Cavs, Terps still in ACC race

On Sunday, the standings for the Bowl Championship Series will be announced.

After an early-season slide, that is of little importance for Virginia (2-3, 1-0 ACC).

The same could be echoed at Maryland (2-4, 1-1).

The two have far greater issues as the two teams tangle today at 4 p.m. at Byrd Stadium in College Park, Md., but with help, the winner could awake Sunday in first place in their division in the ACC.

“I’ve been stressing it all week,” Maryland coach Ralph Friedgen said. “We talked about it in [Thursday’s] team meeting. This is a pretty important stretch.”

In regards to the Cavaliers, a four-point favorite today, having first-place possibilities seems shocking. UVa did, in fact, open the season with three demoralizing losses.

“We’ve seen, I would say, two and a half games of positive progress,” Virginia coach Al Groh said. “Not really speaking of the 30 minutes of that third game [at Southern Miss], but there was a good deal of positive progress, just not enough to call it a complete game, obviously, with the result. So we seem to be kind of getting our legs underneath us.”

Virginia’s improved play coincides directly with execution on offense — the Cavaliers have passed for 765 yards and scored 97 points in their past three games.

“Things have been clicking,” Virginia quarterback Jameel Sewell said. “It has been a lot of fun to watch how the work in practice has carried over to the games.

“Everybody is on the same page and the guys up front have been blocking.”

Virginia has won back-to-back games over Maryland, including an ugly 31-0 victory last year at Scott Stadium, but past results are thrown out of the window Groh said.

“I think it’s unlikely that any of us feel that previous games with Maryland have any bearing on how this game is going to go,” he said. “This one is about the level of preparation that we have, how everybody understands and embraces the plan and, most particularly, how we execute.”

Players from both teams said they expected a higher level of intensity given that there is pride associated with winning the contest against a program that shares a border.

“This is a must-have,” Maryland offensive lineman Phil Costa said. “It’s a big rivalry game against Virginia, and it’s homecoming, so it’s going to mean everything to us right now.”