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UVa's PFF grades for Week 11 following the win over Louisville

Lavel Davis continues to play at a high level for the Hoos.
Lavel Davis continues to play at a high level for the Hoos. (UVA Athletics)


The Wahoos were iffy at times against the run but made the big plays when it mattered while also scoring enough points to get a win over Louisville on Saturday afternoon.

There were obviously a lot of places where UVa could have played considerably better, which as expected shows itself in the data provided by PFF College.

Below is a grade card showing how the top 10 offensive and defensive players fared in win over the Cards and also a cumulative grade through the 11th week of the season for the offense and defense with comparisons to national ranking. (For more on how Pro Football Focus grades, we post an explanation at the bottom of this story).


UVa Offense

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Offense Grades: Week 11
Player Position Snaps Grade

Lavel Davis

RWR

44

77.6

Brennan Armstrong

QB

66

69.2

Terrell Jana

RWR

50

68.6

Dillon Reinkensmeyer

LG

27

67.9

Ryan Nelson

LT

35

66.7

Billy Kemp

RWR

44

66.4

Olu Oluwatimi

C

59

65.3

Ryan Swoboda

RT

52

64.0

Shane Simpson

HB

27

62.7

Wayne Taulapapa

HB

43

60.5


Takeaways: Watching the game it’s no surprise to see No. 81 at the top of this list. In his first game back after missing time due to COVID-19 protocols, Davis put up to only a team-high overall grade on the offensive side but also had a team-high 79.4 in the passing game. He was followed there by Armstrong, whose 75.8 was the other grade north of 70. In fact, Kemp was the only other player to grade out north of 65 with a 68.3). There were also some really strong pass blocking numbers, starting with Nelson’s team-high 85.5, Joe Bissinger’s 84.1, and Bobby Haskins’ 80.3. In addition, Oluwatimi (79.6), Taulapapa (79.2), and Grant Misch (75.7) all graded out higher than 75 with Swoboda and Reinkensmeyer (73.1 each) not missing that mark by much. While the passing numbers were solid, the grades in the run game left a lot to be desired despite UVa’s production on the ground. Simpson had a team-high 64.2 in running while Jana’s 78.9 run blocking number was one of just two north of 65, joined by Reinkensmeyer’s 67.0.


UVa Defense

Defense Grades: Week 3
Player Position Snaps Grade

Noah Taylor

LOLB

53

88.6

Antonio Clary

FS

37

78.8

Nick Jackson

MLB

62

78.2

Nick Grant

RCB

61

73.8

Adeeb Atariwa

LE

34

66.5

Mandy Alonso

DLT

44

66.3

Nusi Malani

DRT

25

65.4

D'Angelo Amos

SS

62

65.1

Charles Snowden

ROLB

56

62.7

Coen King

SCB

55

60.4


Takeaways: Sometimes these numbers jump out at you and Taylor’s overall grade might seem like one of those. But it was his 91.6 across 19 coverage snaps that really explains how good he played in this game. His was by far the team high in that category, followed by Grant’s 82.6 across 32 reps in that facet. Clary, though, was the unsung hero given his consistency across the board. It starts with a very solid 73.4 in coverage, where he was followed by Snowden at 70.2. Clary also had a team-high 81.7 in run defense, the best grade in that category by nearly 10 points (Taylor had a 72.6). And in addition the young DB also had a team-high 85.2 in tackling, one of three—along with Amos at 83.9 and Jackson at 83.4—to grade out above 75.5. Jowon Briggs finished with a 75.2 followed by Alonso’s 73.1 and Malani’s 72.8. Lastly, Jackson had a team-high 77.0 in pressure across 13 snaps followed by Briggs at 75.3 and Zane Zandier at 74.3.


Overall


The Virginia offense finished Week 11 with a cumulative grade of 72.2, which ranks 70th nationally (up from 71.6 when UVa was 56th after Week 9). The Wahoos are currently ninth in the ACC on offense (down from eighth). Each facet of the unit is currently graded as such:

Running— 82.9 (down from 85.7)

Pass blocking—78.8 (up from 76.9)

Run blocking—65.0 (down from 66.0)

Passing—64.7 (down from 62.5)

Receiving—60.5 (up from 59.3)


The Wahoo defense, meanwhile, finished the Louisville game with a cumulative grade of 72.1, which ranks 53rd nationally (up from 70.2 when UVa was 50th after Week 9). UVa currently ranks sixth in the conference (same as after Week 9). Each facet of that unit is currently graded as such:

Run defense—75.7 (down from 78.8)

Pressure— 74.4 (up from 71.7)

Tackling— 57.4 (down from 63.6)

Coverage— 52.3 (up from 47.0)



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An explanation from PFF on how the grading scale works:


On every play, a PFF analyst will grade each player on a scale of -2 to +2 according to what he did on the play.

At one end of the scale you have a catastrophic game-ending interception or pick-six from a quarterback, and at the other a perfect deep bomb into a tight window in a critical game situation, with the middle of that scale being 0-graded, or ‘expected’ plays that are neither positive nor negative.

Each game is also graded by a second PFF analyst independent of the first, and those grades are compared by a third, Senior Analyst, who rules on any differences between the two. These grades are verified by the Pro Coach Network, a group of former and current NFL coaches with over 700 combined years of NFL coaching experience, to get them as accurate as they can be.

From there, the grades are normalized to better account for game situation; this ranges from where a player lined up to the dropback depth of the quarterback or the length of time he had the ball in his hand and everything in between. They are finally converted to a 0-100 scale and appear in our Player Grades Tool.

Season-level grades aren’t simply an average of every game-grade a player compiles over a season, but rather factor in the duration at which a player performed at that level. Achieving a grade of 90.0 in a game once is impressive, doing it (12) times in a row is more impressive.

It is entirely possible that a player will have a season grade higher than any individual single-game grade he achieved, because playing well for an extended period of time is harder to do than for a short period, Similarly, playing badly for a long time is a greater problem than playing badly once, so the grade can also be compounded negatively.

Each week, grades are subject to change while we run through our extensive review process including All-22 tape runs and coaching audit, so you may notice discrepancies among grades published in earlier articles compared with those in the Player Grades tool until grade lock each week.


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