Virginia will host Stanford, Florida State in Sept. games

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Virginia will play seven home games this season, including three opponents for the first time in program history, as the ACC on Friday released the dates of six contests.

UVA’s home schedule will consist of Coastal Carolina (Aug. 30), William & Mary (Sept. 13), Stanford (Sept. 20), Florida State (Friday, Sept. 26) and Washington State (Oct. 18). The Cavaliers will also host Wake Forest and Virginia Tech (dates TBA).

Virginia’s road schedule: NC State (in a nonconference game, Sept. 6), with games at California, Duke, Louisville and North Carolina (dates TBA).

Clearly, the Cavaliers’ schedule is less challenging than this past season when UVA faced SMU, Clemson and Notre Dame — three opponents that all made the 12-team College Football Playoffs. Virginia also avoids a meeting with Miami.

In fact, as far as the conference schedule, four of UVA’s 2025 foes (FSU, Stanford, Wake and Cal) all finished below the Cavaliers in the ACC standings in 2024, and a fifth (UNC) finished tied with Virginia in the league.

Of the 2025 ACC opponents, only three finished among the ACC’s top eight teams in the ‘24 rankings: Louisville 5th, Duke 7th and Virginia Tech 8th.

Three new teams will pop up on the Cavaliers schedule for the first time ever: Stanford, Cal and Washington State.

It’s quite odd that UVA plays almost as many opponents from the former Pac-12 than it does original members of the old ACC (Wake Forest, Duke, UNC and NC State). Also, just how weird is it that Virginia is playing NC State in a nonconference game, but playing Stanford and Cal in conference games?

UVA will play a rare Friday-night game against Florida State, which is coming off perhaps the most disappointing season of any program in the nation. Can Tony Elliott join his four predecessors — George Welsh, Al Groh, Mike London and Bronco Mendenhall — all with a win over the Seminoles?

Welsh and Groh did it the hard way, upsetting FSU during the Bobby Bowden era.

All in all, Virginia has the opportunity to get off to a decent start to the season with Coastal Carolina, NC State, William & Mary, Stanford and FSU being the first five games on the slate.

The remainder of the schedule will be revealed Monday at 9 p.m. on ACC Network and ESPN2.