UVA’s safeties near top of ACC, top 25 nationally in tackles

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Virginia boasts two of the top safeties in the ACC in home-grown Jonas Sanker and Antonio Clary. It’s no mistake that the duo is ranked among the top five tacklers in the conference and among the top 25 nationally.

Sanker, who hails from Covenant School in Charlottesville, is No. 5 in the ACC in tackles (29 total, 16 solo) and No. 25 nationally. Secondary mate Clary is No. 2 in the ACC (33 total tackles, 12 solo) and No. 11 nationally.

UVA defensive coordinator John Rudzinski will be counting on both to stop Coastal Carolina’s multi-look offense on Saturday, as the Cavaliers hope to improve to 3-1 on the season.

“I see two young men that have been disciplined in the offseason and they’ve taken advantage of all the resources that have been accessible to them,” Rudzinski said after Wednesday’s practice in a misty rain. “They’ve put in the work.

“Though there’s no equity in last week (Clary registered 14 tackles in the loss to Maryland, while Sanker had 11), they’ve got to go on Monday and they’ve got to get in that squat rack. They’ve got to go on Tuesday, they’ve got to do cleans. And then late in the week, they’ve got to come off that practice field and get back in the weight room. They’ve got to go do it again this week,” Coach Rud said.

Rudzinski said that Coastal (3-0) does a great job of running the ball with a quarterback who is a physical runner, and features some triple option and is physical up front.

Coastal offensive coordinator Travis Trickett, who has an extensive background in college football going back to the FSU Bobby Bowden days, runs a multiple offense with all kinds of elements, including some option, which caught Rudzinski’s eye.

Having come to Virginia from Air Force, Coach Rud is very familiar with option offense.

“You always try to reference your previous experiences,” Rudzinski said. “You try to go back and go, ‘Alright, what’s been good?’ You also want to study their opponents to see what they’ve done well. We’ve got to be great against the option because when you look at their breakdown, they’ve had explosive plays, which change field position and end up leading to scores.”

The two UVA safeties will play key roles against option plays in particular, as they must come up and make tackles on some of the pitches or QB keepers on the edge.