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UVa's PFF grades for Week 7 after the loss to the Hurricanes

Hasise Dubois had another big game, though he missed the end due to injury.
Hasise Dubois had another big game, though he missed the end due to injury. (VirginiaSports.com)

After failing to score a touchdown in its 17-9 loss at Miami last Friday night and putting up just nine points across six possessions inside the 25-yard line, it’s safe to say that there’s plenty of angst about Virginia’s offense.

And as much as that shows up in the PFF College grades following the loss in Miami Gardens, it’s also clear that UVa executed at a much higher clip on the defensive side of the ball.

Below is a grade card showing how the top 10 offensive and defensive players fared in loss to the Hurricanes and also a cumulative grade through the seventh week of the season for the offense and defense with comparisons to national ranking. (For more on how PFF grades, there’s an explanation at the bottom of this story).


UVa Offense

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Offense Grades: Week 7
Player Position Snaps Grade

Hasise Dubois

WR

42

73.0

Bryce Perkins

QB

76

70.0

Terrell Jana

WR

38

69.5

Tavares Kelly

WR

22

68.9

Ryan Nelson

OL

76

65.4

Olu Oluwatimi

OL

76

62.4

Billy Kemp

WR

22

62.2

Wayne Taulapapa

RB

34

61.6

Dejon Brissett

WR

25

61.1

Chris Glaser

OL

67

60.9

Takeaways: It’s no surprise that Dubois is at the top of the list of grades given his production and playmaking ability in this game. It was the second game in a row where he looked like an All-ACC candidate. His 71.9 grade in the passing game was just ahead of Jana’s 70.8 and the Hoos really could have used him late. Taulapapa finished with a team-high 81.9 in pass pro with Nelson (79.5) putting up the best number among the linemen. Perkins, who hasn’t been as steady a presence in the top 10 graders as one would expect, had a solid game with a 67.7 in passing and a 65.5 in running. Lastly, one good bit of news is that three linemen (Nelson, Oluwatimi, and Bobby Haskins) each played all 76 snaps with Chris Glaser (who had a 69.1 in pass pro) in on 67 of them That means that right tackle remains the spot where the Cavaliers continue to rotate.


UVa Defense

Chris Moore came in late and played a solid game for the Wahoos.
Chris Moore came in late and played a solid game for the Wahoos. (VirginiaSports.com)
Defense Grades: Week 7
Player Position Snaps Grade

Chris Moore

SS

29

73.8

Noah Taylor

OLB

40

73.0

Richard Burney

DE

18

72.1

Brenton Nelson

NB

23

71.9

Eli Hanback

NT

31

71.4

Jowon Briggs

NT

12

66.5

Charles Snowden

OLB

50

64.1

Zane Zandier

MLB

48

63.3

Mandy Alonso

DT

37

63.1

Aaron Faumui

DE

35

61.1

Takeaways: That Moore was in on 29 snaps was directly related to the injury to Bryce Hall but he played well in relief, which is good news since his role is expected to grow moving forward. Moore had a solid all-around game, with a 70.4 in run defense (fourth best on the team), a 79.1 in tackling (also fourth), and a 71.4 in coverage (third). Hanback had the highest grade in run D (77.5) followed closely by Zandier (77.3) as Snowden and Moore were the other two put up grades above 70 in that facet. Elsewhere, it was a better tackling game for the D as 11 Cavaliers finished with a 70 or higher in that category, led by an 84.6 from Joey Blount, an 80.4 from Taylor, 79s by both Cross and Moore, and then a 78.8 by Nelson. The others included Alonso, Burney, Elliott Brown, Hall, Hanback, and Briggs. Jordan Mack had the team’s best pressure grade (67.9) and was one of three along with Zandier and Faumui to be above 65. Lastly, Taylor had by far the team’s best coverage grade, coming in with an 80.5. Nelson (72.4) and Moore were the only others above a 70.


Overall


The Virginia offense finished Week 7 with a cumulative grade of 67.7 (down from 68.2), which ranks 93rd nationally (down from 85th after ND). The Wahoos are currently ninth in the ACC on offense (previously fourth after ND). Each facet of the unit is currently graded as such:

Receiving— 75.5 (up from 75.2)

Running—72.0 (down from 74.1)

Run blocking—60.5 (down from 61.7)

Passing—53.8 (down from 50.3)

Pass blocking—49.0 (down from 51.4)


The Cavalier defense, meanwhile, finished the Miami game with a cumulative grade of 79.3 (up from 78.3), which ranks 66th nationally (same as after the ND game). UVa currently ranks eighth in the conference (previously fourth after ND). Each facet of that unit is currently graded as such:

Run defense— 82.3 (up from 80.1)

Pressure—74.9 (down from 75.4)

Tackling—73.3 (down from 74.0)

Coverage— 65.5 (down from 66.3)



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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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