BSD Staff Predictions: Virginia Cavaliers

The Deacs move on to 3-0 after taking down the Florida State Seminoles, and everyone is still perfect in picking winners. That being said, no one has picked against the Deacs or against the favorite yet. Now that Wake is the underdog, one of those is going to have to change. Will we continue to ride with the Deacs or go with Vegas on this one?

Game Info

• Opponent: Virginia Cavaliers
• Spread: Wake +3.5
• Over/Under: 68.5

Adam: Wake 34—UVA 31 | Wake +3.5 | Under

Virginia’s offense is crazy good. The Hoos are slinging the ball around like crazy with QB Brennan Armstrong, averaging 438 passing yards and over 550 total yards per game. That being said, William and Mary and Illinois are not exactly the most impressive teams to be racking up numbers against. The UNC game was interesting because UVA gave up a ton of points, but had a second quarter where they scored 3 touchdowns and retook the lead. In the second half, however, they only scored 11 points and ended up losing the game by 20. What happened between the first and second halves I do not know, but I am hoping that the coaching staff was abled to see what adjustments the Tar Heels made defensively to slow down such a potent offense.

I won’t say this is the first test for the Wake Forest defense, because I think regardless of what is going on at FSU, they are still an ACC team with great players. That being said, this will be the first elite, big play offense the defense has seen this year. I don’t think there’s any reason to think the Deacs completely shut down Virginia, but holding them to anywhere around 30 points would be a win in my book. That means the offense is going to have keep up and put points on the board as much as they can. The Cavs are giving up over 200 rush yards per game this season, so I expect a big day from CBS. Let’s get to 4-0.

Elijah: Wake 35—UVA 28 | Wake +3.5 | Under

UVA is surprisingly a good team at home. With the Deacs rolling in hot after a dominant game against Florida State, look for Wake Forest to try and keep their good times rolling. The Deacon defense improvement seems to be very legitimate and defense typically travels better than offense. Virginia enters the game after surrendering 59 points to UNC. The Cavaliers will be trying to wash the bad taste out of their mouth so the motivation will be very high. Look for Wake to try and play their game in Charlottesville in a seemingly annual trend of Football Friday Night. Wake Forest keeps on rolling, 35-28.

Cam: Wake 38—UVA 30 | Wake +3.5 | Under

I truthfully think that UNC game was not an anomaly. This is a team that while well-coached, has deficiencies, especially when it comes to the RPO. Time and time again over the last ~7 games, when a team actually is running the RPO, the team kind of freezes and it’s an explosive play. I think Wake played an extremely sloppy game last week against FSU and only put up 35 because of a) sloppiness at times but b) taking the air out of the ball and just running it basically the entire second half to run out the clock. If UVA can’t scare this team with a ground game, it’ll allow them to deploy as many combos of 5 DBs as they want, which is surprisingly their deepest unit right now. Brennan Armstrong can only do so much, and I think Wake plays the type of football that when run correctly just causes too many issues for this UVA defense. I think this game will be close through midway through the fourth, but getting worn down by Wake’s stable of running backs will prove to finally catch UVA off guard enough for Wake to catch a lead and hold onto it.

SF: Wake 24—UVA 17 | Wake +3.5 | Under

I’m pretty much exactly on board with Cam. I don’t think that UVA is a terrible team or anything, and I definitely think that they’re the best team that we’ve faced so far—not to mention the game will be on the road—but I still think that Wake is the better team. I’m looking for the defense to continue their solid aerial coverage and sure tackling in open space, and UVA’s defense is pretty porous to say the least. Apparently ESPN’s football power index only gives us about a 30% chance to win the game, which honestly makes no sense to me. I see it being fairly close, but I see Wake Forest pulling it out in the end 24-17.

Average: Wake 33—UVA 27 | Wake +3.5 | Under

We might be slightly biased, but everyone is once again taking the Deacs to win this game outright.