportunity to rally past an ACC opponent, in turn creating the springboard moment that may push this season deeper and closer towards a program's eventual Hollywood ending with a much-needed 27-24 victory over the Cavaliers.

"We had 266 yards in the second half, and they had 39," Hafley said. "It really started before halftime on the defensive side, and after Ryan [O'Keefe] went down [with an injury], I think we had two penalties and two turnovers, which were costly because I didn't think they were stopping us at that point. But our guys rebounded. It was pretty emotional for a lot of guys…We have a resilient team. We really do. Do we need to play better in some areas? Sure. Do I need to coach better in some areas? Sure. But we have a resilient group that could have laid it down, and they didn't, multiple times in that game. I thought they showed that, and I'm proud of them."

It wasn't perfect, but BC shrugged off another slow start because it quickly found answers to a team's success. The game began with Virginia grabbing two two-touchdown leads because Muskett tilted the field with his offense, and the initial numbers told a stark story after the Cavaliers scored on their first drive with a 10-play, 75-yard march to the end zone and later added four drives that ended either in the midfield area or in plus territory, including the two touchdowns.

That story was that the field had tilted against BC, and an offense stuck in neutral couldn't get out of its own way with its 120 yards in the first half. Four of the Eagles' six drives started inside their own 30-yard line, and the one drive that started in Virginia territory ended when BC failed a fourth-down conversion after Dre Walker intercepted Castellanos' pass, a play that the defender probably should have dropped to help his team's field position.

"We made it too easy for him early in the game," Hafley said. "He didn't feel us, and that was the plan. We wanted to make [Muskett] play, but we wanted to make him uncomfortable because when you start [pressuring], you start getting some momentum."

The secondary objective, though, was that BC could succeed if it recommitted to its scheme, and the aftermath of the Hail Mary handed Hafley a golden opportunity to reinforce several points of emphasis on both sides of the ball. Defensive pressure ratcheted up, and the offense found its holes after Virginia overplayed its hand by stacking the box against Castellanos and his propensity to work horizontally.

He became more of a pocket passer in the second half, and the running game moved into gear because his throws forced the safeties to cheat backwards. Jonas Sanker continued having a monster game, but the tackle numbers on the defensive line began ticking upwards because the Eagles attacked the teeth of the Virginia front. Soft spots then began emerging, and the running game that barely gained four-plus yards per carry in the second quarter punched 136 yards on 18 carries in the third even as Bowry and Trapilo left the game injured. BC's Swiss-army knife lineman Jack Conley, who started all 12 games at four different positions in 2022, stepped in to handle right tackle the rest of the way.

"Fortunately we have guys that played a lot last year," Hafley said. "Dwayne Allick started [a good amount] for us last year, so him going into the game wasn't a big deal, even in a big moment. We have depth, and I think that [with] good coaching, guys are taking their jobs seriously. That's a close group. Even Drew [Kendall] went down at one point, and he toughed it out to go back in. That's a tough group that's playing really well."

It's why everything unsurprisingly fell into place throughout a dominant second half performance. Turnovers in the aftermath of Ryan O'Keefe's scary injury in the fourth quarter's early minutes didn't turn into anything on the Virginia side because the defense held the Cavaliers to 39 yards of offense in the second half, and the quick outs prevented BC from getting pinned inside its own end.

Four of BC's six drives in the second half ended in points, and the two forced turnovers ended in a grand total of three points, 28 yards, and 12 plays for the Virginia offense. Time of possession, which included over 17 minutes of Wahoo time in the first half, crumbled to under 10 minutes in the second half, and the third quarter in particular kept Muskett's group on the sideline for all but eight plays. He was also intercepted once when Elijah Jones undercut a slant route, and his 2-for-8 passing in the fourth quarter drew a stark contrast from the 72 first quarter yards with just two incompletions.

"We ran the ball [well]," Hafley said. "I wanted to try to run it out at the end, but it didn't work out that way, so I had to kick the field goal even though I like going for it on fourth down. We rushed for over 200 yards. Pat Garwo rushed for 91 yards, and Thomas [Castellanos] had 82. Alex Broome made a couple of big runs, and we had a reverse where I thought we were a foot away. We were tripped up, and I thought we could have scored [on that play]. Our offensive line did a nice job of controlling the line of scrimmage. Virginia came out with a lot of pressure. They were bringing guys off the edge, and they were bringing guys into the middle. I thought we adjusted between the offensive line and the coaches."

The performance got BC into the win column and sent the Eagles into the upcoming week with some much-needed good vibes. They overcame a 14-point halftime deficit and tied a 1997 rally over West Virginia for the largest second quarter deficit in program history, and they defeated an ACC opponent for the first time this season. They moved to 2-3 overall on the season with a road trip to Army on the horizon, and they earned their first win over a former Coastal Division opponent since the consecutive wins over Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech two years ago.

"They just refused to lose this game," Hafley said. "That has to be our mentality. We have to get better. We have to clean things up. But we found a way to win. I don't care how it looks. We have to do the same thing next week…It's good to get success and now we can get them in here and show them what they need to do better and what they did well, and then we'll move on and go play Army and give them everything we have, and then we can take a deep breath with a bye week to get some guys healthy."

Players Mentioned

Dwayne Allick

Alex Broome

Jack Conley

Elijah Jones

Ryan O'Keefe

Shitta Sillah

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