Thursday, October 11, 2007
Gould a student of place-kicking history
Fans introduce themselves to Danny Aiken
Doug Doughty
Doug Doughty's UVa Insider is exclusive to roanoke.com and is posted by 5 p.m. Thursdays in season.
See Doug and Randy talk sports every week with the Sports edition of the TimesCast
Recent columns
Even before he was a Virginia football player, Chris Gould was a follower of UVa kicking fortunes.
Gould’s 35-yard field goal Saturday night at Middle Tennessee marked the first time since 1998 that UVa had kicked a game-winning field goal in a game it had been trailing with less than one minute remaining.
There had been other game-winning field goals since 1998, most notably in the 2005 Music City Bowl, but that came in a game that had been tied 31-31 until Connor Hughes booted a 39-yarder with 1:08.
If you want to talk about impressive kicking performances, Gould said earlier this week, you have to start with Virginia’ 27-24 home victory over Wake Forest in 2003.
That was the game in which Hughes kicked a career-long 53-yarder that pulled Virginia into a 24-24 tie with 1:51 left, then, following a Jamaine Winborne interception, booted a game-winning 38-yarder with 10 seconds left.
Gould was still in high school at the time, “but I watched the game on TV,” he said.
Actually, Gould already had committed to the Cavaliers, so he had a rooting interest in the game, but it would be two years before he would replace Hughes as the Cavaliers’ place-kicker.
Because he was needed as a punter, Gould was not redshirted and his numbers will place him well short of Hughes, who is the leading scorer in ACC history, but Gould is earning a niche in Cavalier annals.
His five field goals tied a school record that he now shares with Rafael Garcia and Hughes, and his 35-yarder Saturday night marked the first time since 1998 that a last-minute field goal had meant the difference between a win and a loss.
The last UVa place-kicker to enjoy that distinction was Todd Braverman, who kicked a 30-yarder with 49 seconds left to lift Virginia past Clemson, 20-18, in 1998.
That game was at home, however. You have to go back more than 20 years to find a similar occurrence on the road.
In 1986, Virginia won at Wake Forest 30-28 on a 36-yard field goal by fifth-year kicker Jeff Gaffney with 56 seconds left.
That was the only year that Gaffney served as the Cavaliers’ place-kicker, having used up his soccer eligibility in 1984, when he was a first-team All-ACC forward. Gaffney, a college teammate of current UVa men’s soccer coach George Gelnovatch, is the only Cavaliers’ soccer player of note to enjoy a successful stint as the Cavaliers’ place-kicker.
Gould, coming off a nondescript 11-for-19 season in 2006, has made nine of his 10 attempts this season and, as coach Al Groh noted earlier this week, is perfect on kicks that have gotten airborne. An early field-goal attempt against Duke was blocked after snapper Danny Aiken rolled the ball back to holder Vic Hall.
Gould has a chance at Hughes’ school record for field-goal percentage in a season, set when Hughes was 23-of-25 (92 percent) in 2003. Gould also might have the rare but dubious distinction of posting a higher percentage on field goals than extra points.
A miss Saturday night at Middle Tennessee left Gould at 88.2 percent (15-of-17) onn extra points for the season.
VIRGINIA HAS PLAYED in front of more intimidating crowds than the announced turnout of 23,277 at Floyd Stadium, but the Middle Tennessee fans made their presence known.
“When the seats are filled, all the crowd noise kind of blends together,” Gould said. “At Middle Tennessee, the fans were right on top of us and you could hear everything they said. They were really on Danny Aiken; they kept calling him ‘Clay’ all night.”
Unlike Clay Aiken, famous for his stint on American Idol, Gould and Danny Aiken were winners.
