He missed, for all practical purposes, a quarter of the season. He has thrown for 694 yards, about 1,800 fewer than Texas Tech’s B.J. Symons. For the time being, he has dropped off the national radar screen.
In other words, Matt Schaub is hopelessly out of the Heisman Trophy hunt, isn’t he?
Not necessarily.
To be sure, Virginia’s senior quarterback began the season as a longshot for college football’s biggest award, and a separated shoulder on the 11th play of the opening game realistically may have dashed his chances.
But who knows? In two-plus games on the field, Schaub has performed like one of the premier players in the nation. He has completed 74 percent of his passes, including a 19-for-22 outing in last Saturday’s 38-13 victory at North Carolina.
“A few [more] weeks of that, he will force people to look at him,” UVa coach Al Groh said. “He won’t be overlooked.”
UVa’s sports information department will try to make sure of that. The school prepared a low-key promotional campaign for Schaub before the season. The plan called for sending postcards to media members throughout the country every three weeks. After his injury, the first mailing was cancelled, but the next one will go out as scheduled following the Florida State game on Oct. 18, depending on how Schaub performs the next two weeks.
“Mid-October is the prime-time push for the Heisman, anyway,” said Cathy Bongiovi Stewart, who heads the school’s eight-person Heisman committee that met Monday morning. “That’s when voters really start paying attention.”
It is also when Schaub could begin making his case for the award to a national audience. The 25th-ranked Cavaliers (4-1, 3-0 ACC) will play at least two nationally-televised games - against the fifth-ranked Seminoles next week, and on Nov. 13 at Maryland. They also have high-profile matchups in November against N.C. State and No. 4 Virginia Tech, which have their own Heisman contenders in QB Philip Rivers and tailback Kevin Jones, respectively.
If Schaub keeps playing as he did against North Carolina, he could climb back in the race. He passed for 284 yards and two touchdowns, leading six straight scoring drives.
“Using that game as a measure, I don’t think he’s ever been better,” Groh said. “He was sharp, he was crisp, the ball was right on every receiver’s hands. I really think he was on top of his game.”
Schaub currently ranks second nationally in completion percentage and ninth in passing efficiency. At this point, however, his stats probably won’t be impressive enough to warrant much attention. With four touchdown passes, he is 20 behind Symons, who has three straight 500-yard passing games.
To register on the national radar, Schaub likely will have to lead the Cavaliers to the ACC title - or at least spring a few big upsets.
“As long as we keep winning and doing what we’ve been doing, that’s all I really care about,” said Schaub, the 2002 ACC player of the year. “There are a lot of guys out there having great years. I’m not really worried about that individual stuff. If the team keeps winning, we’ll see.”
The Cavaliers have won 12 of the past 15 games that Schaub has started. If anything, his absence helped highlight his value to the team. Clemson coach Tommy Bowden, whose team plays host to Virginia on Saturday, said UVa might be undefeated had Schaub not been injured. In the first of two games he missed, the Cavaliers lost 31-7 to South Carolina.
“I watched the South Carolina film. It’s pretty obvious what he means,” Bowden said. “I think we know what happens when he doesn’t play. … Other than his skills, his leadership permeates throughout the team.”
In a few months, when Heisman voters cast their ballots, will Schaub’s name permeate the short list of favorites? The school continues to update its Web site, Schaub4Heisman.com, and the quarterback answers e-mail questions from fans every three weeks.
Seven games still remain, and Schaub surely hasn’t won the Heisman yet. But he may not have lost it, either.
“I said last year that no player in the country meant more to his team than Matt did to our team,” Groh said. “In two weeks of his senior season, he’s lived up to that again. He’ll be as good as whoever wins it, I know that.”
Virginia offensive coordinator Ron Prince knows something about job security, so the Cavaliers’ coach went out and helped secure his offense’s future on Wednesday. Prince was a strong influence in getting another big target for his quarterbacks to throw to when 6-foot-5 wide receiver Maurice Covington committed to UVa.
Covington, the second junior to commit to the Wahoos in less than a week, chose the Cavaliers over North Carolina, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, N.C. State, Duke and a handful of SEC schools.
“I loved the way that Coach Prince responded to me as a high school player,” said Covington, who attends Southern High School in Durham, N.C.
At 190 pounds, Covington is a physical receiver, who also plays outside linebacker on a defense that has posted five consecutive shutouts on the No. 3-ranked team in the Tar Heel state.
A solid student with a 3.5 GPA and a score of more than 1,000 on his SAT, Covington has already qualified academically.
Virginia gained a strong endorsement from Southern coach Gordon Walters, who formerly coached another Cavalier player while at Laney High in Wilmington, N.C., sophomore safety Willie Davis.
“I think that Virginia is the best place in the ACC to get an education and play football,” Walters said. “That’s hard for me to say because I’m a Carolina graduate. I really trust Coach Groh and his staff. Coach Prince has been recruiting my players for a long time and there’s a lot of trust there.”
Covington was at Scott Stadium for UVa’s dramatic comeback win over Wake Forest two weeks ago as was Gretna quarterback Vic Hall. Hall committed a few days later after almost accepting an on-the-spot offer.
“Yeah, [committing] went through my mind too,” Covington told The Daily Progress on Wednesday morning. “I wanted to commit right then and there but I went home and talked about it with everyone.”
Walters said that Covington is the type of athlete who can play a number of positions but believes UVa recruited him as a wide receiver. With his size and good speed (he runs track and plays basketball), and a 32-inch vertical jump, he makes for a good target.
“He has the ability to make absolute circus catches,” Coach Walters said. “He has made just amazing catches for us. He lays out for every ball. When the ball is in the air, he views it as his.”
Covington said that’s one of the fun things about playing the position.
“I like going out there and fighting for cornerbacks for the ball, jumping up over their heads and catching it,” Covington said. “I have good hands and enjoy catching the ball. I appreciate all my catches.”
Covington doesn’t have mind-boggling statistics as a receiver because Southern High is a running team and doesn’t throw it very often. Still, of his 37 catches as a sophomore in 2002, 11 of them were for touchdowns.
Another thing that Virginia has to like about Covington is his blocking skills from the wide receiver spot, something that Groh and Prince demands from their wideouts. Perhaps his physical play stems from his linebacker background, a position where Walters said Covington’s range and speed are improving by the week.
“I feel real good about committing to Virginia,” Covington said. “My family is firmly behind me because it is one of the top academic schools in the country. Even if I get hurt, I will be able to still do something with my life because of the education I will get there.”
Scattershooting around the ACC, while noting that Lee Corso and ESPN’s Game Day could be coming to Charlottesville next week for the first time ever if both Virginia and Florida State win this weekend ...
Corso, the analyst for the network’s college football coverage, made the statement during a Charlotte, N.C., radio show Tuesday night.
But first, the Cavaliers have to walk out of Death Valley all in one piece, something that few Virginia teams have done over the years. Clemson may be struggling, but the Tigers are fierce at home and are already talking about upsetting the Wahoos.
“I want what they’ve got,” Clemson cornerback Tye Hill said with a big smile after he learned of UVa’s No. 25 national ranking. “I’m working hard this week. Everybody on our team wants what everybody else has right now. We want to be ranked.”
Clemson has lost its last eight straight games against ranked teams going back to September of 2001. But this group of Tigers are still talking about winning the ACC championship.
Wolfpack woes
Why is N.C. State only at .500 (3-3) midway through the season? Wasn’t this the team that was supposed to challenge for a BCS bid?
A lot of critics are pointing to the Wolfpack’s pass defense, which is ranked 116th out of 117 teams in the country. State is giving up 329.3 yards per game through the air and have surrendered 13 TDs via the pass.
But Coach Chuck Amato said that’s not why State is losing games. He points the finger elsewhere.
“I’ve said it time and again. If we don’t win the kicking game ...” Amato said. “If we win the kicking game, we’re undefeated. It has nothing to do with the offense and nothing to do with the defense.”
In all three losses, State has turned the ball over or given up big plays on punts, field goals or kickoffs and it has cost the Wolfpack big time.
Miami pipeline
Bobby Bowden believes there are so many great high school players coming out of South Florida these days that he has put two of his coaches in that area to increase the Seminoles’ recruiting efforts there.
“There are great players everywhere, but there are probably more of them in Miami than any other area that I know of in the country,” Bowden said.
The Noles have only three players from the Miami area over the past three recruiting seasons and have only five Dade County players on the current roster, the fewest since 1983.
Short yardage
...Georgia Tech freshman QB Reggie Ball just turned 19 on Monday. ...Florida State may be undefeated but the Seminoles’ schedule won’t help them in the BCS. FSU’s first five opponents are 11-16 collectively and the remaining seven are a combined 22-14 at this point. ...Clemson coach Tommy Bowden was so upset at controversial calls on pass plays in the Tigers’ loss at Maryland that he sent the videotape of the game to ACC officiating coordinator Tommy Hunt. ...Six current ACC QBs are ranked among the league’s top
15 all-time passing efficiency leaders. ...FSU’s defense has given up only three TDs in the first five games and leads the nation in scoring defense. ...Virginia has only three wins ever at Clemson, but one of ‘em was two years ago.
The picks. Last week: 2-1. To date: 28-8.
This week: Maryland 24, Duke 7; North Carolina 44, ECU 27; N.C. State 52, UConn 13; Wake Forest 27, Georgia Tech 24; Virginia 33, Clemson 19; Florida State 30, Miami 24.
The No. 2 player on the South Carolina Farrell 14, Columbia (S.C.) Spring Valley offensive guard Leon Hart, lists Virginia in his top three along with South Carolina and Ohio State.
Hart, a 6-foot-4, 284-pounder with excellent quickness, will take an official visit to Virginia although he’s not sure when. His teammate and friend, defensive end Mack Frost (6-5, 235 pounds) will also take an official visit to UVa, likely the same weekend that Hart does. Frost also lists the Cavaliers in his top three.
Hampton (Va.) Kecoughtan linebacker Jerod Mayo, ranked as the No. 11 outside linebacker in the country by Rivals.com, is set to visit Virginia on Dec. 12. Although he also lists N.C. State (Dec. 5 official visit), Virginia Tech, Tennessee, North Carolina and Purdue as other schools of interest and claims no leader. Inside word is that UVa has a sizeable lead.
Mayo talks about the Wahoos quite often with friends and family and considered a commitment to the Cavaliers during the summer. The 6-2, 214-pounder will likely take all of his official visits before deciding, but right now Virginia is in the driver’s seat.
New Brunswick, N.J., wideout Dwayne Jarrett, a 6-5, 195-pound blur who reminds some of former New Jersey standout wide receivers Johnny Morant (Syracuse) and Anthony DiCosmo (Boston College), is being compared by some schools recruiting him to current star players on their team.
Pittsburgh is selling the “next Larry Fitzgerald” bit while Southern Cal says he can become the next Mike Williams. Although tempting, Virginia hasn’t used comparisons to Billy McMullen or Herman Moore and are recruiting Jarrett to be the “next Dwayne Jarrett” - a very smart move. Jarrett recently visited Iowa on an official visit and will trip to Virginia next weekend when the Cavs host Florida State. He also has official visits set with USC (Nov. 21) and Pitt (Nov. 28) and said he will likely choose between those four schools.
A couple of Pennsylvania juniors are interested in taking unofficial visits to Virginia over the next few home games. Altoona, Pa., offensive guard Zach Haulman (6-3, 285) and Doylestown (Pa.) Central Bucks East offensive tackle Dave McClain (6-5, 325 pounds) are both interested in Virginia and will take an early look.
The top player on the Farrell board (although it’s early) for Pa. in 2005 is Gateway, Pa., running back Justin King, a 5-foot-11, 170-pound speedster who ran a 4.24 in the 40 at Ohio State camp this past summer. King should be getting an offer from UVa very soon to match offers from Penn State, Boston College, West Virginia, Maryland, Pittsburgh and others.
UVa is still in the mix for offensive tackle Kyle Mitchum (Erie, Pa.), tight end Rory Nicol (Beaver, Pa.), offensive guard Jamie Thomas (Harrisburg, Pa.) and cornerback Chris Gorham (Pottstown, Pa.).
Some of the top sophomores in the nation are Virginians, including: West Potomac High School’s linebacker/defensive end prospect Micah Johnson, the best sophomore in the state. The 6-2, 248-pounder already runs a 4.7 and is ranked amongst the top 10 or 15 sophomores in the country. Right behind him is Highland Springs linebacker Jarrell Miller, a 6-3, 230-pounder who runs a 4.8.
Plainfield, N.J., linebacker/defensive end Dan Davis may need a year at prep school if he wants to be a Wahoo. Davis, a 6-3, 245-pounder, will take an official visit to Virginia for the Florida State game and is also interested in Maryland and Rutgers although he said, “I am pretty sure my mind is made up” when it comes to choosing Virginia.
Davis’ teammate, offensive tackle Eugene Monroe (6-6, 320 pounds) could be the best offensive line prospect in New Jersey since Bryant McKinnie (Minnesota Vikings by way of the Miami Hurricanes). Monroe is only a junior and already has offers from Maryland and Rutgers.
Mike Farrell is the publisher of thewagononline.com, the premier Web site for UVa football recruiting. For more information, go to www.thewagononline.com or call 1-866-2-Rivals.
Three out; Whitehurst game-day decision
CLEMSON — Three Clemson players have been all but ruled out for Saturday’s game
with Virginia because of injuries, but starting quarterback Charlie Whitehurst
will be a game-day decision, coach Tommy Bowden said Wednesday evening.
Defensive end Khaleed Vaughn (knee), linebacker Eric Sampson (sprained ankle)
and wide receiver Airese Currie (sprained ankle) all are unlikely to play,
Bowden said. Clemson will wait until after pregame warmups to decide whether
Whitehurst will play, Bowden said.
“We’ll go out there, have him cut full speed and make a decision at that time,”
Bowden said.
Currie’s absence will cost Clemson its most formidable deep receiving threat.
Tony Elliott will start in Currie’s place, and Curtis Baham will appear in the
Tigers’ four-wideout packages.
Third-team quarterback Will Proctor also has been practicing at wide receiver
and might play Saturday, Bowden said. Proctor won the team’s “Iron Man” fitness
contest in the spring, Bowden said.
“He’s just a good athlete,” Bowden said.
Proctor began practicing at wide receiver Monday but still is practicing at
quarterback as well, Bowden said.
Lionel Richardson will replace Sampson in the starting lineup, and Maurice
Fountain will replace Vaughn.
• Kicking plan. Senior Aaron Hunt has kicked well for two weeks in a row in
practice and remains Clemson’s kicker of choice for field goals of up to 49
yards, Bowden said.
If the Tigers needed a field goal of 50 yards or longer late in the half or in a
game, Bowden would consider using walk-on Stephen Furr. Freshman Jad Dean won’t
work as a place-kicker during games.
“Jad, I just really want to concentrate on kicking off right now,” Bowden said.
• Tiger tracks. Bowden remains confident in redshirt freshman punter Cole Chason,
who had a shaky day with a 15-yard kick and a 36.2-yard average against
Maryland. Chason particularly had a good day of practice Tuesday. “I think he’ll
be all right,” Bowden said. ... Clemson leads all Division I-A teams in kickoff
return average at 29.2 yards per return.
— Ken Tysiac
CLEMSON FOOTBALL
Player, coach differ on why Kelly hasn’t played
By KEN TYSIAC
Staff Writer
CLEMSON — The first five games of Clemson’s football season have taught junior
tailback Yusef Kelly not to take a certain word for granted.
“I definitely learned that you can’t miss any ‘voluntary’ workouts,” Kelly said
Tuesday, referring to practices the NCAA allows college football players to hold
on their own during the summer.
Kelly estimates he missed about half of Clemson’s 20 “voluntary” workouts last
summer. Beyond that, it is difficult to get a grasp on the reason Kelly has
carried just one time in five games after leading the Tigers in rushing in 2002.
Even Tuesday, as coach Tommy Bowden discussed Kelly’s impending return to a
prominent role in the backfield, Bowden and Kelly differed in their versions of
the events that kept Kelly idle.
Bowden said Kelly reported to camp overweight in the preseason.
“There are certain situations when you ask players to do specific things, like
come in at a certain weight, and they don’t, and that’s an indication of their
commitment,” Bowden said.
Kelly said he was never given a reporting weight.
“If they don’t tell you that you have to be a specific weight, how can you know
that you’re overweight?” Kelly said. “I was out there running. I was feeling
fine. I felt the same. I’m the type of person, no matter how much I weigh, I can
run.”
Whatever the case, Kelly has lost 13 pounds and is playing at 229 pounds, and
will share time with Duane Coleman at tailback Saturday against Virginia.
Clemson’s coaches hope Kelly, who rushed for 520 yards last season on 125
carries, will breathe some life into a stagnant running game.
The Tigers are rushing for just 98 yards per game; since Clemson began charting
that statistic in 1938, its lowest season rushing average has been 109.2 yards
per game. Kelly hopes his powerful build will add a new dimension to a running
game that has been ineffective with smaller backs Coleman, Kyle Browning and
Reggie Merriweather.
“I don’t think I’m going to come in and try to save the world,” Kelly said. “But
I’m definitely going to come in and try to do my part.”
Kelly said his troubles began during the summer, when he missed workouts while
attending to personal problems he declined to specify. He said he missed some
summer school classes to spend time at his home in Walterboro; other times he
didn’t have time to work out after class.
After reporting overweight (according to Bowden), Kelly suffered a groin injury
on the first day of preseason practice. He played through the pain but missed
two days of practice when his girlfriend, former Clemson track All-American
Terri Robinson, experienced labor symptoms in Atlanta.
Later, Kelly suffered a rib injury. As the Tiger running game began to sputter,
people began to wonder if there wasn’t more to Kelly’s absence than injuries and
reporting overweight.
Bowden said the injuries were legitimate.
“Sometimes if it’s not a compound fracture or a bone sticking out with blood,
the media has a hard time believing it,” Bowden said.
Kelly finally worked his way into the lineup for Clemson’s game at Georgia Tech
on Sept. 20. But a day earlier, he was present at the birth of his son, Aalijah
Keshon Kelly, in Atlanta.
On his first carry, Kelly fumbled. Kelly did not play the rest of the game, and
Clemson offensive coordinator Brad Scott said Kelly’s struggles at Georgia Tech
were understandable.
“That’s a pretty big distraction,” Scott said. “I wasn’t worth a hoot the day
after my sons were born, I can tell you that.”
Meanwhile, Coleman had a big day in Atlanta, carrying 13 times for 86 yards, a
season high for a Clemson back. Kelly said Clemson’s coaches wanted to give
Coleman a chance to continue his progress Saturday against Maryland.
But Coleman rushed for just 36 yards on 11 carries, opening the door for Kelly
to prove himself against a Virginia defense that yielded 72 yards on 17 carries
to Kelly last season.
Scott, who has been encouraging Kelly throughout a frustrating first half of the
season, is happy to see Kelly getting a chance.
“I’ve been telling him that I have gained a lot of respect for the way he is
handling this thing,” Scott said. “I feel like he is ready when we call on him,
and his days are going to come this year.”
Kelly said having a son has taught him to be more responsible and said he is
proud of how he kept his temper in check during his difficulties. He said he
thinks Bowden has been teaching him a lesson about working as hard as everybody
else on the team.
And now Kelly is looking forward to bringing a straight-ahead, bruising running
style back to the Clemson backfield.
“I know what I can do,” Kelly said. “But part of me feels like I did let this
team down by coming into camp the way I did. But the reality was, I just wasn’t
able to work out and run this summer like I was supposed to.”
ACC's divisions not as divisive as expected for state's fans
JOHN MARKON
TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST Oct 9, 2003
Attempting to forecast the reactions of college football fans may be an even
more fruitless activity than attempting to predict the outcomes of college
football games. I'm still surprised, though, by the lack of local response to
the realignment formats announced last week by the ACC.
In case you haven't had it tattooed on a body part, the proposed divisional
set-up for football is:
Clemson, Florida State, Maryland, North Carolina State and Wake Forest in one
division;
Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami, North Carolina, Virginia and Virginia Tech in the
other.
The ACC's inevitable 12th member, which still looks like Boston College, would
probably be slipped into the vacant spot in the five-team division.
League officials stressed that the lineups can be adjusted and that divisional
play won't even be needed until the league receives NCAA permission to stage a
championship game. Since that isn't likely to happen without 12 teams, the
11-team formats were probably obsolete before they were revealed.
What I felt fans would respond to, how ever, was the idea of Virginia's only two
Division I-A schools being placed in the same division. Most obviously, it means
that Tech and Virginia would never be able to meet in the championship game.
"You're right," said U.Va. Athletic Director Craig Littlepage. "That would be a
huge event in the state, but it wasn't an overriding consideration."
It certainly was for Florida State and Miami. After at least one change of
heart, the two Florida rivals requested (demanded?) that they be placed in
opposite divisions. It's just a guess, but the Seminoles and the Hurricanes
probably envision playing each other in the title game a few times.
Virginia and Tech made no such demands.
"We're the new guys in the outfit and we'd like to be team players," said Tech
AD Jim Weaver. "If it can help things, we're prepared to be flexible."
It's not as if an argument can't be made for keeping rivals in the same
division. Littlepage made one of the best when he brought up the timing of the
annual U.Va.-Tech game, usually set for late November.
"There will be situations where the title game is a rematch of a regular-season
game," he said, "but I'd think you want to avoid a rematch of a late-season,
regular-season game."
Toward that end, and with an eye on giving the loser time to stage a rally in
the polls, Miami and Florida State will now play their future games as early in
the season as possible. Since July4 wasn't available, next year's game is booked
for Labor Day.
If you look at the Southeastern and Big 12 conferences, where they've had
divisions for about a decade, you'll notice that Texas-Oklahoma, Texas-Texas
A&M, Georgia-Florida, Alabama-Auburn and Mississippi-Mississippi State are all
intra-divisional games.
In these leagues, divisional opponents face each other every year. In the
proposed ACC format, they don't, although league Commissioner John Swofford made
a point of saying something will be changed to make certain UVa.-Virginia Tech
and Duke-North Carolina are always played and played as conference games.
With both Virginia schools in the same division, it's very possible that a
future Tech-U.Va. game could determine a spot in an ACC title game. That's still
not quite the same as a vision of Wahoos and Hokies thronging the streets of
Charlotte or Orlando waiting for a December rematch that might shoot the winner
straight into a game for the national championship.
You can argue divisions both ways, except that no one seemed to want to.