For the many struggles of the 2015 Virginia football team, there were a couple of bright spots. One of those was the breakthrough of linebacker Micah Kiser, the starting inside linebacker in the 4-3 defense of then-defensive coordinator Jon Tenuta. Kiser led the ACC in tackles with 117 in 12 games, which was good enough for 17th in the nation as well.
One could argue that while those numbers are impressive from an individual perspective for Kiser, it doesn’t bode well for the team as a whole that one player can make that many tackles. To that point, Virginia’s defense was 81st out of 128 FBS teams in 2015 with 412 yards allowed per game, and 96th at a staggering 32.