Cavaliers Now

Reports: Virginia Pulls Out of Fenway Bowl Due to COVID-19 Concerns

The Cavaliers will not travel to Boston to face SMU in the inaugural Fenway Bowl

Matt Newton

The Virginia football team will not play in the Fenway Bowl against SMU on December 29th due to COVID-19 concerns, per multiple reports on Sunday morning.

The team canceled flights to Boston on Saturday and Sunday to undergo additional COVID-19 testing. It has been reported that multiple players within the UVA football program have tested positive for COVID-19.

Despite being bowl eligible for a fifth-straight season, the Cavaliers will enter the offseason having not participated in a bowl game for the second-consecutive year.

The inaugural Wasabi Fenway Bowl will likely be canceled, becoming the third bowl game in the 2021-2022 college football bowl schedule to be canceled, joining the Hawai’i Bowl between Hawai’i and Memphis and the Military Bowl between East Carolina and Boston College, which was also canceled on Sunday morning.

This also means that Bronco Mendenhall, who announced he would be stepping down from his position as head coach of Virginia after the bowl game, has coached his final game with the Cavaliers.

Virginia finishes the season with a 6-6 record and will enter the offseason under the direction of new head coach Tony Elliott. 

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Matt Newton
MATT NEWTON

Matt launched Virginia Cavaliers On SI in August of 2021 and has since served as the site's publisher and managing editor, covering all 23 NCAA Division I sports teams at the University of Virginia. He is from Downingtown, Pennsylvania and graduated from UVA in May of 2021.

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