Last week's contest brought back some painful memories. We asked fans to relate their worst experience as a Wahoo fan, and we got enough tales of woe to make us cry.

There were personal stories about the 1995 loss at Texas, the 1991 Gator Bowl debacle, the Sugar Bowl loss to Tennessee, last year's trip to Blacksburg, and much more. But the all-time heartbreaker was the game many fans will never forget (even though they'd like to) - the 1990 loss to Georgia Tech. I was a student at the time and felt sick about that game for, oh, about five years. The best entry belongs to Lars Nordin (aka vikinghoos)...

The top-ranked Hoos took on 16th-ranked GT at Scott. We had the game in hand but never put it away. The Shamu blimp circled overhead as the nation was riveted to the right leg of Scott Sisson, who sails one through the uprights for a crushing 41-38 GT victory. Scott goes incredibly quiet; all you could hear were the traveling GT fans who were roaring. We just stood there looking at the field. No one knew what to do. It was awful. The dream was shattered. This was supposed to be such a wonderful day. The Hoos were going to 8-0 and my girlfriend (now wife and fellow Hoo) and I were going to the Allman Brothers concert that night at U-Hall. What a doubleheader. We return to our house and I'm so depressed, practically inconsolable with no desire to go to the concert. My future wife says, "Let's just go, I think it will do you good to get your mind on something else." I reluctantly agree, but as we approach U-Hall walking hand-in-hand, we come across some GT fans in post-celebration revelry, hours after the game. One of them sees my future wife, a 5'11" blonde, and yells out, "Hey baby, don't hang with a loser, come party with a winner!" Can it get worse? By the way, the concert sucked even if it was awesome.

Well, it wasn't all bad. Lars didn't lose his girlfriend and now he wins a free month of Sabre Edge.

OK, enough bad memories. Let's move on to the good stuff for this week's contest: Please describe, in 500 words or less, your best experience as a Wahoo fan.

A great game, a sublime moment, a fun road trip, a hell of a tailgate...anything that made you proud, happy and thrilled to be a UVa fan. The only stipulation is that you needed to be sober enough to have actual memories of the event, not something you imagined in a drunken stupor.

Please send your entry to [email protected] with the header: SabreMail Contest. Thanks, and good luck!

Football recruiting.

Meadowbrook (Richmond, VA) star John Graves had a good visit to Virginia Tech last weekend. The 6-3, 240-pound outside linebacker/defensive end recruit made an unofficial trip to Blacksburg for the Georgia Tech game. He was impressed by the fan support throughout the game.

Nothing much has changed for Graves, who continues to say he'll decide when he's ready. He does not have a definitive timetable in terms of making a commitment. Virginia remains in good shape here, but it will be interesting to see if John does take official visits.

Graves has helped Meadowbrook to a 3-0 start, including wins over L.C. Bird and Manchester over the past two weeks. The Monarchs are the defending state champions.

Phoebus (Hampton, VA) 3-star athlete Brent Vinson had scheduled an official visit to UVa on the weekend of the Florida State game, but the coaches convinced the 6-1, 185-pound speedster to take an unofficial visit that weekend in hopes that he would take an official visit after the season.

Vinson is also considering Virginia Tech, Tennessee and Michigan State, among others. He has an official visit set to Tennessee on the weekend of November 11th.

In terms of commitments, one verbal commit having an outstanding season already is 6-1, 200-pound running back Raynard Horne. The Overlea (Baltimore, MD) star has rushed for nine touchdowns this season in leading Overlea to a 3-0 mark. Last weekend he rushed six times for 136 yards and four touchdowns.

Basketball recruiting.

Dave Leitao landed his first verbal commitment as Virginia head coach when Sam Zeglinski, a 6-0, 165-pound point guard out of Penn Charter H.S. in Philadelphia, Pa., chose the 'Hoos over interest from a host of ACC programs as well as several Big East schools.

Zeglinski, a two-year starter who averaged 18 points per game as a sophomore last season, is a 2007 class recruit.

A handful of other decisions did not go Coach Leitao's way. 2006 recruits including SG Kelvin Lewis, C Brad Sheehan and WF Wellington Smith all verbally committed to other programs. Lewis chose Auburn, Sheehan chose Georgia Tech and Smith selected West Virginia.

Virginia remains in the mix for PF Jon Mitchell, a Mount Vernon H.S. (N.Y.) star who made an official visit last weekend, as well as SG Solomon Tat and F Jamil Tucker. Tat is expected on grounds this weekend for an official visit and Tucker may already be in Charlottesville for his official.

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Subject: The first quarter of the season is done, what to make of it?
Posted by: Homer L Ferguson on Sun Sep 25 2005 3:54:20 PM
Message: UVA starts out against three cupcakes. In game one, struggles on both sides of the ball. In game two, struggles a little less on offense, not a great defensive performance. In game three, things start slowly on offense but come around, and the defense is sound as the pound throughout.

So, UVA is now 3-0 and evidently within the top 20. Well, this is just where UVA should be. None of these three games should have been close in the first place. Steady improvement and no injuries are all we can hope for starting against WMich, Sorry-excuse, and Dook.

Steady improvement? Yes, definitely, but it is a little hard to measure. Since none of these opponents should have posed much of a challenge, is this really steady improvement in the sense of the team getting better or steady improvement in the sense of the team catching up to where it was supposed to have been in the first place?

Marques Hagans and the OL are doing very well, and the front seven has done well in Brook's absense. It will be interesting to see how the receivers and DBs do in the next three games, as that will determine a lot.

Injuries, well, hard to say if the Hoos will be good enough to deal with Maryland, BC, and Florida State, the first two on the road, if Lundy, Brooks, Barthelmes, and Ferguson (Dbrick, not Homer L) aren't there.

Given the talent in Blacksburg and Coral Gables, it is probably reasonable that the Hoos will need to go 2-1 in the second quarter of their schedule. One man's opinion: based on the first quarter of the schedule, no way to say confidently that this is or isn't possible. This isn't a pep talk or a flame, just an opinion intended to have no positive or negative connotations.

Being a fan of any team should be a low-stress proposition, but as a UVA fan, I'd have to say that the only real stress is that, three games in, still no clear picture about how competitive the team is in the ACC. Maryland seems to me to be the most critical game, since Maryland is the softest of the three upcoming games. Lose to Md and BC and beat FSU, and either it is an underachieving team or a fluke. Take care of the Twerps on the road, than that is building momentum. The BC game will be a lot easier coming off a win.

To read the entire thread, please click the link below.

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