Two Notre Dame defensive starters out against Virginia Cavaliers

Notre Dame will be without two defensive starters and captains against Virginia on Saturday night. 

Defensive lineman Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa and linebacker Drew White will watch the game from the sidelines with an illness unrelated to COVID-19. They traveled with the team to Charlottesville.

White has 40 tackles, a sack, a pass breakup and a fumble recovery on the year, and Tagovailoa-Amosa has 21 stops, 2.5 sacks and a pass breakup.

Tagovailoa-Amosa and Drew White’s absences mean four of Notre Dame’s seven captains are out of tonight’s game. Receiver Avery Davis is out for the season with a torn ACL, and safety Kyle Hamilton remains sidelined with a knee injury suffered on Oct. 23.

While there has been speculation that Hamilton has played his last game in an Irish uniform before entering the 2022 NFL Draft, head coach Brian Kelly made it seem as though the likely first-round draft pick is doing everything in his power to return to the field in blue and gold at least one more time. 

“This isn’t a young man that doesn’t want to play,” Kelly said on Thursday.

If Hamilton is ready to play next weekend, the Atlanta native’s last game at Notre Dame Stadium will be against Georgia Tech.

Armstrong unlikely to play

UVA quarterback Brennan Armstrong was a game time decision and is unlikely to play on Saturday night after suffering a rib injury against BYU on Oct. 30. He threw for a few minutes in warmups, but true freshman Jay Woolfolk will get the start against the Irish.

Woolfolk is from less than an hour from Charlottesville in Richmond, Va. The 5-foot-11 200-pound signal caller is the first true freshman to start for UVA since 1977, and he did not play high school football last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Irish defense will look to dominate in the trenches against a UVA offensive line that has allowed 26 sacks this season, which is 104th in the nation.

Lineman Isaiah Foskey leads the country in sack yardage by 30 yards with 97. He has nine sacks on the season, which is tied for fourth nationally.

Notre Dame was an 8-point favorite just before kickoff.