The Pittsburgh Media Recap is here. Now it’s a chance to look over the Virginia perspective of this loss. The setting, as long as you ignored the rains that had been there all day seemed perfect. A cool night, little wind and a semi-national debut on ESPNU.

The curtain rose at 7:06 p.m. Saturday on a new era of Virginia football. The Cavaliers’ offensive coordinator, defensive coordinator and quarterback – all making their debut performances.

Virginia’s players lined the sideline, their jerseys neatly tucked, their ankles taped, their chin straps buckled. Place-kicker Chris Gould ran toward the football, kicked it off the tee and watched it tumble through the night sky.

Little else went right for the Cavaliers after that.

The Washington Post has a feature summarizing all the local schools and it seems useful.

Highlight: Well, Coach Al Groh proved to be an apt judge of talent: Through one game, this does appear to be a rebuilding season.

Lowlight: Two Cavaliers quarterbacks threw passes that resulted in touchdowns — for Pittsburgh. Christian Olsen was intercepted by Darrelle Revis, who took it back 19 yards to make it 24-10 midway through the third quarter. Olsen’s replacement, Kevin McCabe, entered late in the fourth quarter and immediately was intercepted by Clint Session, who ran 78 yards for a touchdown.

I have to be honest, there is a part of me that isn’t enjoying this. I read a quote like this.

“I’m disappointed,” Olsen said. “We thought we were going to play a lot better. Never in our wildest imagination did we think that we’d lose by 25 points.”

And all I can think is that it reads a lot like what Pitt players were saying after last season’s opener against ND. The players are confused and shocked and will have to deal with a head coach that put them in an awkward spot.

“If that’s who we are, we’re in for a long season,” cornerback Marcus Hamilton said. “We didn’t get it done, but I don’t believe that’s who we are as a team. If it is, then we’re in trouble.”

That seems to be a response from a question regarding this statement from HC Al Groh regarding the team.

On this game showing the status of the Virginia football team:

“There is no aberration in competition. It is what it is.”

The early answers on questions about Virginia were not ones they wanted.

New quarterback Christian Olsen? He spent much of the night backpedaling, looking in vain for open targets, dumping the ball to receivers who had tacklers waiting. He rushed some throws and overthrew a few others. He completed 17 of 34 passes but none went for longer than 20 yards. He also threw a game-turning interception that was returned for a touchdown midway through the third quarter.

That young offensive line? It didn’t create much daylight for Cavalier runners, nor did it buy much time for Olsen. Virginia rushed for 52 yards.

The rebuilt front seven of Virginia’s 3-4 defense? It was porous against the run and didn’t generate much pass rush. Pittsburgh rolled up 390 total yards.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment of the night was Virginia’s veteran secondary, which was considered the strength of the defense. The Cavaliers allowed two touchdown passes of more than 70 yards, giving up a 72-yard score in the second quarter and a 78-yarder in the third.

On the bright side their punter/kicker, Chris Gould, showed he can do both jobs and that he will have a very tired leg after each game.

Naturally a lot of attention was on the poor play of Cavalier QB Christian Olsen, there was some defense of him. Pointing out that you can’t expect a great deal from a 5th year senior who was making his first start since he was a high school senior, and not getting much help from anyone, anywhere.

The offensive and defensive lines were terrible; defensive backs misplayed balls and bit on play-action fakes.

Pitt yielded 30 sacks last season, at least one in every game. Yet Virginia rarely pressured Palko, registering one sack, that on an all-out blitz.

No surprise, really. The Cavaliers’ 19 sacks last season ranked next-to-last in the ACC.

Virginia’s defensive highlight certainly had nothing to do with its sorry pass rush. On a three-step drop, Palko threw an out route, but his receiver ran a slant, gift-wrapping an interception for Lyles.

Also kind of puts perspective on Pitt’s pass protection that this may be one of the bad pass rushing teams faced.

Coming out of halftime, receiving the ball to open the 2nd half, lucky to be down only 17-10 the team thought for sure things would change. Whoops.

“Coming out of halftime, we were going to come down the first series and score,” Olsen said. “It just didn’t happen for us.”

In fact, UVa lost two yards on three plays and was forced to punt. The Cavaliers defense, however, held serve, but on the Panthers’ punt, Tony Franklin ran into teammate and punt returner Emmanuel Byers, which allowed Pitt to down the ball at the Virginia 2.

One play later, Olsen delivered a gift that sent many of the 46,758 fans into a wild frenzy. Virginia’s signal-caller took the snap on the first-down play, fired a bullet to the left in the direction of wideout Kevin Ogletree. Unfortunately for Olsen, Darrelle Revis was standing in the way and picked off the pass and raced 19 yards untouched into the end zone.

Groh said, “it was an overall poor play by Virginia,” and pointed out that the play had worked in past situations.

I’m not sure if I would characterize that pass as a bullet. And pointing out that it had worked in the past kind of ignores that he was throwing to a receiver covered by one of the country’s top corners with a safety coming over to help.

Regarding the offense, they still think the tailbacks are good but there is the issue of the O-line.

Virginia’s offensive line simply didn’t get the job done. As Groh has pointed out for five-plus years, all running backs run the same when there’s no hole. And that’s how it was Saturday night.

There were no holes, thusly the Cavaliers rushed 21 times for 52 yards and averaged only 2.5 yards per rush.

“Fifty-two total yards of rushing defense allowed – I know this, that you have no chance if you don’t run the ball and stop the run,” said Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt.

With Virginia’s running game shut down, Pitt had a field day in gambling to stop the pass, blitzing and becoming the first team since Duke in 1956 to return two interceptions for touchdowns against the Wahoos.

“Not much worked,” said Groh of Virginia’s running game.

Certainly the Cavs planned to run the ball. They had the backs, they thought they had the line. But do they?

Man, that sure seems familiar.

This kind of loss means everything is up for reevaluation.

The scouting report on Virginia heading into the season was that quarterback Christian Olsen wouldn’t kill the Cavaliers with mistakes and the secondary was the best coach Al Groh has had in his time in Charlottesville.

After one game, some re-evaluation is required.

Olsen threw a back-breaking interception that was returned for a touchdown and the UVa secondary gave up two touchdown passes of more than 70 yards in Virginia’s 38-13 loss to Pittsburgh at Heinz Field on Saturday.

“We’re extremely disappointed and embarrassed in the outcome,” Groh said.

Luckily there is perspective for Virginia, courtesy of history.

Fact: Virginia lost its season opener Saturday night, 38-13 at Pittsburgh.

Shocking truths: It was the Cavaliers’ most lopsided non-conference, regular-season loss since 1988, when they fell 42-14 to Penn State. It was Virginia’s worst season-opening loss since ’84 and a 55-0 defeat against third-ranked Clemson, which went 9-1-1 in ’83. (Pittsburgh went 5-6 last season. Four of those wins came against Division I-A teams that finished a combined 16-29.)

Fact: Pittsburgh returned two interceptions for touchdowns – both on the first play of a drive. Shocking truth: The last team to return two Virginia passes for touchdowns was Duke in 1956.

Fact: Pittsburgh quarterback Tyler Palko threw touchdown passes of 72 and 78 yards – both on the first play of a drive – against a Virginia secondary that was supposed to be its defensive cornerstone.

Shocking truth: A team hadn’t completed a pass that long against Virginia – any pass, not just a touchdown pass – in the Cavaliers’ past 30 games. (Florida State had a 79-yarder in 2003.)

Expect for next season to read about how they circled the rematch shortly after this.