When you look back at the 2024 statistics, the Virginia football team expects to have five of its top seven tacklers back for the start of the season this fall. This spring, however, cornerback Jam Jackson is the only member of that quintet taking part in practices.
For the linebackers, missing Kam Robinson, Trey McDonald, and James Jackson this spring, that actually has created a positive side effect at their position. It’s throwing some players into the pressure cooker and hopefully accelerating their development.
“I think it’s a great thing,” Virginia linebackers coach Mike Adams said. “You never want your older guys or your returners to have the spring off, but in this particular situation it’s good all the way around.”
It’s not exclusively young players getting those reps, necessarily. A pair of upperclassmen, in fact, are getting some valuable time on the field this spring.
For transfer Maddox Marcellus, these practices with extended snaps are providing a crash course of sorts at a new school. While Marcellus said “football is football” in this Jeff White article at VirginiaSports.com, the junior still is making the step up from the Football Championship Subdivision level. He came to UVA from Eastern Kentucky where he had 97 tackles on the way to first team All-United Athletic Conference honors.
The coaches have been impressed with how quickly he’s picked up on the Cavaliers’ schemes already.
“What you've seen with Maddox is he's very, very, very smart,” Virginia coach Tony Elliott said. “He's a natural football player. He picks up on concepts quickly. He's a violent guy. We're starting to see him play with some freedom because he's able to now equate, okay, this is what we're doing, this is what we call it, I can equate that in my mind. I don't have to think about it. I can go play fast.”
Adams echoed similar thoughts, calling Marcellus an “instinctive linebacker.” The production at EKU along with personal recommendations to the UVA coaching staff sealed their pursuit of him in the transfer portal and so far he’s made the Hoos happy with that decision.
“He has a burst to the ball, he’s physical on contact, he’s got great vision and instincts, he’s got all the movement skills you want for a guy in the ACC,” Adams said. “So he checked all the boxes at least the toolset and the way he played, but more importantly it was all the people that we had connected to him that highly recommended him off the field. He’s been another pleasant surprise.”
A more familiar name is taking advantage of extra snaps too. Senior Stevie Bracey, who first came to Virginia in 2022 and appeared in seven games as a true freshman, is getting his proverbial sea legs back this spring. Bracey missed last season after suffering a torn meniscus in preseason practices just before the start of the season.
Adams said you never know how a player will react to that type of setback. He could tell from observing Bracey, however, that it became a mission to get back to the field by the way he attacked his rehab and the weight room. That allowed him to get fully cleared before the spring practices and he’s now a taking advantage of that to try to shake off the rust.
Bracey recorded 26 tackles across 18 games in his first two seasons before he had to sit out last year. He made a diving interception after a deflection in a social media video posted by Virginia on Instagram.
“I’ve loved his energy. He’s been flying around this spring,” Adams said. “But he’s rusty like anybody that hasn’t played. When you take that long off, even if you kind of know what you’re doing, you’ve got to make your body do it and you’ve got to do it at a pretty high level. It’s been cool to watch him because he’s got great energy. He’s influencing guys by the way he plays and he’s been positive. Now, he’s got a lot of things to work on but I’m pleased with what he’s done this spring so far.”
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