Miami coach Mario Cristobal, assistants, lament Virginia football deaths. ‘Unimaginable’

Miami Hurricanes football coach Mario Cristobal, followed by offensive coordinator Josh Gattis and defensive coordinator Kevin Steele, walked into the usual weekly news conference on campus Monday with solemn faces and sadder words.

Each separately offered their condolences to the University of Virginia Cavaliers and the family of the three football players who died in a Sunday shooting. One of the victims was junior linebacker D’Sean Perry, a Miami resident and Gulliver Prep graduate. The others: junior receiver Devin Chandler of Huntersville, North Carolina; and junior receiver Lavel Davis Jr. of Dorchester, South Carolina.

“First off, just thoughts and prayers with everyone in Charlottesville — unspeakable,’’ Cristobal said softly. “Everyone is grieving for them. Our hearts are grieving. Thoughts and prayers, and any support that they should ever need from us, they’ve got it.”

Two other UVA students were reportedly wounded in the shooting. One was identified as Mike Hollins, a junior running back from Baton Rouge who already underwent one surgery and was scheduled for another, per the Associated Press.

According to the Associated Press, the shooting occurred just after 10:15 p.m. Sunday as a charter bus full of students returned from seeing a play in Washington.

The suspect, former Virginia football player Christopher Darnell Jones Jr., 22, has been arrested.

‘As tragic as it gets’

Perry and Davis reportedly had scholarship offers from Oregon while Cristobal coached there. He said the team hadn’t been able to meet yet when the news was released, but that “it’s as tragic as it gets,’’ and that it would be addressed with the Hurricanes players.

“Always do, always do, always do, always, always,’’ the coach said. “You can’t stop teaching, you can’t stop learning, you can’t ever do too much to do whatever you can to prevent tragedy — rough.

“Just thoughts and prayers to the families, man — good, good young people; Good young men with futures ahead of them and everyone that knows their families or doesn’t know their families, but associated with the conference, with college football, sports, life in general needs to do everything possible to support them because what they’re going through is like nothing we could ever imagine or ever hope for, wish for upon anybody, so we’ve all got to really, really do everything we can to show support.”

Virginia, which Miami met Oct. 29 in Charlottesville and defeated 14-12 in quadruple overtime, is part of UM’s Atlantic Coast Conference. The college coaching fraternity is a close-knit bunch, intertwined in various ways.

Gattis said he “exchanged messages” Monday morning with Virginia coach Tony Elliott.

“First off, I’d like to send my condolences to UVA and the community, the football team, Coach Elliott during this hard, tragic time, “ Gattis said. “Obviously, he’s a strong man of faith, but a tremendous tragic loss that they’ve experienced right now. And I’m just sending my heart and thoughts and prayers to the team and the university.”

Steele, 64, said you can’t separate football from life, and that he has experienced “multiple” deaths among players in his long career as a coach at several programs. But he said each time it was just “one isolated incident.’’

‘Unimaginable’

“That’s one family that’s heartbroken, one football family that’s heartbroken, but not three. It’s unimaginable,’’ Steele said. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the University of Virginia, and University of Virginia football program. Tony is a friend of mine. I coached with Tony and I can’t imagine — unbelievable.”

When asked if he’ll talk about the situation with his players, Steele said this:

“We’re teachers and we’re teachers of life first. That’s the beauty of the game of football. Yes, it’s a game and we’ve really made it very complicated, and complex and it’s got its own challenges, but there’s a lot of life lessons in it.

“We’re parents to the players — surrogate parents, if you will. We’re teachers — you’ve got to be on them about homework and going to class, and those kinds of things, all the things that happen. Just like 9/11 happened one day and we’re in the middle of football season — we’ve got a game that week.

“You’ve got to address those things. You just don’t walk in, throw football on. If you say you care, you’ve got to show them you care.”

Edwin Pata, UM’s assistant director of recruiting, is the older brother of the late Bryan Pata, a former Miami defensive lineman who was shot to death in November 2006. He sent out tweets expressing his condolences.

In Pata’s case, it wasn’t until August of last year that Miami-Dade homicide detectives arrested Rashaun Jones, 35, a former Canes defensive back, in Marion County on a charge of first-degree murder.

The Hurricanes (5-5, 3-3 ACC) travel to Clemson, South Carolina, to face the No. 9 Tigers (9-1, 7-0) at 3:30 p.m. Saturday (ESPN). They were off Monday but begin on-field preparation Tuesday.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with @UVAFootball and the entire @UVA community as they cope with this unspeakable tragedy,’’ UM athletic director Dan Radakovich posted on Twitter.

UM receiver Xavier Restrepo tweeted that he was “Praying for the Friends/Families of the UVA tragedy Psalm 34:18,’’ accompanied by emojis of praying hands and a bandaged heart.