UVa wins third in a row

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — The field was completely destroyed, waterlogged to the point where every step created a small puddle. But defensive line coach Chad Wilt didn’t have to worry about that — he got a celebratory lift to the locker room courtesy of Nate Collins.

The two had plenty to cheer about, as Collins returned an interception for the winning score in a 20-9 Virginia victory, then sacked Maryland quarterback Chris Turner late to seal the ’Hoos’ third straight win.

The decisive interception return was made possible by a Darren Childs’ tip, with the play-call designed to create exactly that. What happened next was spontaneous, though, as Collins grabbed the ball and ran harder than he’d ever run 31 yards before.

He tried to glance at the video board to see where the defenders were, but quickly turned his focus back to the pylon — and to protecting the ball after Rodney McLeod yelled a warning at him. Collins held off the strip attempt, and tried to find enough gas in the tank to celebrate.

“I’ve probably never been so tired in my life,” he said. “I was like, ‘I just gotta get in there.’”

It was a defensive effort that won the game, bailing out a Virginia offensive line that allowed Jameel Sewell to get sacked five times and failed to score a touchdown from the one-yard line.

Sewell’s day ended when he reaggravated an ankle injury in the third quarter, and Marc Verica took over admirably for the remainder of the day. Defensive lineman Matt Conrath left with an ankle injury on a kneel-down play. His replacement, Zane Parr, also stepped up. Virginia’s third injury fear was allayed by Rashawn Jackson’s 90-yard performance filling in for Mikell Simpson.

“We may have to patch ourselves up, but we won’t have to fix our heart,” coach Al Groh said.

Sewell left using a crutch for his right foot, though he maintained that he was fine and would be back to work today.

He displayed his best stuff early, marching the team to the red zone with pinpoint accuracy on his passes. The Hermitage High grad started the day 5-for-7, with a dropped ball and a foot out of bounds keeping him from perfection.

“We saw a lot of the things we were looking for in practice,” he said. “They did what we thought they were going to do in that first drive.”

The drive stalled near the goal line, and Groh opted to go for it on fourth-and-1 from the 2-yard line. Sewell jumped over his linemen and got the yard for the first down, though not the second one for the touchdown.

From there a false-start call against Landon Bradley pushed the team back, Sewell was sacked, and Virginia had to settle for a Robert Randolph field goal for the opening score.

Maryland had the only other scoring in the first half with field goals of 48 and 30 yards from Nick Ferrara. The Hoos had a fourth-and-5 from the Maryland 35 with the first half running down, but opted to play it conservatively and punt the ball.

From the time Collins made his game-changing play, the focus shifted squarely to Jackson, who had a career-high 19 carries and turned his uniform into a shade of muddy gray.

“Rashawn was magnificent,” Groh said. “We decided a few weeks ago he was going to be a big part of our offense this year.”

That was worth celebrating on the sidelines as the final seconds ticked off. But as some of the players wondered what do to next, captain Denzel Burrell gave a yell and pointed at the locker room. Sure, winning in the rain was fun, but it was time for the Cavs to dry off — now with a record of 2-0 in conference play, there are bigger challenges ahead.

Phillips is a staff writer for the Richmond Times-Dispatch.