CLEMSON — For a second, Virginia had No. 10 Clemson a little nervous. Then the Tigers took over.

After falling behind seven points early in the second quarter, Clemson scored 35 answered points over a 22 and a half minute span to beat the Cavaliers 48-31 Saturday at Memorial Stadium.

The win was the Tigers’ six straight over Virginia, its longest over the Wahoos since they won 29 straight between 1955-’89 to open the series.

Virginia (4-3, 2-2 ACC) took a 10-3 lead with 12:26 to play in the second quarter thanks to a Anthony Colandrea 8-yd touchdown pass to Dakota Twitty.

However, Clemson (6-1, 5-0 ACC) responded with an 11-play, 80-yard drive, capped by a Phil Mafah 1-yard run with 7:38 to play in the first half. From there, both the offense and defense complimented each other as they dominated the rest of the game.

The Clemson defense, behind the play of defensive end Peter Woods and linebacker Wade Woodaz, held the Cavaliers to 172 total yards through three quarters. The Wahoos had just 105 yards combined in the second and third quarters.

The Tigers had a season high four sacks, one of those was a strip sack by Woodaz, which led to a Clemson touchdown.

On the offensive end, Klubnik bounced back from a first-quarter interception that set up UVa’s first touchdown of the afternoon, with two touchdown passes of 11 and 40 yards to tight end Olsen Patt-Henry.

It was not Klubnik’s best day by any stretch, but he still completed 23 of 35 passes for 308 yards and three touchdowns. Besides his interception, he had several overthrows, including one to a wide open Jake Briningstool in the end zone.

For the second game in a row Antonio Williams threw an end-around-reverse pass pass to Briningstool. The two hooked up for a 28-yard TD at Wake Forest last week on a double-pass play, and on Saturday, their 34-yard connection set up Mafah’s second TD of the day, a three-yard scoring run.

Williams also scored on a 36-yard end-around, which gave the Tigers a 31-10 lead with 4:31 to play in the third quarter.

Klubnik and freshman T.J. Moore connected on a 34-yard TD pass with 1:54 to play that gave Clemson a 48-25 lead at the time.

The Clemson offense finished with 539 total yards.

Virginia scored two late touchdowns to make the final score closer than it appeared.

Up Next

Clemson will get the next week off before returning home on Nov. 2 to host Louisville in a key ACC matchup.