Groh dusts off his old playbook

GREENSBORO, Ga. - When Al Groh learned that Jameel Sewell would not be Virginia’s quarterback this season, the coach reached into his files and looked for a specific folder. This particular file needed a little dusting off.

After the grades from the first semester were compiled, Sewell was placed on an academic suspension for the next two consecutive semesters, meaning he would miss spring practice and this coming season. So, Groh and his staff were forced to find another quarterback and return to a different style of play.

“I wouldn’t call all of our candidates [former UVa star Matt] Schaub-style quarterbacks, but I said we’re going to go back to playing more of that style game,” Groh said. “Let’s put it this way — plays are being heard around here by name that haven’t been heard in about four years.”

Getting into the pocket

That goes back to the Schaub era, when the rangy right-handed quarterback rewrote the Cavaliers passing records book in two years as starter. Schaub was a precision passer and a master of the quick-decision, short-pass offense, yet could strike deep when required.

“The Schaub to Heath Miller plays went into a particular folder,” Groh said. “They didn’t get thrown away — they just sat for a while. So, a lot of this is going back to a style of play that fit that type of quarterback and which our present quarterbacks are more like that.”

Schaub’s successor, Marques Hagans, was more of a sprint-out passer with the ability to create on the run. Sewell followed Hagans, but his game was somewhere between his two predecessors.

The question is: Now that Virginia is going back to a pocket passer — a precision passer rather than a power passer — who is going to be throwing the passes?

A wide-open race

There are three candidates competing, and none of them managed to win the job in the spring, which means that for the fourth time in Groh’s eight seasons at UVa, the quarterback job will be contested in August. One could consider adding September, October and perhaps beyond into the equation.

Sophomore Peter Lalich, known to Wahoo fans as “Pistol Pete,” appeared to have the inside track, but Groh hasn’t confirmed that notion, meaning that redshirt sophomore Marc Verica and senior Scott Deke are in the mix.

Lalich has the most experience, having thrown for 321 yards and two touchdowns as a true freshman last season. Verica has never played a down in college and Deke had a cameo appearance a year ago.

Lalich was the highest-profile quarterback to enroll at Virginia since Shawn Moore in 1986. He carried all the credentials of a high school superstar, a blue-chip recruit who was pursued by some of the nation’s best football factories.

“The way I think of him, at least with guys I’m familiar with, Michael Groh had two pretty good years at quarterback ... his fourth and fifth years,” Al Groh said. “Aaron Brooks had two pretty good years, Matt Schaub had two pretty good years, Marques Hagans had two pretty good years, their last two years.

“Now we have a talented player [Lalich] who has been anointed from the outside as the starting quarterback even though he deserves the same developmental process as all his predecessors,” Groh said. “That’s a great deal of what happened to Jameel. He had to rush out there a year before he was really ready and learn from on-the-job training. Under ideal circumstances, last year would have been his first year as starter instead of the once that preceded it.”

With that fact alone, Groh believes that the best approach for Virginia’s quarterback system this year could be the same one as last season: a two-quarterback system.

“I can see the possibility that for a while it might take two quarterbacks for the position to play as well as it needs to,” Groh said. “If it takes two, we’ll use two. Sometimes in Major League Baseball, it takes two guys to pitch the game.”

Groh spent a lot of time talking about the two quarterback system with Florida coach Urban Meyer last year and so Virginia used both Sewell and Lalich for a while in ’07 before Sewell regained most of the playing time. However, with Sewell’s academic situation and a wrist injury that could have perhaps ended his playing career, Groh thought it best to get Lalich acclimated to college ball as soon as possible and their teammates bought into the plan.

Surely, if Lalich can live up to his reputation, then perhaps he can produce the way Schaub did, but again, could that happen this season or will it have to be delayed until Pistol’s final two seasons?

“He just needs development,” Groh said. “He had the opportunity to throw the ball more than most high school quarterbacks, but at the same time, almost all those passes were against simplistic defenses. So, does he have a good ability to throw a pass? He has a real good ability to throw a pass.

“Now, he’s dealing with much more intricate patterns against much more complex defenses with much better pass rushes disrupting the timing of the play. It has gotten more intricate for Pete’s level,” the coach said.

Virginia isn’t alone in the quarterback predicament. At this weekend’s ACC Football Kickoff at Reynolds Plantation, three other teams (Boston College, Miami, and Georgia Tech) are also looking for starting quarterbacks. Of all four, Virginia’s candidates have the most attempts, completions and yards.

Now that the dust has been removed from Groh’s old files, it’s just a matter of which one of the candidates can best execute those plays. Or should we say, which two?