Boston College unravels in fourth quarter, loses to Virginia, 24-14

Against Michigan State and Western Kentucky, Boston College started slowly before rallying to escape each time. Saturday at Virginia, the Eagles came out with conviction, then unraveled late in a 24-14 setback in Charlottesville.

The Cavaliers (4-1, 2-0 Atlantic Coast Conference) ripped off 24 unanswered, outscoring BC 18-0 in the fourth quarter. It cost the Eagles (4-2, 1-1) a prime opportunity to move to 5-1 for the first time since 2008. It was BC’s third loss in program history when leading by 14 points or more and first since 1999 against Miami.

“It was terrible,” Eagles coach Bill O’Brien said. “Put it on me. Blame it all on me. We’ve got to do a better job. We’ve got to coach better. We’ve got to play better. We’ve got a long way to go.”

Two costly Thomas Castellanos turnovers in a five-minute span dramatically shifted the momentum midway through the fourth. The Cavaliers capitalized to decimate a BC team that completely lost its edge in a very winnable game.

“We have to look in the mirror,” O’Brien said. “Everybody in the program has to self-assess. Coaches and players, we all have to look and see what we can do to be better. We’re a lot better than what we showed today.”

The interception came early in the quarter, when Anthony Britton tipped Castellanos’s pass into Chico Bennett Jr.’s hands. Two plays later, Anthony Colandrea found Malachi Fields for a 30-yard score. The Cavaliers added a 2-point pass, from Colandrea to Andre Greene Jr., to take their first lead, 17-14, with 10:39 remaining.

Castellanos (22 of 30, 254 yards, 2 TDs, 2 INTs) then fumbled, setting up a Jonas Sanker scoop-and-score from 40 yards out to push it to 24-14 with 6:02 left. He threw his other interception in the final minutes, and Virginia ran out the clock on its home field.

“Credit to those guys,” BC defensive end and captain Donovan Ezeiruaku said. “They executed a little bit more than we did in the second half, especially in that fourth quarter. We’ve just got to do better, execute, and do our jobs.”

Castellanos, who missed Boston College’s narrow win over Western Kentucky after suffering a concussion against Michigan State, was in command early.

On BC’s opening drive, he found tight end Kamari Morales for a 34-yard gain, then hit a wide-open Jaedn Skeete for a 9-yard score to vault the Eagles in front. Skeete waltzed into the end zone with his palms to the sky, letting the Cavaliers know the touchdown wasn’t too taxing.

Two drives later, Castellanos lost his left shoe and still connected with Reed Harris for 27 yards. The Eagles held a 122-16 edge in total yards and limited the Cavaliers to one first down in the quarter, taking a 7-0 edge into the second.

Castellanos then handled pressure with grace and led Morales in stride for a 29-yard touchdown to make it 14-0 with 13:08 left in the half. He started the game 11 for 11 with 135 yards and two touchdowns before throwing an incompletion late in the half.

Virginia chipped away thanks to two Will Bettridge field goals, from 35 and 33 yards, slicing Boston College’s advantage to 14-6 at halftime.

It was a largely productive and efficient half for the Eagles, who held the Cavaliers to 1.9 yards per rush, broke up three passes, and excelled in the red zone.

“Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter,” O’Brien said. “You’ve got to play 60 minutes.”

At the same time, Boston College committed five penalties for 55 yards in the half to give Virginia life. BC entered with the second-fewest penalties per game in the nation at 3.4, but Khari Johnson’s ejection for targeting paved the way for a Bettridge field goal as time expired.

O’Brien said he needs to do a better job explaining the rule to players, so they understand that hitting the opposing player with the top of their head will lead to a targeting call regardless of where they hit them.

Virginia took that momentum into the third, before BC registered a timely stop on fourth and goal from the 2; KP Price broke up a pass in the end zone. Castellanos fumbled on the ensuing drive, but Jeremiah Franklin fell on it just in time.

The Eagles took a 14-6 edge into the fourth. Once again, the Cavaliers marched into the red zone, and once again the Eagles forced them to settle for a field goal. This one, a 27-yarder from Bettridge, trimmed BC’s lead to 14-9 with 13:29 remaining.

That’s when everything went awry for the Eagles. It happened in a hurry, with no warning, and left them helpless, disorganized, and overwhelmed.

BC finished with eight penalties, including one where it had 10 players on the field to start a drive in the fourth quarter.

“I’m not sure what happened with the penalties, just losing focus there,” center and captain Drew Kendall said. “It’s something we’ve got to regroup, take a close look at, and fix it moving forward.”

They’ll have time to rectify those issues before a road matchup with Virginia Tech on Oct. 17. The mission is to ensure this is an outlier, rather than the start of a concerning trend.

“Awful. Awful,” O’Brien said. “Bad coaching, bad execution combined. Awful. Give Virginia credit. They did a great job. We did not do a good job. Thank God we’ve got 12 days before our next game. Maybe we can get some things corrected. Bad. All the way around.”