Juan Thornhill to wear special cleats honoring Virginia shooting victims

Kansas City Chiefs safety Juan Thornhill will honor University of Virginia shooting victims with special cleats.

This past Sunday, tragedy struck the University of Virginia after a shooting left three students dead. The victims of the shooting were members of the school’s football team — wide receiver Devin Chandler, linebacker D’Sean Perry, and wide receiver Lavel Davis Jr. Two other students were injured. The shooter, former Virginia player Christopher Darnell Jones Jr., is currently in custody.

Juan Thornhill, a former safety for Virginia from 2015 until 2018 and current member of the Kansas City Chiefs, unveiled special cleats that he will wear for the team’s Sunday Night Football game against the Los Angeles Chargers this weekend. The cleats are navy, orange, and white, featuring the jersey numbers of Chandler, Perry, and Davis.

Juan Thornhill honors slain Virginia football players with cleats

“Wearing these Sunday to honor you three,” wrote Thornhill in his tweet.

Thornhill spent all four years with Virginia, where he recorded 208 combined tackles, 26 passes defended, 13 interceptions, and 1.5 sacks. In his final season, Thornhill made the All ACC First Team.

In 2019, Thornhill was selected in the second-round of the NFL Draft by the Chiefs.

Chandler, Perry, and Davis were returning from a field trip to see a play in Washington D.C., and when they returned to the Charlottesville campus, the bus was hit by gunshots. Two other students were injured, one of them being running back Mike Hollins, who was hit in the back when helping his fellow classmates escape, his mother told ESPN. The other injured student has since been discharged from the hospital.

Virginia was scheduled to face Coastal Carolina this Saturday. The university announced that the game has been canceled. The Cavaliers have one game remaining on the schedule against the Virginia Tech Hokies.