First wave of Virginia Football players pick their jersey numbers

As you may have seen by now, the first round of the 2019 Virginia Football Jersey Draft went down Sunday night. A total of 36 players received their numbers, but the draft order has not been made public at this point. What is known, however, is the first pick had to go to someone other than Jordan Ellis for the first time in Bronco Mendenhall’s tenure at Virginia.

Here’s how the first 36 picks went:

Third year CB Nick Grant chose Ellis’s No. 1 jersey, but we don’t know when Grant picked (though he must’ve picked pretty early on to snag the coveted #1). Bryce Perkins kept his #3, with Joe Reed (#2) and Charles Snowden (#11) keeping their same numbers as last season.

Here’s a list of the guys who received numbers yesterday. Once again, these are in order of jersey number, not in draft order:

#1 CB Nick Grant

#2 WR Joe Reed

#3 QB Bryce Perkins

#4 ILB Jordan Mack

#5 RB Lamont Atkins

#6 RB P.K. Kier

#7 DB Chris Moore

#8 WR Hasise Dubois

#9 WR Terrell Chatman

#10 QB Brennan Armstrong

#11 OLB Charles Snowden

#13 WR Terrell Jana

#14 OLB Noah Taylor

#15 S De’Vante Cross

#16 DE Richard Burney

#21 RB Wayne Taulapapa

#22 ILB Rob Snyder

#27 BB Jamari Peacock

#28 S Brenton Nelson

#29 S Joey Blount

#31 RB Chris Sharp

#32 CB Darrius Bratton

#33 ILB Zane Zandier

#34 CB Bryce Hall

#44 TE Tanner Cowley

#45 ILB Reed Kellam

#54 OL Ryan Nelson

#56 OLB Matt Gahm

#58 DL Eli Hanback

#64 OL Ben Trent

#69 OL Chris Glaser

#79 OL Dillon Reinkensmeyer

#81 P/PK Nash Griffin

#83 WRHayden Mitchell

#91 DE Mandy Alonso

#94 DE Aaron Faumui

Key Number Changes

A majority of these numbers are unchanged from last season. But there are a few notable changes. Nick Grant has #1 (Jordan Ellis’ old number) after wearing #20 last year. Jordan Mack has #4 (Olamide Zaccheaus) after wearing #37 before. Lamont Atkins has #5 (Tim Harris) after #25 last year. Wayne Taulapapa has #21 after wearing #7 last year. Last year, Chris Moore was #7, but he missed the entire season. Moore is back this year and has his number back.

Brennan Armstrong has #10 after wearing #98 last year. Terrell Jana has #13 after wearing #84 last year. Jamari Peacock has #27 after wearing #10 last year. Tavares Kelly was #27 last year and he was not one of the 36 so he’ll have to choose a new number.

Notes

We shouldn’t read too much into this as we don’t know the full process of how one earns their number (the order is determined by the team), and the fact more guys will get numbers as training camp progresses. Still, we can make some educated guesses.

There are four WRs on that list. Reed and Dubois were givens, but it’s telling that Jana and Chatman got their numbers. Those two are the most likely backups to Reed and Dubois on the outside. It’s also interesting that none of the candidates to replace OZ on the inside have received numbers. That includes Kelly, the presumptive starter at H-back/slot WR.

Stay tuned for updates on all things Virginia Football as we get closer to the season kicking off on August 31st at Pitt.