The polls have Tech outside the top 25, but firmly within the next group of teams vying to receive an official ranking. That status jives with the ratings I’ll be using to grade the team this year. The rankings by metric tell us that Tech has a great offense, alright defense, and good special teams, resulting in a fringe top 25 team.

In short, the Hokies have performed as advertised, at least from a 30 thousand-foot view. Dig a bit deeper, though, and the real strengths and weaknesses of the team are revealed.

Offense

Virginia Tech’s PFF grade range on offense is quite narrow. At the extremes, the Hokies have an 83 in passing and a 70 in pass blocking. They excel in passing EPA/play (0.509), passing down success rate (44.4%), and defensive back havoc allowed (1.3%).

The struggles have come on the ground. That might surprise some people after last year’s 3-9 team produced some fairly gaudy rushing stats. One thing to keep in mind is that after the first few games, Philip Montgomery reverted back to using Kyron Drones as a battering ram, which gave the Hokies a man-advantage in the run game. It was as though the Hokies were on one endless power play.

This year, without the numbers advantage, the still-developing offensive line has had to do more work to open holes. The struggles on deep passes haven’t helped.

The two offensive metrics that stand out most in the negative column are rushing explosiveness (0.958) and open-field yards/rush (0.89). Tech’s quick passing game has helped it successfully sustain drives, but an average depth of target of only 6.4 yards does little to move linebackers and safeties back from the line of scrimmage.

Defense

For opposing offenses, it has been feast or famine against the Hokie defense. The outlier range (39.9) is three times greater than for the offense, meaning that Brent Pry’s unit is elite in some aspects, and at certain positions, but below average, at least so far, in others.

Tech has succeeded so far in shutting down the run, outside of one long run by ODU quarterback Quinn Henicle. The team’s PFF grade, 95.0 reflects what fans have seen with their own eyes.

On the other side, Tech’s coverage grade of 54.1 reflects a level of performance through three games that can only be called disappointing. Kaleb Spencer (92.8), Thomas Williams (72.8), and Joshua Clarke (70.4), have all defended the pass well, but Quentin Reddish (43.6), Jaquez White (53.5), and Isaiah Brown-Murray (58.2) have struggled.

Tech has been able to shut down the run thanks to dominant play in the trenches. The Hokies are allowing 0.31 line yards/rush, and they are stuffing the opponent on 45.2% of rushes. The front seven havoc rate (24.4%) is nearly eight times that of the defensive backs (3.5%).

The success rate allowed by play type tells the whole story:

• On passing plays: 50.6%

• On rushing plays: 21.3%

The game at Boston College

Games at Boston College tend to be sleepy affairs, but there is nothing cozy about a Nor’easter. Today’s menu features both rain and wind, with gusts likely to top 40 mph.

Still, the forecast is not calling for apocalyptic weather. Rather, it’s just going to be chilly and nasty. Regarding football, the weather will be bad enough to impact the game’s final outcome, but not the entire game plan. Tech is still likely to do what it wants in this game, meaning a healthy dose of Ethan Grunkemayer and the short-to-medium range passing game.

On paper, Virginia Tech has a definite advantage:

When Boston College has the ball

There is no reason to believe that the Eagles will be able to move the ball consistently against the Virginia Tech defense. BC’s offensive EPA/play (-0.038) almost exactly matches what the Hokies allow (-0.037). The weather might conspire to net BC an explosive play or two, but expect the Hokies to drive down BC’s already sub-40% success rate.

When Virginia Tech has the ball

The Hokies may be down their starting left tackle (Justin Terry) and right guard (Montavious Cunningham), but they are the two lowest graders among Tech’s starting five up front. If backups Logan Howland and Brody Meadows can themselves stay healthy, the drop-off in play should not be significant.

A bigger loss would be if Ayden Greene can’t go at wide receiver. Playing young receivers in bad weather is practically asking for an ill-fated turnover, or two. And I’m not just talking about the usual run-the-wrong-route sort of deal. I’m thinking more along the lines of tipped pass interception and fumble after the catch. James Franklin and Fontel Mines weren’t born yesterday. Expect to see a healthy dose of Marlion Jackson and Que’Sean Brown out wide, while Grunk continues to target his tight ends, especially Luke Reynolds, whenever he really needs to make a play.

There has been a lot of speculation in the days leading up to the game that Tech would lean more heavily on the run because of the weather. Perhaps, but if the o-line struggled to get a push in good weather, there is no reason to think that putting those guys on slick field turf will improve their fortunes. If the Hokies are able to do damage on the ground, it will likely be thanks, at least in part, to scheme. The coaches know what they have now, and just like last year’s team, expect some subtle shifts that enable the team to better play to its strengths on offense.

Data sourced from collegefootballdata.com and pff.com. Dashboard visuals are from collegefootballdata.com.

Subscribe now

Share

If you hadn’t seen this story year-after-year for decades, you might look at this Maryland team and feel pretty nervous about Saturday’s game.

If, like me, you are well aware of Maryland’s exemplary record against the Little Sisters of the Poor and various local, directional schools, it is exceedingly difficult to take this week’s game seriously.

Are the Terps a legit Big Ten program, capable of not only beating the Hokies, but doing so comfortably, or are they a team whose relationship with its conference is more about guaranteeing nine “buy” games each season?

And what about the Hokies? Last week’s performance was a mixed bag against a lower-level opponent. There is also that pesky little record — read: no wins — against non-ACC power conference opponents dating back to the opening game of the 2017 season.

Getting a handle on this game is tough, as we will be asking a lot from just a few metrics.

What a major outlier tells us

Both teams enter Saturday’s game with equal 2-0 records against opponents who had no business sticking within three touchdowns of them. In such a situation, raw stats as well as PFF grades are supposed to be inflated.

In a matchup between two teams with inflated numbers, an outright bad number becomes newsworthy. The most noteworthy outlier for either team is Maryland’s inability to tackle. The Terps graded out below 65 in both games this season, and were under 60 last week at rebuilding UConn.

Taken as a whole, Maryland’s inability to bring ball carriers to the ground would seem to point the way for Ty Howle and the Hokie offense. Expect a health dose of Marcellous Hawkins on the ground to soften up a Terrapin defense that is a bit undersized at some positions.

For example, half of Maryland’s two-deep at defensive end weigh less than 250 pounds. Can they hold up over four quarters if they struggle to tackle ball carriers? If the Hokies win the time of possession battle, there is a high likelihood that it will be the result of drives getting extended by players who refuse to go down.

Predictability in the passing game

Defenses tend to struggle when they don’t know where the ball is going. Sign stealing is one answer, but few teams manage to pull it off successfully.

The defensive coordinator’s job is made much easier if there are clear tendencies from an opponents’ charted plays.

Consider the passing distribution between Maryland’s Malik Washington and Virginia Tech’s Ethan Grunkemeyer.

Washington, so far this season, has demonstrated a clear preference to throw the ball in the middle third of the field.

At every level, Washington has thrown to the center of the field more than to the left and right combined.

Expect the Hokies to be dialed-in to this tendency, especially on screen passes and throws between 0 and 20 yards. On “gotta have it plays”, expect him to try to pick on Tech’s linebackers. The Hokies have not had to defend against a competent passing attack yet this season, and at times they showed holes against Old Dominion.

For the Hokies, Ethan Grunkemeyer shows the same preference for throwing to the middle of the field on passes thrown within 10 yards of the line of scrimmage. Beyond 10 yards, though, he is as likely to throw to either side as he is to attempt a pass down the middle.

For Grunk, the key will be completing those deeper passes to the outside.

In addition, Hokie fans have noted the offense’s inability to hit on wide open deep shots. The Terrapin coaches have surely noted this fact too, so don’t be surprised if they crowd the line of scrimmage and dare the Hokies to beat them deep.

Final thoughts

This game is tough to get a read on. Most grades and statistics for both teams are cartoonishly high.

The Hokies showed some weaknesses up front last week against ODU, but Maryland’s defensive scheme is so different from what ODU ran that it is unclear whether the Terps will be able to take advantage of Tech’s youth and inexperience.

Meanwhile, Maryland clearly struggles with tackling on defense, and the offense appears easy to game plan against.

Malik Washington is a talented player, but one wonders if sees plays develop near the sideline as well as he does in the middle of the field. If the Hokies can crowd the center third and disguise their coverages, there is every reason to believe that they could pick off a pass or two.

Takeaways in the passing game and a dominant rushing attack are the keys to victory for Virginia Tech. In contrast, sacks on first and second down combined with the danger of a mobile opposition quarterback will be critical if Maryland hopes to make this a four-quarter contest.

Both teams are undefeated against lower-level patsies. This game is being portrayed as each team’s first true test, but if recent records are any indication, the loser is more likely than not to be revealed as a P4 patsy.

If you had to label one of these teams as being set up to take a fall, which would you choose? That answer alone is worth more than all the early season powder puff stats, combined.

Subscribe now

Share

However, before we look forward to two teams seemingly moving in opposite directions, let’s look backward and tease out what can be learned from last week’s scrimmage, -er game, against VMI.

Looking back

Let’s start with the five metrics that before the game I noted would tell us a lot about the 2026 Hokies:

1) Offensive time-to-throw

Overall, Ethan Grunkemeyer’s time-to-throw was 2.32 seconds, while Bryce Baker’s was 1.93. Those numbers were solely a product of scheme and play selection. VMI generated nothing in the way of push up front. The ball won’t always come out this quickly, but it is clearly going to come out a lot quicker than it did last year. As a result, the number of drive-killing sacks should decline appreciably.

2) Count of (non-injury influenced) offensive line snaps by non-starters when Ethan Grunkemeyer is under center

While I am not aware of official stats for this metric, I did note via the television broadcast some degree of rotation along the offensive line in the first half. Overall, the starters played between 38 and 43 snaps. Logan Howland and Brody Meadows only played 17 and 16 snaps, respectively, but other second and third stringers got extended playing time:

• Tommy Ricard - 39 snaps

• Gavin Crawford and Buddy Wegdam - 24 snaps

• Lucas Austin - 21 snaps

This group played well, for the most part. Lucas Austin was the only one of the four to grade out below the baseline of 60. The other three were all above 70.

3) Offensive downfield shots taken (and converted)

True to expectations, the Hokies threw a lot of short passes. Grunkemeyer had two passing attempts greater than 20 yards, but missed an open Que’sean Brown both times. Baker connected on his only attempt, a 40-yard touchdown pass to Keylen Adams.

4) Offensive line yards allowed by the defense

Before the game I set the cut-off line at 1.5 offensive line yards allowed. As expected (honestly, hoped), the Hokies shut down the Keydets rushing attack by dominating at the line of scrimmage. Virginia Tech allowed only 0.6 line yards per rush. Here is a full breakdown of the rushing advanced stats for both teams:

Not much to quibble with there.

5) Count of (non-injury influenced) back-up linebacker snaps in the first half

No Virginia Tech defender played more than 27 snaps, and Brent Pry began rotating players almost immediately. That included the linebackers. There was, however, a sharp drop-off in performance after the top four players:

• MLB 1: Noah Chambers - 88.0 (19 snaps)

• WLB 1: Keon Wylie - 78.1 (15 snaps)

• SLB 1: Kaleb Spencer - 81.3 (22 snaps)

  ---

• Mike 2: George Ballance - 89.5 (23 snaps)

• WLB 2: Curtis Jones Jr. - 56.2 (27 snaps)

• SLB 2: Sherrod Covil - 62.3 (26 snaps)

  ---

• MLB 3: Mathieu Lamah - 84.6 (14 snaps)

• WLB 3: Terry Wiggins - 57.6 (14 snaps)

• SLB 3: Antwone Santiago - 70.5 (13 snaps)

Notice how two of the biggest question marks — Curtis Jones Jr. and Sherrod Covil — got the most snaps. That was not by accident. The staff clearly wanted to get a good evaluation on them. Unfortunately, the results were pretty pedestrian. Those guys will still see the field plenty this season, but hopefully they log only true second string snaps. Tech would be in trouble if either player were forced into a starting role (e.g., due to an injury at the top of the depth chart).

Looking ahead

The Hokies were a little better last week in just about every proxy measure than anticipated before the game. They dominated both lines of scrimmage, played a ton of guys, and the passing game was crisp, regardless of who was under center (or in the shotgun).

The depth questions at linebacker are real, and unresolved. When the game is on the line, expect to see primarily a four-man rotation, with George Ballance being the only second stringer who has thus far earned significant snaps.

On the offensive line, keep an eye on the battle at guard. Layth Ghannam blocked well (81.5 pass blocking, 71.3 run blocking), but committed two penalties, which resulted in him grading out the lowest among the five starters (67.9 overall).

This week, if Ghannam commits an early penalty or two, look for Gavin Crawford to get more snaps. Against VMI, Crawford played 24 snaps and earned an 81.5 overall grade. He was equally strong in blocking for the run and the pass.

If Brody Meadows can stay healthy, the Hokies might be a legit two deep at guard. Tommy Ricard’s solid performance (73.8 overall) suggests the same might be true at center.

The Hokies are not as deep at tackle, but starters Aidan Lynch (93.2) and Justin Terry (78.4) graded out very well in terms of their overall play.

Talent in, talent out

We’re still about two weeks from having enough data to draw some serious conclusions about the 2026 Hokies and their opponents. Absent sufficiently powered PFF grades, there are a few other metrics that provide clues about how the game against Old Dominion is likely to play out on Saturday afternoon.

Since the series with ODU began in 2017, the Hokies have been trending down, while the Monarchs have been trending up. This SP+ graph tells the story:

Has Virginia Tech already bottomed out? Did ODU peak last year? Possibly yes and yes.

Old Dominion got hit hard by the transfer portal. Out of the 10 highest rated players in the transfer portal linked to ODU this past offseason, 8 left the program and 2 entered.

Meanwhile, the situation in Blacksburg was the polar opposite. All 10 of the highest rated transfer portal players linked to Virginia Tech transferred in. The highest rated departure, linebacker Michael Short, left the program four games into the 2025 campaign and transferred to TCU in the offseason. He earned a 0.86 rating from 247Sports.

Traditional recruiting rankings tell a parallel story. The Hokies brought in the 34th best class in 2026 according to 247Sports, while ODU’s class ranked 95th.

Even that ranking hides the extent of the disparity between the schools’ recruiting hauls. Virginia Tech’s average player rating was 87.91 (high 3-star), while ODU’s was 82.97 (high 2-slow to 3-star territory).

Overall, the Hokies are much better this year than they were in 2025, while Old Dominion is much worse. Does it all add up to the three touchdown swing from a year ago that the Hokies will need to achieve to win the game?

Most likely, yes.

And comfortably.

Subscribe now

Share

There are so many other factors that drove those decisions when Head Coach James Franklin and Howle were at Penn St., things that most people do not even consider, such as:

• Relative athleticism of Big Ten linebackers

• Ability of Big Ten programs to recruit top flight talent at cornerback

• Weather conditions

• Strengths and Weaknesses of Penn St. quarterbacks

• Availability of blue chip pocket passers in the mid-Atlantic region

• Fan expectations and the Overton window for what kind of offense can be run in Happy Valley

• Comparative strengths and weaknesses of the Penn St. offensive line

This is not to say that semi-informed prognostications made in the May-June dead period do not have their place. The professionals need to generate content and the fans crave any morsel they can get.

But in the niche of a niche where Hokie Analytics lives, I have long operated under the data-driven maxim of only going so far as I felt the numbers could support.

And in the time period between when the Hokies hired Franklin and the end of training camp, that is not very far.

Now that the Hokies are set to take on their week 1 opponent, Virginia Military Institute (VMI), it would seem a salient time to discuss the metrics that, in what should be a blowout win for the home team, are most likely to reveal just how good (or not) the Hokies will be in 2026.

Week 1 metrics that matter

By the end of the first quarter, the final result of the game against VMI should no longer be in doubt. That does not mean there will not be a lot to watch for during the rest of the game. Here are the five metrics that I think will give us the best early indication of just how good Franklin’s first team in Blacksburg will be.

1) Offensive time-to-throw

Pro Football Focus’s time-to-throw (TTT) metric is always informative, but seldom authoritative. The biggest caveat is that it offers no comment on why the quarterback released the ball when he did. It could be because the play called for a quick pass, the defense blitzed, there was a blown coverage, an overmatched lineman got beaten, the defense played a soft Cover 4, etc.

Against the Keydets, who will be physically overmatched, TTT will give us a sense of the Hokies’ offensive strategy, which should offer clues about the offense’s comparative strengths. For example, lots of quick hitters would indicate that the offensive line still has a long way to go. Similarly, a lot of short drops with a longish TTT could indicate that some combination of scheme and ability is leading to Hokie receivers struggling to gain separation.

2) Count of (non-injury influenced) offensive line snaps by non-starters when Ethan Grunkemeyer is under center

If Matt Moore really believes he has depth along the offensive line, he’ll play some second string guys when Grunk is quarterback. If it’s all starters for the first half, we can safely conclude that the line is still another year (or two) away.

3) Offensive downfield shots taken (and converted)

This metric brings together many moving pieces - pass protection, route running, acceleration and top-end speed, quarterback accuracy and arm strength, and overall offensive scheme. The Hokies will probably run the ball a lot on Saturday, which should result in some wide-open opportunities on play action passes. Even if the Hokies run the expected vanilla scheme, there will probably be one or two deep shots off play action. What will be more telling, though, are the deep pass attempts off straight drop-backs.

4) Offensive line yards allowed by the defense

The result here should be essentially nil versus VMI. Anything over 1.5 yards is cause for concern. And I’m not just talking about from the starters. The average for the entire game should be under 1.5 offensive line yards allowed. If the third-stringers get pushed around late and the average drifts upward, that will tell us that the depth is not there yet. In that case, it will fall to Brent Pry and the defensive coaches to develop the second- and third-string guys during September, before the schedule gets tough.

5) Count of (non-injury influenced) back-up linebacker snaps in the first half

This is the same deal as the offensive line - a position with mostly established starters, but depth questions. There is no reason for the starters to play a lot of snaps against VMI. In fact, the second stringers should log more snaps than the starters. In particular, I want to see Sherrod Covil play meaningful snaps in the first half. He’s switching positions, is a bit undersized for a linebacker, and would generally be someone you hope you don’t have to play. If Pry isn’t confident enough to get him some action in the first half, then the Hokies could be one Kaleb Spenser twisted ankle away from disaster.

Team talent

Twelve of the ACC’s seventeen teams are ranked in the top 50 schools nationwide in the 2026 composite team talent metric. Among those teams, Virginia Tech is fourth (27th overall).

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that Virginia Tech’s most talented players - in terms of original high school ratings, which comprise this metric - are also among its youngest. Put another way, Tech’s starters are numerically less talented than its backups.

Of course, high school ratings are not everything. Development matters. See: Marcellous Hawkins and Kemari Copeland.

Still, when looking at the team as a whole, that pesky fact matters, especially with the glut of teams whose talent rating nearly matches Tech’s:

• 28th - UNC

• 31st - SMU

• 32nd - NC State

• 33rd - Cal

• 34th - Georgia Tech

• 35th - Syracuse

Among the teams on that list, the Hokies play at Cal and SMU, and get Georgia Tech at home.

Tech also plays two ACC teams with higher talent ratings - Miami (12th) and Clemson (16th).

Overall, six out of Virginia Tech’s nine ACC opponents (Stanford sneaks in at 50th) are in the top 50 on Team Talent. Notable among the three that are not is Virginia, which checks in at 53rd, and Pitt, which is 64th.

Here is what all of this means from an expected results perspective:

• Expected record against teams with more talent (0-2)

  • The Hokies travel to both Miami, a likely but not certain loss, and Clemson. The Tigers are trending down and have questions at quarterback, but their schedule sets up nicely in the weeks leading up to their tilt with the Hokies.

• Expected record against teams with similar talent (1-2)

  • Georgia Tech, which lost at home to Colorado 14-13 on Thursday night, is a very winnable game at Lane Stadium. Cal and SMU are both road games, and therefore will be uphill battles

• Expected record against teams with less talent (2-0)

  • UVA looked good in dismantling NC State last week, but quarterback remains a question, and it has been decades since the Cavaliers beat the Hokies twice in a row. Pitt comes to Lane Stadium on a Friday night, which gives Tech a distinct advantage.

• Expected record against teams lacking P4 talent (1-0)

  • Boston College will have home field advantage, so the game may be closer than Hokie fans would prefer, but Tech should nonetheless prevail.

• Expected record against non-conference opponents (3-0)

  • Maryland, ranked 46th in team talent, can and should put up a fight, but James Franklin has a history with the Terrapins, and the Hokies should be very locked in for that game.

Based on team talent, and factoring in where the games are played, fans can reasonably expect the Hokies to finish 8-4 overall, and 5-4 in the ACC. The likelihood of going 7-5 is greater than 9-3. In fact, 9-3 is nearly as likely as 6-6. And if Ethan Grunkemeyer were to get hurt, the Hokies could easily fail to win half their games.

If Tech wins 7 or 8 regular season games, the fanbase should be pretty happy. But just to show how far James Franklin and his staff will still have to go to compete on the national stage, the difference between the most talented team, the Georgia Bulldogs, and the Hokies is 334.55 rating points. That is more than three times the 109.89 rating points that separate Virginia Tech and Boston College, the least talented team in the ACC.

Subscribe now

Share

The reason is simple. Since others own the hot take space, I chose to sit back and observe.

Like everyone else, I want to know what is going on in college football and how it is all going to impact Virginia Tech. How do the Hokies win in this environment? And not just for a season or two. What can the past teach us about how to sustain success long into the future?

To answer these questions I went back and looked at the four teams everyone had pegged as the best in the ACC when the conference expanded in 2004. Not coincidentally, they are the only four schools that have sustained excellence over an entire generation in my lifetime (since 1984).

Part of the utility of such an analysis is comparing teams across years. In order to do that, I settled on the simplest complex metric in existence today. Simple Rating System (SRS) “combines scoring margin and strength of schedule to rate teams. The rating indicates expected margin vs. an average team, adjusting for home field advantage.”

In an attempt to keep the analysis clean, I defined a generation as 17 seasons. In every case except Clemson, those 17 seasons played out over 16 years (the Tigers needed an extra year because SRS data is not available for the Covid season in 2020).

Here is a rundown of the four programs and how they stack up over the best 17-season period in their respective modern histories.

4) Virginia Tech (1994-2010)

• Best Season: 1999, 11-1, National Championship appearance, 24.5 and #3 in SRS

• Historically Elite Seasons (30+ rating): 0

• Peak (Best 5 in a row) Seasons: 1998-2002, 1 top-5 and 4 top-10 SRS

• Average SRS: 15.5

• Median Season: 1995, 10-2, Sugar Bowl Champions, 15.8 and #12 in SRS

What felt like a period of sustained, extended excellence for Virginia Tech could more accurately be described as a period of peaks and valleys during which the floor was high and, in peak years, the ceiling put the Hokies among the nation’s best teams.

A few things stand out with the Hokies during Beamer’s golden era.

First, and befitting a program in which development was paramount, the Hokies tended to build over several seasons toward truly exceptional teams. Only in 1999 and 2000 did the Hokies play at a level commensurate with those competing for a National Championship.

Second, Beamer really did have the Hokies consistently among the top-10 teams in the country. However, they were only a top-5 team in three out of the 17 years.

Even in top-5 years, the Hokies were not truly elite. The Hokies never had an SRS rating above 25, whereas the three other teams on this list all had at least one season with a rating over 30.

Still, consistent excellence was the name of the game. The median season, which was the ninth best, was the 1995 Sugar Bowl championship team.

3) Clemson (2007-2024)

• Best Season: 2018, 15-0, National Champions, 32.7 and #2 SRS

• Historically Elite Seasons (30+ rating): 1

• Peak (Best 5 in a row) Seasons: 2015-2019, 5 top-5 SRS, 2 NCs

• Average SRS: 16.7

• Median Season: 2007, 8-4, Chik-Fil-A Bowl appearance, 14.6 and #14 SRS

Without Clemson’s run of greatness in the second half of the 2010s, the Tigers would not have made this list. But oh that five-year run (arguably six, but there are no data for 2020).

Clemson finished in the top-5 every year from 2015-2019, and the Tigers won two National Championships in the process.

The best season, the undefeated National Championship run in 2018, put the Tigers in the conversation for the best team of the millennium, if not all of college football history. However, even in that amazing year, Clemson still finished with the second best SRS rating. Alabama, the team Clemson destroyed in the National Championship game, still finished the year with a higher rating.

Outside of those five years, Clemson was somewhere between good and very good. The median season, the 2007 team that went 8-3 in the regular season before losing in the Chik-Fil-A bowl. Even though the 2007 team finished #14 in SRS rankings that season, compared to #12 for the Hokies in 1995, there was a big difference between capping the year off with a major win and ending with a loss in an upper-middle tier bowl.

2) Miami (1986-2002)

• Best Season: 2001, 12-0, National Champions, 32.4 and #1 SRS

• Historically Elite Seasons (30+ rating): 1

• Peak (Best 5 in a row) Seasons: 1987-1991, 5 top-5 and 2 best SRS, 3 NCs

• Average SRS: 21.1

• Median Season: 2002, 12-1, NC appearance, 24.4 and #3 SRS

Miami is one of very few programs in the country capable of fielding a team that merits mention among the all-time best.

The 2001 Hurricanes would probably win a vote for team of the decade. The only other contenders would be 2000 Oklahoma, 2004 USC, 2005 Texas, and 2009 Alabama.

The Hokies barely lost to the Hurricanes in 2001 (oh, Ernest Wilford…) and hung with 2004 USC and 2009 Alabama into the fourth quarter.

For my money, that Canes team belongs in the same conversation that includes 2019 LSU among the all-time best college football teams. Sports Illustrated agrees, as the venerable media organization placed the 2001 Hurricanes atop a list of the top 25 teams of the last 25 years. As SI summarized:

The term “loaded” has never applied more accurately to a team than these Hurricanes. Thirty-eight players on the ’01 Canes were drafted by the NFL. They led the nation in scoring defense, allowing just 9.4 points per game, and in takeaways (45). Only one of their 12 wins [Virginia Tech!] was by single digits, and they beat five ranked opponents by an average of 32.8 points. They were so good, rookie head coach Larry Coker just had to keep from screwing it up.

The problem with Miami has never been the heights the team could reach. Rather, the issue has been consistency.

Two factors, above all else, have conspired to make Miami a wildly unpredictable program: cheating (especially paying players long before it was legal) and the coaching carousel.

If you run a Google search for Miami football sanctions hoping to learn about what happened in the mid-1990s, you will find that more refined search criteria are required because of the sanctions following the Nevin Shapiro scandal in 2011.

If Miami could ever get its act together for an extended period of time, the program could become a real juggernaut. But then, Miami would not be Miami without all the semi-legal swagger.

1) Florida St. (1987-2003)

• Best Season: 1987, 11-1, Fiesta Bowl Champions, 30.5 and #1 SRS

• Historically Elite Seasons (30+ rating): 3

• Peak (Best 5 in a row) Seasons: 1996-2000, 5 top-5 and 3 #1 SRS, 1 NC

• Average: 25.0

• Median: 1992, 11-1, Orange Bowl Champions, 24.9 and #1 SRS

In the 1990s, a top-5 finish must have felt like a birth right for Florida St. fans. In the modern era, only Nick Saban’s Alabama teams are comparable. Not until 2001 was there finally a drop off in FSU’s level of play.

During their run of greatness, the Seminoles’ average team was better than the 1999 Hokies. However, the only time during this run that FSU produced an undefeated national champion was in 1999 - the Chris Weinke/Peter Warrick team that came back to win the Sugar Bowl over the Michael Vick-led Hokies.

The one annual slip-up almost came to be expected, but beating the ‘Noles always required the opponent to be either great themselves (think Steve Spurrier’s Florida teams) or really good and play the game of their collective life (think 1995 Virginia).

In many ways, Bowden and Beamer followed the same formula. Florida St. pushed the boundaries a bit more with regard to NCAA rules, but the general blueprint was the same, especially when it came to staff stability.

The run of greatness ended following the 2000 season. After FSU’s 13-2 loss to Oklahoma in the National Championship game, Mark Richt left to become Georgia’s head coach. He was succeeded by Bobby Bowden’s son, Jeff, who proved to be a major downgrade.

In addition, in 2001, the Seminoles started redshirt-freshman Chris Rix who was not ready to play at a championship level. Those two factors were the primary drivers of the decline in the team’s on-field performance.

Final thoughts

Three of the teams featured in this article - Virginia Tech, Clemson, and Florida St. - were led by current or future Hall of Fame coaches. Miami had a coaching carousel, but the Hurricanes were at their best under Jimmy Johnson and Dennis Erickson, both Hall of Famers.

This commonality is important for understanding the critical drivers to sustained success in college football - it all starts with great coaching.

Subscribe now

Share

But on gameday morning, have I indeed lived to see that day?

It’s debatable.

Virginia is a good team with no obvious holes on the roster. Virginia Tech is a misaligned, broken team with a few very good pieces, but also some glaring holes.

Still, the question remains, are the Wahoos really that much better than the Hokies?

In the age of mega-conferences and unbalanced schedules, it’s not such an easy question to answer.

In an attempt to bring some quantitative rigor to bear, I modified the college basketball quadrant system, adapting it for college football.

In basketball, there is no FCS. All 350+ teams in Division 1 are grouped together.

Since there are less than 140 FBS teams, the ranking windows for the quadrants had to be compressed.

And speaking of rankings, there is no NET for college football, so I used SP+, which is the closest advanced metric.

Here is where I drew the lines for the quadrants:

The Hokies did not play the world’s toughest schedule in 2025, but their opponents ended up having much better seasons than many would have guessed back in August.

UVA will be Tech’s ninth bowl bound opponent. If Florida St. beats Florida, the Seminoles will become the tenth bowl eligible opponent.

Only South Carolina and FCS Wofford will join the Hokies in staying home for the holidays.

Tech’s average opponent this year has a 7-4 record and is ranked #43 in SP+.

Overall, the Hokies have played a lot of good to very good teams. Outside of Wofford, there were no games that any team, much less this Virginia Tech team, could just sleepwalk through and expect to win.

Virginia’s schedule is another story altogether.

The Cavaliers have played six bowl eligible teams, four of which are 6-5. Two other teams, Florida St. and Washington St., are 5-6 and could punch their ticket to a minor bowl with a win on Saturday.

The average UVA opponent is 6-5 and ranked 71st in SP+.

Here is a comparison of the two teams’ resumes:

If the Hokies had played the Cavaliers’ schedule - replace Virginia Tech’s Quad 1 game and two Quad 2 games with Quad 4 games - it is very likely that they would be at least 6-5. Brent Pry would likely still be Hokies’ coach.

Don’t believe me? Let’s review the first four games on UVA’s schedule

1. vs. Coastal Caroline (6-5, #112 in SP+)

2. at NC State (6-5, #66)

3. vs. William & Mary (FCS)

4. vs. Stanford (4-7, #107)

Against that schedule, the Hokies would have likely entered the week 5 matchup against Florida St. with a 4-0 record. And the Wahoos got the Seminoles at home.

Brent Pry would not have been fired, so opt outs wouldn’t have hurt the team’s depth.

Under that hypothetical, there is little chance the Hokies would have been forced to start two true freshmen against UVA.

But the schedule is what it is, and it has played out very well for UVA. The Hoos even had an extra week to prepare for the Hokies.

And that could be decisive, because in ELO terms, the Hokies (1409 ELO) look more like a marginal 5-7 team than one about to finish 3-9, while UVA (1604 ELO) is closer to 7-5 than 10-2.

When Virginia Tech is on offense

The Hokies need to finish promising drives with touchdowns, period.

Since Tech has gone all in on the run game, the offense has moved the ball alright between the twenties, but everything bogs down in the redzone.

Kyron Drones can give the Hokies a man advantage in the run game, but the wide receivers, three of whom are on the field for almost every play, are practically invisible.

And has anyone else noticed Benji Gosnell’s disappearing act this year? After catching 32 passes for 341 yards last year, Gosnell has just 12 receptions for 86 yards this year.

At 6’5”. 254 lbs., he would seem as good a target as the Hokies have in the redzone. With Ayden Greene questionable due to injury, perhaps Gosnell gets a few more targets today than has been the norm of late.

Those targets might come by default. The Hokies are so thin at receiver that Greene’s health might force Philip Montgomery to run more plays out of two-tight end formations.

UVA’s rush defense is ok, but the team really excels against the pass. As teams have done of late, it seems likely the Cavaliers will aim to shut down the pass, get a lead, then force the Hokies to try to throw the ball in order to come back.

Statistically speaking, the two biggest concerns are field position (UVA’s opponents start each drive, on average, at the 26-yard line) and staying ahead of the sticks (the Hoos allow a success rate under 38%).

Overall, there is no reason to think the Hokies will score more than 20 points at Scott Stadium.

When Virginia Tech is on defense

Virginia is pretty pedestrian on offense. Their EPA numbers are indicative of a team with higher explosiveness and success numbers than the Cavaliers have achieved on the field, so there is a bit of a disconnect, perhaps due to biased sampling (see: schedule = easy).

Virginia Tech’s opponents have been able to nickel-and-dime the defense, methodically driving the length of the field without the aid of a big play. In theory, Virginia could do this too, but that success rate, which at 42.5% unadjusted is actually lower than Virginia Tech’s, suggests that consistency could be an issue.

Translation: bend-but-don’t-break might be a more successful defensive philosophy this week for the Hokies than it was against FSU and Miami.

Winning the game will require a Herculean effort by the defensive line and no stupid late hit penalties (I’m looking at you, Ben Bell).

Tech’s back-seven is at a moderate disadvantage in terms of skill, track record, and experience. The scheme will be vanilla because that is all the freshmen can handle. Tackles will be missed, gap fills will be late, and receivers will get lost in zone coverage.

If the big boys can win in the trenches, it will largely negate all these disadvantages. However, if PFF is any indication, the Wahoo’s have as strong an offensive line as Tech does a defensive line.

Final thoughts

Speaking of PFF and holes in the line-up, consider the number of players on each side of the ball who have played more than 150 snaps and graded out lower than 60 (the PFF baseline):

• Offense

  • Virginia Tech - 8 (5 of who are linemen)

  • Virginia - 3

• Defense

  • Virginia Tech 3 (Jojo Crim just misses the cut at 149 snaps)

  • Virginia - 0

If ever there was a telling stat, it’s that count above: 11 total players for Virginia Tech have played 150+ snaps and graded out below 60. Virginia only has three such players.

Philip Montgomery will have the Hokies ready to play, and they will indeed play very hard.

However, Virginia is a better team with better players, playing at home at night, and with an extra week to prepare.

The deck is rather stacked against the Hokies, even if the Wahoos aren’t really as good as their record suggests.

Subscribe now

Share

Kyron Drones did not come to Virginia Tech to go 3-9 and cash checks. If that were the case, he would not play half as hard as he does.

No, the guys getting set to run out of the tunnel one last time to “Enter Sandman” came to Blacksburg for the right reasons and have made this Virginia Tech alum proud.

Has it always been pretty on the field? No, obviously not. But the problems in the football program are so much bigger than any of these individuals, or their coaches for that matter.

The misaligned Hokies have two games remaining, each against much more aligned opponents.

The Hokies-in-waiting have a lot to be excited about as the James Franklin era begins, but the question for today and the coming week centers on how smooth the overlap is in regimes, and can one play off the other.

Miami should steamroll Tech

There is no point in beating around the bush. Miami is an elite team that has posted very good results. The Hurricanes, currently sporting an ELO rating of 1914, are by far the best team Virginia Tech will play this year.

The disparity - more than 500 ELO points separate the two teams - is shocking.

Based on ELO alone, there is no reason to think the Hokies can even make this a game.

Advanced statistics tell the same story.

Miami is better at every position and in every facet of the game, save for placekicker.

So, why bother watching the game. If you have tickets, why attend?

For one, if you can go to the game, go. And be really loud for four quarters. I don’t care if Tech is trailing 55-3 midway through the third quarter. Stay, be loud, and be engaged.

Send a message to the players, recruits, and the incoming staff that the fanbase is as committed as the Board of Visitors now appears.

If you can’t go to the game, watch it on ESPN. Every set of eyeballs helps, financially speaking.

The real reason to watch, though, is to understand the why behind the coming player personnel moves. Players will cycle out, and new guys - many with different skill sets - will fill the vacant roster spots.

There will probably be some surprises, both coming and going. As a fanbase, it’s easier to get behind new players and coaches if you have already critically noted how individuals who arrived in Blacksburg pre-Franklin perform on the field and are likely to adapt to the new leadership and on-field systems.

Thoughts on the Franklin hire

For all the handwringing about his in-game coaching issues, Brent Pry failed as head coach because he couldn’t recruit good enough players.

The root cause of the recruiting challenges were deeper issues within the football program, driven by forces within the university and beyond, up to and including state government and demographic changes.

When prompted earlier in the week, Franklin said one thing that really set Virginia Tech apart from the other schools contacting him was that Tech’s search committee had a plan for the program. It did not just come to him and ask what he needed.

The fact that such a plan exists is good. The negotiation with Franklin has no doubt made it better.

The reality, though, is that the plan was unlikely to come to fruition without a Hall of Fame caliber coach who could hold everyone accountable.

James Franklin and Philip Montgomery could appeal to the school for the same capital expenditure - say, for a new football building with increased office space - but only Franklin has the cache to actually drive the project to completion.

Montgomery has shown himself to be an excellent football coach, guiding the Hokies to some unexpected wins and carrying himself with class.

Somehow, he has motivated the players to give outstanding effort, and when there have been issues behind the scenes, he has quietly dealt with them.

There has been no public drama.

That said, Monty, like Franklin, needs the right situation in order to be successful.

Franklin is a builder. Monty is an optimizer.

The school that lands Montgomery this offseason should consider itself extremely fortunate. I’m sure Whit Babcock will provide a glowing reference.

In the meantime, if Montgomery somehow leads the Hokies to an improbable victory over Miami, and in the process infuses even more excitement into Franklin’s visiting recruits, then he should be carried off the field.

Even keeping the final score within two touchdowns should merit a pat on the back and (quiet) congratulations in post-game interviews.

Subscribe now

Share

To reach 7-5, however, FSU will need to win its final three games, two of which are on the road.

The Seminoles will probably be favored in all three games, but is it really likely that they win all three?

Breaking down their record, the 'Noles are an all-or-nothing sort of team:

• One-score games: 0-4

• Two touchdown games: 1-1

• Three or more touchdown game: 3-0

The line on Saturday night’s game is an even 14.0 points, so that means the Hokies have a 50% chance of winning the game, right?

Actually, yeah, they kinda do.

Framing this matchup in terms of offensive and defensive matchups is a fool’s game.

I promise you, on paper Florida St. entered its games with Stanford and UVA looking stronger in almost every statistical category.

FSU lost both games.

Likewise, did anyone really see Mike Norvell’s team not only upsetting, but dominating Alabama back in week 1?

In order to present as rich a picture as possible, first I’ll tackle the advanced stats, then I’ll break down the two versions of Florida St. that could face Virginia Tech.

The sum of Florida State’s parts

If we throw the 2025 Seminoles in a blender, what comes out, in smoothie form, is a team that should beat Virginia Tech by around 10 points.

In ELO terms, a 1500 rating roughly corresponds to a 6-6 power conference team. Every additional 100 rating points add a win and subtract a loss. So, just looking at ELO, Florida St. is roughly a 7-5 level team, while the Hokies are a 5-7 level team.

Team-level advanced stats tell a similar story - the Seminoles are better in almost every category.

The only advanced stat in the above chart that tilts in the Hokies’ direction is EPA on rushing plays when Virginia Tech has the ball.

Otherwise, the chart screams, “'Noles, comfortably.”

But none of the above numbers represent who the Seminoles are as a football team midway through November.

A host of transfers and a new offense took the first few opponents by surprise (mainly Alabama - the other two were patsies). However, once tape got out showing what this team does and does not do well, the results flip-flopped.

Normalizing results

The out of conference games seem like eons ago for both teams. Florida St. (3-0) was unstoppable, and Virginia Tech was unmovable (0-3).

In conference play, it has been a different story:

• Virginia Tech: 2-3, 24.8 ppg scored, 29.6 ppg allowed

• Florida State: 1-5, 26.0 ppg scored, 26.5 ppg allowed

Those results are much more even, but Florida State’s scoring is skewed by its win over Wake Forest (42-7). In fact, many of FSU’s one score losses were not as close as the final score made them appear.

With that in mind, here is a break down of the score through three quarters in conference games for each team:

• Virginia Tech

  • at NC State: winning 20-14 (won 23-21)

  • vs Wake Forest: losing 23-27 (lost 23-30)

  • at Georgia Tech: losing 14-28 (lost 20-35)

  • vs California: tied 20-20 (won 42-34 in OT)

  • vs Louisville: losing 16-21 (lost 16-28)

On average, the Hokies have scored 18.6 ppg in the first three quarters of their ACC games while allowing 22.0 ppg during those same three quarters.

Virginia Tech, -3.4 points through three quarters, tends to fade in the fourth quarter.

It has been a different story with the Seminoles:

• Florida State

  • at Virginia: tied 28-28 (lost 38-46 in OT)

  • vs Miami: losing 3-28 (lost 22-28)

  • vs Pittsburgh: winning 24-21 (lost 31-34)

  • at Stanford: losing 10-20 (lost 13-20)

  • vs Wake Forest: winning 28-0 (won 42-7)

  • at Clemson: losing 7-21 (lost 10-24)

In conference play, FSU is scoring 16.7 ppg through the first three quarters and allowing 19.7 ppg.

Like Virginia Tech, Florida St. has, on average, entered the fourth quarter of conference games trailing by a field goal. Unlike the Hokies, the Seminoles have rallied in the fourth quarter of their games.

If we throw out each team’s best result after three quarters, NC State for the Hokies and Wake Forest for the Seminoles, then we find the Hokies trailing on average by 5.8 points entering the fourth quarter and FSU losing by 9.2 points.

All of this is to say that in conference games, both teams’ stats are skewed by the fourth quarter. This period has hurt Tech’s numbers and helped FSU’s.

Virginia Tech was off last week, whereas Florida St. lost a tough game at Clemson.

Unless FSU breaks open the game early, there is a good chance the Hokies will begin the fourth quarter with a lead. At that point, the question will be, can the Hokies hold off a Seminole comeback bid?

Thoughts on the James Franklin situation

Numerous outlets this week have reported that Virginia Tech has met every demand James Franklin has made regarding the possibility of him becoming the next head coach in Blacksburg.

While that appears to be a good thing, it has me rather concerned. The search committee appears content to let the next coach determine the front office structure within the football program, which I think would be a massive mistake.

Franklin knows what has worked for him at Vanderbilt and Penn St. Virginia Tech in 2025 is rather different from both of Franklin’s previous stops.

That the Virginia Tech brass would let Franklin essentially draw the org chart within the program suggests to me that the committee knows neither what is wrong with Tech’s current setup, nor what should be done to fix it.

The savior model of coach appears to be on its way out. Virginia Tech could position itself for lasting success if it structured the front office, scouting, and development parts of the program - the permanent roles - independent of the next coach. The coach really should only be in charge of on-field decision making and its antecedents (i.e., hiring the coaching staff).

Once again, the Hokies appear to be one era behind college football’s leaders.

Will it cost them?

I’m afraid it might.

Subscribe now

Share

This week James Franklin was the name du jour.

Perhaps next week the Louisiana governor will take a break from micromanaging the LSU athletic department in order to advise Virginia Tech’s search committee on who should wear the big whistle next year in Blacksburg.

Brian Kelly, anyone?

At this point, all the noise is pure comedy.

Let’s focus on the here and now.

After the Hokies beat Wofford, I wrote the following:

No one has more on the line than Philip Montgomery. A 6-2 conference record (obviously very unlikely) would make him Virginia Tech’s coach in 2026. Even five wins might be good enough to get that interim tag removed.

Four wins would get him a P4 coordinator job or a shot at a G5 head coaching opportunity.

Two to three wins would give him a shot at a G5 coordinator gig.

Anything less, and he’s probably done coaching college football.

The Hokies are 2-2 in the ACC, and 3-2 overall under Montgomery. He will be coaching college football next year if that is what he wants to do.

However, with dominoes not following (Matt Rhule, Curt Cignetti, and Rhett Lashlee have all recently signed contract extensions at their current schools), the list of coaches under consideration for open head coaching positions has shrunken.

Depending on who you ask, the Virginia Tech job is somewhere between #4 and #6 in terms of desirability among programs with openings, with the potential to fall further if the Florida St. and/or Auburn jobs come open.

All of this begs the question - is the sixth best available coach an upgrade over the current (interim) coach?

In his six weeks at the helm, Montgomery has:

• deftly and discreetly separated the players who did not belong in Blacksburg from those that do

• won two one-score games, twice as many as Brent Pry managed in three-plus years

• earned the appreciation of a fan base that was staring down a 1-11 season after Pry’s dismissal

And let us not forget that Monty won ten games in 2016 at Tulsa, and he took the Golden Hurricane to four bowl games during his eight-year tenure as head coach.

That experience should be good preparation for the slate of games Tech will play in November. The most favorable matchup, on paper anyway, is at Florida St., so if Montgomery wants to be the full-time head coach in Blacksburg, he’s going to have to earn it.

A win over a top-20 Louisville team in Lane Stadium would definitely help the cause, but it will not be easy.

In terms of both ELO (-308 points) and the spread (+11.5), Tech is a major home underdog.

While last week’s win over Cal was fun, it was not unexpected (Tech was favored according to ELO and the spread). Beating Louisville would be an attention getter.

When Virginia Tech has the ball

Louisville (6-1, 3-1) features an elite defense that nonetheless allows opposing teams to score a surprising number of points.

The players in Louisville’s regular defensive rotation who have the lowest PFF grades on the season are on par with Kemari Copeland and Cody Huisman, Virginia Tech’s two highest graded defenders.

The Cardinals are especially stacked at Edge. If allowed to pin their ears back, those guys will embarrass Tech’s tackles.

Expect Montgomery to frequently leave them unblocked and attempt to option them into oblivion. If Monty and Drones can keep those Edges guessing, it will give Johnny Garrett and Aidan Lynch a fighting chance.

Louisville is very stingy against the run. However, one could credibly argue that the Hokies feature the best rushing attack that Louisville will face all season.

If Louisville commits an extra hat to the box, Tech will need its receivers to make plays on the outside.

Donovan Greene has been very quiet in recent weeks. He is due to break out of this recent funk and play a good game.

Benji Gosnell is another guy who has been rather quiet. Keeping a defense off balance requires the offense to break tendencies. For that reason, Gosnell is another player worth keeping an eye on.

Louisville knows the Hokies want to run the ball. The extent to which Tech will be successful in that endeavor depends on how far variety, misdirection, and play action will go toward equaling the talent/experience disparities that, in terms of 1-on-1 matchups, favor Louisville.

When Virginia Tech is on defense

The good news is that Louisville’s offense is not particularly dynamic. In fact, Virginia Tech’s offense has a higher EPA/play in both rushing and passing.

One stat that really stands out is stuff rate allowed, which is an astonishingly high 25.5% for Louisville.

Three of Louisville’s starting offensive linemen grade out below the baseline of 60, according to PFF. Whichever Virginia Tech tackle lines up opposite Louisville Guard Jordan Church is likely to have a big day. Church struggles mightily in pass blocking (41.7) and is below average in run blocking (57.8).

In fact, Louisville’s offense reminds me of South Carolina’s, except quarterback Miller Moss is not mobile and the Cardinal running backs are better.

Tech’s defensive line alone should keep the Hokies in this game.

The Hokies are likely to blitz a fair amount on passing downs, as the Louisville running backs, Isaac Brown (21.8) and Keyjuan Brown (18.1), are absolutely atrocious in pass blocking. The path of least resistance is running right through these backs.

Chris Bell, Louisville’s highest graded player on offense, is an excellent wide receiver. He is also a willing and able run blocker. However, none of the other pass catchers really jump off the page. That opens the possibility of the Hokies employing bracket coverage on Bell.

Overall, the Louisville offense is a pretty good matchup for Tech’s defense.

One key stat that could decide the game is average starting field position. Here, the Cardinals have a 5.4 yard advantage over the Hokies.

Final thoughts

Louisville’s ELO aligns with a 9-3 regular season, which suggests the Cardinals will go 3-2 in November.

That would mean Louisville is fixing to get upset because they should be favored in every game left on their schedule. The team’s toughest tests in its last four games are at home against Clemson and on the road at SMU.

In that context, a loss in Blacksburg looks as likely as anywhere else.

Virginia Tech is rightly the underdog, but this matchup is much closer than it has been portrayed all week.

Louisville’s gaudy rushing numbers do not align with their mediocre-at-best offensive line and average quarterback play.

Likewise, the defense’s impressive PFF numbers mask a surprising number of points allowed.

In four ACC games, Virginia Tech has allowed an average 30 points per game. Louisville has allowed an average of 26.

In regulation Louisville has allowed between 21 and 27 points to every ACC opponent.

Louisville’s 3-1 conference record is entirely driven by turnovers. In the three wins, the Cardinals forced a combined 12 turnovers, or 4 per game.

In the lone defeat, in overtime to UVA, they generated zero turnovers.

For Virginia Tech, there is no need to force anything on offense. Three runs and a punt is fine.

Louisville is squeaking out wins on the basis of their attacking defense forcing opposing offenses to make grievous mistakes.

The Hokies can score 24 points and win this game if they stay patient and avoid turning the ball over.

But if they give the ball away twice in the first half? Forget about it.

Subscribe now

Share

Surprisingly, though, when we dig into the advanced stats and layer in the caveats, the -6.5 point line makes perfect sense.

The Hokies, despite their record, enter the game with an ELO advantage of 11 points. ELO is all about the results of each game and the quality of the opponent at the time.

Although Tech has lost five games already this season, only the Wake Forest loss was particularly bad in ELO terms. The Hokies really should have won that game. It took an incredible amount of bone-headed, drive-extending penalties to lose it.

Contrast that with Cal, whose best win was over Minnesota and whose losses include a shocking 34-0 defeat at the hands of mighty San Diego State University and a 45-21 drubbing by Duke. Both of these games were played in the state of California, so traveling to the East Coast was not an issue.

However, travel will be an issue Friday night.

Cal, working on a slightly shortened week, is coming off a 21-18 win over lowly North Carolina. This will be the second cross-country trip for the Golden Bears, who defeated Boston College in Chestnut Hill 28-24 a few weeks back.

Boston College is horrendous.

Throw in an extra week of prep for the Hokies, including some presumed healing among the myriad injured players, and one does not need to squint to see why Tech is favored to win the game.

But win by nearly a touchdown? If you think that seems a bit much, read on. The Hokies have some favorable matchups in this game.

When Virginia Tech has the ball

Cal’s defense has been pretty good this season, Even in the blowout loss to SDSU, the Bears only allowed 321 yards.

In the two games Cal has lost, the opposing quarterback was very efficient:

• Jayden Denegal (SDSU): 15/18, 186 yards, 1 TD, 0 INT

• Darien Mensah (Duke): 22/30, 265 yards, 2 TD, 0 INT

In contrast, Cal’s freshman quarterback, Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, threw only one touchdown opposite five interceptions in those two games.

If Kyron Drones is efficient and does not give the ball away, the Hokies should win the game.

Cal has been pretty good against the run, but again, the bears have not faced strong competition.

The most telling stat is the 14.6% stuff rate the Cal defense has put up this year. This is not a team that plays in the backfield.

Translation: the Tech offensive line, with its 18.3% stuff rate allowed, actually stands a chance.

BC and UNC combined to average 21 points scored in their losses to Cal. Playing at home at night with an extra week to prepare, the Hokies should be good for at least 24 points, if not 28.

When Cal has the ball

The Golden Bears do not have a good offense. Their overall EPA/play is 62.5% that of Virginia Tech’s offense. And Virginia Tech’s offense is…limited.

Cal struggles mightily to run the ball (0.00 EPA/run). Tech’s defense has been terrible against the run (0.51 EPA/run allowed). Something has to give.

Don’t expect the Tech defense to totally shut down the run, but Cal will have to throw to win, and that will be tough.

Cal’s EPA/pass matches that of Virginia Tech’s offense at 0.18. Can you imagine the Hokies having to throw to win?

They’d lose!

It is no surprise that with such a bad running game Cal struggles to stay on schedule (40.5% success rate). Here, they will encounter a pliable Tech defense (45.1% success rate allowed), but considering that Bears allow a 19.4% stuff rate and their quarterback has struggled of late, it is hard to imagine them going up and down the field on Tech.

And should Cal move the ball some, they still have not demonstrated an ability to finish drives with touchdowns. On the year, the Bears are averaging 3.63 points per trip inside the opponents’ 40-yard line.

Once again, that is an unadjusted advanced stat accumulated against a very weak schedule.

Final thoughts

Ok, so the line makes sense. Does it mean anything?

The Hokies have been chronically overrated dating back to…the Fuente era? Longer?

If nothing else, this should be a good game. Nothing in the numbers suggests a blowout in either direction.

Tech has a really good chance to pick up a third win, which would give everyone around the program some hope entering November, when the schedule toughens up.

Not to say that the schedule has been easy. South Carolina’s regression was predictable, but Vanderbilt is legit (that week 2 loss doesn’t look as bad anymore). The rest of Tech’s opponents have been between decent (ODU and NC State) and excellent (Georgia Tech).

This Tech team has been through a lot in the last two months. The Hokies are both battle hardened and well rested. And this game has been penciled in as a win since before the season started.

If not now, when?

Subscribe now

Share

Don’t get me wrong, 13th ranked Georgia Tech is favored by 13.5 points for a reason.

Nominally, one would give weight to the fact that Georgia Tech is the home team and had an extra week to prepare for the Hokies.

However, at 2-4 and led by an interim coach, the 2025 Hokies are not the sort of team that motivates its opponents to dial in.

If anything, all that time off before hosting a lackluster opponent would suggest that perhaps Georgia Tech might come out lethargic.

Psychology aside, Georgia Tech is in the middle of a long run of soft games. Duke is the only half decent team that the Yellow Jackets will play between now and the finale against Georgia.

But, the question at hand is, do the not-quite-half-decent Hokies stand a chance of pulling the upset?

Surprisingly, yes.

Undefeated record and top 15 ranking aside, Georgia Tech hasn’t really played anyone. Their best win was over three loss-Clemson.

As a result, the Yellow Jackets enter the game with a 1568 ELO, which is on par with a seven-win team playing an average P4 schedule.

When Virginia Tech has the ball

The Hokies will probably struggle to move the ball against a stout Georgia Tech defense.

The Yellow Jackets are equally strong against the run and the pass, they do not give up explosive plays, and they allow a low success rate.

Combined with Virginia Tech’s below average offensive firepower, a reasonable expectation would be two to three Virginia Tech turnovers.

The key to scoring points will be field position, and there again the Yellow Jackets are the better team, by nearly two yards in average starting position.

The one advantage the Hokies offense has is average points on opportunities inside the opponents’ 40-yard line, where Virginia Tech is nearly one point better than Georgia Tech.

The Hokies are averaging 21.9 points per game on 5.2 drives that cross the opposing 40. Meanwhile Georgia Tech allows an average of 14.2 points per game on 4.6 such drives.

In football terms, the Hokies are scoring two touchdowns and kicking three field goals per game when they enter the scoring zone.

Even if they trade one of those touchdowns for a fourth field goal, it is imperative that the Hokies score every time they cross the Yellow Jacket 40.

When Georgia Tech has the ball

Georgia Tech is known for its ability to run the ball, but what gets talked about less is how the run game sets up the pass.

The Yellow Jackets enter the game with a 0.35 EPA per passing play, twice that of the Hokies.

It is hard to imagine the Hokies shutting down that passing attack, especially since the porous Hokie run defense will probably require reinforcements (e.g., an eight-man box).

The Georgia Tech offense is not explosive, but it does a great job of staying on schedule, thanks in part to a low stuff rate. The Yellow Jackets generally move in one direction - forward.

Expect Sam Siefkes to apply pressure on first down to try to get the Georgia Tech offense behind the sticks. All of Georgia Tech’s offensive advantages evaporate if the Hokies can get them into second and long consistently.

Action inside the Hokie 40-yard line will also be key. Georgia Tech is averaging 20.2 points per game on six trips inside their opponents scoring zone. Here, the Yellow Jackets are less efficient than the Hokies.

The trouble is that the Hokies defense is allowing 24.5 points per game on 5.2 trips inside its 40-yard line.

Combining these numbers with the numbers presented earlier when Virginia Tech has the ball, the expectation is that Georgia Tech will outscore the Hokies 22-17 on trips inside the forty.

Given that offensive explosiveness is nearly equal for the two offenses, but the Virginia Tech defense allows more explosive plays, the Hokies will need to either stiffen up on defense when Georgia Tech gets in the scoring zone, or do better at limiting explosive plays.

Of course, the Virginia Tech defense’s numbers are weighed down by the terrible performances against Vanderbilt and Old Dominion. The Hokies have been better since then, but those games still count.

Final thoughts

PFF grades point to a few favorable matchups for the Hokies.

Georgia Tech is a very average run blocking team (60.3), and the Virginia Tech defense actually grades out well against the run (84.2).

Additionally, the Yellow Jacket defense is not particularly strong in the areas where the Virginia Tech is weak:

• VT has been horrible in pass blocking (46.7), but the GT pass rush is just alright (65.3)

• GT is not a great tackling team (60.7), and for all the talk the GT run game gets, VT’s rushing offense actually has graded out better (82.3 vs. 78.9)

Virginia Tech does have a chance to pull the upset.

Pay close attention to the first two times each offense crosses the opposing 40-yard line. In order to win the game, Virginia Tech probably needs to net a five to seven point advantage in this metric.

If the Hokies can get touchdowns on both trips and limit Georgia Tech to field goals, good things could be in store.

Anything less will likely end in defeat.

Phillip Montgomery remains five victories away from becoming Virginia Tech’s full-time head coach, and there are only six games remaining in the regular season.

Subscribe now

Share

Forty carries for 200+ yards is very possible, and would probably result in a Virginia Tech win.

I took a screenshot of the moment when the Hokies hit 200 yards on the ground. Turns out, they did in half the carries, thanks in large part to Terion Stewart’s 85-yard run.

As good as home cooking tastes, the Hokies are likely to encounter a much stiffer Wake Forest defense this week. On the flip side, the Wake offense does not pack nearly as much offensive punch.

When Virginia Tech has the ball

Wake Forest’s defense is much better than NC State’s.

The Demon Deacons are excellent against the pass and solid against the run.

It is very possible that Wake will stack the box, similar to what the Wolfpack did last week, and trust its secondary to hold up on the outside. Given Tech’s youth along the offensive line, that would probably be a sound strategy.

Regardless of what the defense does, look for Tech to try to establish the run with the one-two punch of Stewart and Marcellous Hawkins. We have yet to see the Hokies give either back significant carries in a game, much less both in the same game.

Wake’s defensive numbers suggest that the best strategy for Tech’s offense this week is to give the ball to their stocky running backs and pound away on the defense for four quarters. The hope would be that the defense wears down as the game goes on.

An ideal breakdown of designed runs would be the following:

• Hawkins: 18 carries

• Stewart: 15 carries

• Drones: 8 designed carries

Stewart played a great game last week, but some of the pain he dishes out via his love of contact does reflect back on him. If he’s going to make it through the rest of the season, the Hokies really need to limit his touches. Fifteen carries is a logical maximum for one game.

Hawkins offers much more in the passing game and has demonstrated better durability. so he should get more snaps and more carries.

The two running backs are the highest graders on the Tech offense through five games:

• Stewart: 79.5 offense, 41.9 pass, 87.1 run

• Hawkins: 76.9 offense, 66.2 pass, 77.9 run

Wake does have a very high defensive stuff rate (27.6%), so it will be important for Tech’s line to get a good push up front.

Finally, Wake is very good at limiting opponents to field goal attempts once they get inside the 40-yard line. John Love will likely attempt three or four field goals, but it is important that the Hokies also score some touchdowns.

When Virginia Tech is on defense

Wake Forest appears weakest up front on offense. The Deacons allow a stuff (2 yards or less) on 25.2% of their runs.

Meanwhile, six out Virginia Tech’s seven highest graders on defense play along the defensive line.

As of Saturday morning, Wake quarterback Robby Ashford and running back Demond Claiborne are both listed as probable. However, they will not be 100%.

Claiborne is very hit or miss. At first blush, his stats look pretty gaudy (8.0 yards per carry jumps off the screen). However, he put up more than half of his total yards on Western Carolina.

He did play well against Georgia Tech last week, though, running for over 100 yards on 21 carries.

Ashford has thrown for at least 200 yards in every game this season, but his completion rate is under 60%, and he has only thrown one touchdown opposite three interceptions.

Ashford is a capable runner when healthy, so keep an eye on his mobility early in the game.

Wake Forest has only played two P4 teams this year, which makes their 37.0% success rate worse than it appears. And it looks none-too-good.

Overall, if the Tech defense of weeks 1, 4, and 5 shows up today inside Lane Stadium. then Wake Forest should struggle to move the ball consistently. In that case, twenty points allowed looks like a reasonable ceiling.

X-factors

Wake has lost two games in a row and is coming off a gut-wrenching, referee-assisted, overtime defeat at the hands of Georgia Tech.

The Deacons had sixteen days to prepare for that game and led by two touchdowns in the fourth quarter.

With their best offensive players battling injuries and the team trying to right itself after such a grueling loss, it is an open question just how much fight the Demon Deacons will bring to Blacksburg.

If Tech can wear Wake down, how soon will doubt creep in?

Meanwhile, the Hokies are in the exact opposite position. After losing their first three games, Tech has won two straight and is getting healthy just as conference play ramps up.

The Hokies have performed miserably at home this year, a trend unlikely to continue.

Philip Montgomery needs five more wins to become Virginia Tech’s full-time head coach, and these are the sorts of games Brent Pry always won by a million points.

Monty isn’t Pry, which is generally a good thing. In this instance, though, the result will probably be a more workmanlike, grind it out sort of game that the Hokies stand a great chance of winning.

Subscribe now

Share

By that time, the Hokies, as well as most other college football teams, have played at least one good team, one bad team, and one mediocre team.

There are also at least 200 snaps that have been played on both offense and defense, which provides some statistical power to back up the story the numbers tell.

This season is different, or is it?

On the one hand, the Hokies that play on Saturday night at NC State have not played a football game this season, not as a post-Brent Pry, post opt-out team.

On the other hand, was Pry’s impact on gameday really that great? Is losing the players that have departed really that much different than when players get injured?

The optimistic case is the following:

• The offensive line appears to be getting healthier, and it was injuries upfront that originally set the tailspin in motion

• Losing uncommitted players is addition by subtraction

• Philip Montgomery is a better head coach than Brent Pry, especially on game day

The pessimistic case says:

• The defense is getting Covid-era thin at some positions (think 2020 North Carolina game at Edge and linebacker)

• If the players are half as dejected as the fans, the fight they put up from here on out will be minimal

• This team wasn’t even that good to begin with

Perhaps some numbers can help make sense of what is likely to transpire tonight at Carter-Finley Stadium in Raleigh.

When the Hokies have the ball

First off, these teams are closer in terms of on-field potential than one might expect based on their records. NC State enters with an ELO of 1494, putting them just slightly below average in FBS. The Hokies, meanwhile, carry a 1449 ELO.

Translation: NC State is better, but maybe by a field goal on a neutral field, if you average out 10 such results. At home at night, the Wolfpack are probably about a touchdown better than the Hokies.

But that is all in the aggregate, and it considers hypothetical matchups in which the present remains the present throughout the entire game, i.e., nobody gets hurt and nobody emerges as a major factor.

NC State’s defense appears poised to make Tech’s offense look good, on the ground at least.

The Wolfpack are decent enough defending the pass to hold Kyron Drones to an average performance. Think something in the neighborhood of 60% completion, 200 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT.

Those yards, however, are likely to come on big, chunk plays. With the Hokies playing on the road against a team that struggles to stop the run, expect to see a healthy dose of Tech’s stable of running backs.

Forty carries for 200+ yards is very possible, and would probably result in a Virginia Tech win.

Here’s something else to keep in mind. As anemic as Tech’s offense has looked at times, the Hokies actually score more points on average when they cross the opponent’s 40 yard-line than NC State does.

The Hokies are also successful on 46% of their offensive plays, which is two percentage points better than the Wolfpack.

Where Virginia Tech has struggled is the lack of explosiveness on offense, and that is precisely what NC State’s defense appears set to rectify.

When NC State has the ball

As a team, NC State does not run the ball very well. An EPA/play of 0.07 on runs isn’t awful, but it’s not that much better than Tech’s 0.05.

If Sam Siefkes can successfully scheme against Hollywood Smothers (e.g., make Bailey keep the ball on options, stack the box, etc.), the Hokies defense might be able to put up a fight.

However, Virginia Tech’s 0.62 EPA/play allowed on runs is absolutely atrocious. Most likely, NC State will run the ball at will against the Hokies.

Another possibility is that Siefkes might sell out on offense to try to get NC State into second-and-long. NC State allows a surprisingly astronomic 33.3% stuff rate.

If Virginia Tech can consistently stuff first down runs, then the Wolfpack might be baited into throwing on second- and third-down.

Such a situation may or may not benefit Tech. The Hokies are getting thin in the secondary, and NC State quarterback CJ Bailey has put up huge numbers this season.

He will turn the ball over, though.

Again, the key appears to be pressure. Expect Siefkes to send extra rushers more frequently than Tech has shown through four games this season.

Overall

The Hokies are 0-0 in conference play. Florida St. lost at Virginia last night, and Clemson has two losses in conference (three overall). The ACC is wide open.

Many Virginia Tech players have a ton to play for. Seniors can improve their draft prospects. Underclassmen all have financial, and possibly transfer portal, considerations that should spur them to play hard.

Likewise, the coaches are all trying to put a good product on the field in order to improve their chances of landing a good job next year.

And at the top, no one has more on the line than Philip Montgomery. A 6-2 conference record (obviously very unlikely) would make him Virginia Tech’s coach in 2026. Even five wins might be good enough to get that interim tag removed.

Four wins would get him a P4 coordinator job or a shot at a G5 head coaching opportunity.

Two to three wins would give him a shot at a G5 coordinator gig.

Anything less, and he’s probably done coaching college football.

Tonight we will find out what has truly been lost in 2025, and what is still out there to be gained.

Share

Subscribe now

The team definitely has personnel holes - notably along the offensive line and at linebacker - but it had similar holes in previous years and lacked the depth we have seen this year, yet still managed to win six regular season games.

In 2025, the second stringers have played nearly to the level of the starters, which would be great were it not for the fact that the starters have been horrible.

Changing the offensive and defensive schemes entering year four was far from ideal, but with so many incoming transfers it boggles the mind that the team couldn’t find players who fit the new schemes, especially on defense.

In short, I don’t think this Virginia Tech team is as bad as they have played lately. Rather, I think the version that played the first half against Vanderbilt is probably the closest we have seen thus far of median 2025 Virginia Tech,

Offense

It all went south for the Hokies when left tackle Johnny Garrett exited the Vanderbilt game with an injury. His absence, along with that of right guard Montavious Cunningham, has forced a host of young linemen to play before they are ready.

And yet, Garrett was not having a good year. His PFF grade was an atrocious 52.8. Cunningham was worse at 46.9.

So how did replacing bad linemen with young bad linemen completely tank the Hokies’ season?

It didn’t.

The team couldn’t pass block before the injuries, and it has gotten marginally worse with all the freshmen playing up front.

The big change came in the run/pass ratio. At a high level, though, it’s difficult to detect a major shift:

1. vs. South Carolina: 37 runs, 35 passes (51% run)

2. vs. Vanderbilt: 31 runs, 29 passes (52% run)

3. vs. Old Dominion: 34 runs, 39 passes (47% run)

However, sacks and scrambles go down on the stat sheet as runs, so let’s look at drop backs for Kyron Drones:

1. vs. South Carolina: 41 drop backs out of 72 plays (57% pass plays)

2. vs. Vanderbilt: 36 drop backs out of 60 plays (60% pass plays)

3. vs. Old Dominion: 53 drop backs out of 73 plays (73% pass plays)

As a play caller, Philip Montgomery appears to favor a roughly 50/50 share of rushing calls to passing calls when the game is close. Once the game gets out of hand and the Hokies find themselves down by more than one score, he has to throw a lot more. Consider the following count of minutes during which the Hokies have been leading or within one score:

1. vs. South Carolina: leading or within one score for 48 minutes (3.2 quarters)

2. vs. Vanderbilt: leading or within one score for 50 minutes (3.3 quarters)

3. vs. Old Dominion: leading or within one score for 17.5 minutes (1.2 quarters)

True to form, Montgomery has not asked Drones to keep the ball on designed QB carries more than 9 times in a game this year.

The running backs have had their moments, but the scoreboard has rendered them non-entities for 36% of the season - the amount of game time during which the Hokies have trailed by more than one touchdown.

Don’t get me wrong, the Tech offense is not good. But we knew it wouldn’t be good - not with so little experience up front.

The fixable problem lies on the other side of the ball.

Defense

Raise your hand if you had the secondary pegged before the season as the biggest trouble spot on the team.

Yeah, I don’t think anyone saw that coming.

Through the first three games of the season, the Virginia Tech defense as a whole has a 42.9 coverage grade and has allowed opposing quarterbacks to complete 71.2% of their passes.

As bad as the offensive line has been, both pass blocking and run blocking have graded out above 50.

Only four players with at least 20 coverage snaps have graded out above 60:

• Quentin Reddish (S) - 77.4

• Isaiah Brown-Murray (CB) - 64.3

• Christian Ellis (NB) - 62.1

• Thomas Williams (CB) - 61.2

Caleb Brown (41.7) and the recently departed Dante Lovett (44.8) saw their snaps drastically reduced because of their struggles.

That would be the case with other players too if their backups were not equally bad against the pass.

Unfortunately, there have been no good options at linebacker, nickel, or safety, where every player in the rotation has been atrocious in coverage.

Take linebacker, for instance. Caleb Woodson. His coverage grade is 53.2, and he has allowed 5 completions on 6 attempts.

The Jaden Keller/Michael Short combination has been even worse. Both have coverage grades below 50, and combined they have allowed 8 completions in 9 attempts.

Is it a Sam Siefkes thing? Nope.

Woodson (50.6) and Keller (53.6) were terrible in coverage last year, too.

Short had a better grade last year at North Carolina (71.1), but most of that came against Boston College and UConn late in the season, and he still allowed two catches on three targets overall.

Can anything be done?

Brent Pry was fired because he wasn’t able to elevate recruiting.

The main reason he failed to improve the talent level was that Virginia Tech’s poor football operation (management structure) could not compete against peer programs.

That is how the Hokies ended up with a roster full of G5 and FCS transfers. Tech looked big time compared to where they came from.

Now we’re seeing that for many of those players, the adjustment to P4 football is not immediate.

In order to post a respectable showing the rest of the way, Sam Siefkes needs to fix the coverage problems in the secondary.

At least in theory, those players, who had had some success before transferring to Virginia Tech, are capable of adjusting to the speed of the game at the P4 level and showing improved play as the season progresses.

The first step to winning games is getting stops on third and long, and there is no time like the present to make strides in that direction.

Subscribe now

Share

The focus now is on the machinations surrounding the program, and the impending changes within the athletic department and coaching staff.

Still, there is a game to play, and while Virginia Tech is by far the more talented team, there is little reason to expect the Hokies to beat ODU tonight.

Seriously.

Unfavorable numbers

The Hokies, still winless on the season, have played games against two above average P4 teams in South Carolina and Vanderbilt.

ODU has defeated FCS North Carolina Central and lost to Indiana.

With those caveats in mind, the discrepancy between the two teams in terms of advanced stats is startling.

To put it simply, when Virginia Tech has the ball, it’s bad on good. When the Monarchs have the ball, it’s good on bad.

Another status quo performance by the Hokies in Lane Stadium tonight will result in a humiliating, double-digit defeat.

Given the negativity around the program following last week’s shocking second-half abdication of their home field, one cannot imagine the Hokies being particularly dialed-in this week.

That said, there are a ton of transfers on this team, guys who need to turn things around if they want any shot at an NFL camp invite. (I don’t see many, if any, draftees in the senior class).

Schematically, I’m looking to see whether or not Virginia Tech’s offensive coordinator, Philip Montgomery, opts for a massive change in tactics given his beat-up offensive line and that unit’s inability to protect quarterback Kyron Drones.

I’m not expecting a big change in the Tech offense, and as a result, I’m not expecting much change in the results.

On defense, the Hokies brought in half a million transfer safeties. None of them have played particularly well. In fact, if PFF is any indication, the Hokies are worse off at safety positions played by anyone other than Quentin Reddish than they were last year.

The linebackers have been underwhelming, as well. If Xavier Adibi’s boys do not show improvement this week, we aren’t likely to see it this year.

The biggest quantitative unknown at present is which group has a higher percentage of its people who have tuned out just two weeks into the season: the team or the fanbase.

If the numbers in that metric appear high and relatively close, things could get very ugly inside Lane Stadium.

I’m not predicting it, but I also would not be surprised if Old Dominion wins the game by three touchdowns.

That is how broken the program is at the present time.

What the BOV should be doing

Brent Pry is not the problem. His hiring was the result of deeper problems within the athletic department, the university, and the commonwealth of Virginia.

When Frank Beamer retired, following the 2015 season, Virginia’s Tech’s head coaching position was viewed nationally as good, but not great.

(Imagine if Frank had retired after the 2006 season. Might the Hokies have had a chance to hire West Virginia’s own Nick Saban? Alabama had more tradition, but at the time, Virginia Tech was unquestionably the better job.)

Following Beamer, the Hokies signed an up-and-coming coach in Justin Fuente, who was unaware of the cracks in the program’s foundation.

Fuente was loyal to a fault. In hindsight, he should have taken a better job after winning 19 games in his first two seasons in Blacksburg.

There were too many problems beyond his control that were only getting worse.

That much was clear when Brent Pry was handed the keys after the 2021 season.

Ask yourself, why is it Virginia Tech could not get anyone better to coach its football team? I, like most of you, had not even heard of Brent Pry before word leaked out that he would be the next head coach.

Pry was the anti-Justin Fuente, which I guess was enough to get him the job, but Fuente was never the problem.

The main problem is that in order to be a successful, fringe top-25 program, the Hokies need both better resources and more in-state talent.

Yes, talent in the high school ranks is a big issue.

Pay attention to Chris Coleman over at Tech Sideline. He talks constantly about the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference, and the great coaching the players in that league receive.

He doesn’t talk much about the 757 anymore, and really, he pays lip-service to the Richmond area.

Tech has done pretty well with WCAC kids in the last 10 years, but there are not enough of them to build a winning program.

The Hokies, as well as their rivals up in Charlottesville, need more in-state talent, but they are not going to get it until high schools start paying more to retain good coaches.

Talent follows good coaches, and the flow is headed straight out of state.

This trend was reinforced as I read Jeremy Haymore’s exquisite book The Bandana Express about the 1980 state champion Giles Spartans.

One of the stars of that team was Greg Mance, who would later achieve great success as the head coach at Richlands.

A few years back, Mance jumped at the chance to move to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina to take his “dream job”. After all, the pay was better, he could still coach a good team, and the beach was right there. What’s not to love?

It’s not like Richlands, a Division 3 school, was sending a bunch of players to Virginia Tech, but that level of high school football in southwest Virginia formed a critical pipeline to Virginia Tech.

Logan Thomas is a prime example, having graduated from Brookville, a Division 3 high school in Lynchburg.

Take a survey of the high school coaches in southwest Virginia these days, and I doubt you’ll hear one describe his as a “dream job”.

The next head coach and athletic director are unlikely to know the details of the structural problems that have led to the downfall of the VHSL.

Until Virginia Tech’s Board of Visitors can pinpoint the factors driving the problems at the state level, and formulate a plan to advocate for their reversal, I’d just as soon keep the current regime at Virginia Tech in place.

There is no point in setting up yet another coach to fail.

Subscribe now

Share

That is not the case this week.

The data on week 1 performances by the linemen on both sides of the ball is so stark, that I believe it will determine the outcome of Saturday’s game.

Vanderbilt’s offensive line

Vanderbilt is bad up front.

Of course, they were bad up front last year too, and that did not stop them from beating the Hokies.

In 2024, only one of Vandy’s starting linemen had an overall grade above 60. That was center Delfin Castillo. Tackle Chase Mitchell finished the year under 50.

Fast forward a year, and after one game against a terrible FCS team, I expected to find a bunch of gaudy PFF ratings for Vanderbilt.

And I did, in almost every category.

Every category, that is, except for blocking.

Mitchell looked much better in week 1 this year against Charleston Southern, grading out at 67.7. Only Jordan White, at center, graded out higher (72.2). But these above average grades came in a game against an FCS team that is so bad it would probably be only middling in Division II!

Of particular note was guard Cade McConnell, who graded out at 34.5 on 37 snaps, including a Bluto Blutarsky-esque 0.0 pass blocking grade on 23 pass blocking snaps!.

One has to imagine that former Hokie Gunner Givens, a backup guard who graded out at 62.3 (82.0 in pass blocking) on 36 snaps, will get a long look in practice this week.

He would certainly be motivated, both to play against his old team as well as close to home - he graduated from Lord Botetourt High School in Daleville, VA.

Either way, the Hokies have a massive advantage in the middle of the line when Vanderbilt has the ball.

Vanderbilt’s defensive line

If “bad” is the key word for the Commodore offensive line, then “unimpressive” would be the best word for the defensive line.

Vandy does have one legit player who could cause the Hokies trouble.

Miles Capers, a 6’4” 249 lb. edge player, has improved every year he has been in college:

• Freshman (2021) - 46.1 grade on 55 snaps

• Redshirt (2022) - DNP

• (R) Sophomore - 60.3 grade on 245 snaps

• (R) Junior - 71.2 grade on 517 snaps

Neither Johnny Garrett nor Tomas Rimac, Tech’s two starting tackles last week, showed much in the way of lateral quickness. In fact, I’m not convinced Rimac playing tackle was not a one-off thing driven by the individual matchups against South Carolina’s defensive line.

Whether Rimac starts at right tackle or the Hokies go with Montavious Cunningham, that position is the one area I would expect to see Vanderbilt attempt to exploit.

The rest of the Vanderbilt defensive line played alright last week, with PFF grades generally between 60 and 67, but those are not the types of grades one would expect to see from an SEC school playing against such an inferior opponent.

Tech’s defensive linemen notched grades in that range or above against a South Carolina team ranked in the top 15 nationally at a neutral site last week.

So, the matchup for Virginia Tech’s offensive line is more favorable this week. And that is important because the Hokies are very thin up front. The starters all seem ok, but this line goes about seven-deep right now, and players six (Brody Meadows) and seven (Jaden Muskrat) missed last week’s game with injuries.

Matt Moore would like to get through this game without having to play anyone farther down the bench in competitive snaps. If something does happen, though, and the Hokies are forced to play one of their young backup lineman, things could go south in a hurry.

Final Thoughts

The Hokies are 1.5-point home favorites. Home field advantage is generally worth 3 points, and one could argue Lane Stadium at night could be worth 3.5 or even 4.

That means the betting world believes Vanderbilt would squeak past the Hokies on a neutral field.

Combine that insult, accurate as it may be, with Vanderbilt’s upset win last year, and the Commodores should get the Hokies’ best shot.

I’m not sure many Vanderbilt players know what it feels like to get the best shot, on the road, from another P4 team.

It’s one thing to go play at LSU, where none of the 100+ thousand spectators in Baton Rouge believe you’ll be able to keep the game close, much less win it.

It’s completely different to go to an equally loud stadium where the fans believe they could be the difference between victory and defeat.

Will Vandy’s line get rattled and commit false start penalties? Will quarterback Diego Pavia face enough constant pressure to feel like he needs to press in order to move the ball?

My guess is the answer to both questions will be yes. That doesn’t mean the Hokies will win the game, but it certainly improves the odds.

Given the otherwise equal matchup, it could prove decisive.

Subscribe now

Share

Of course, there is no pre-season in college football, so the result goes into the L column for the Hokies.

Still, it was a hard-hitting, but clean game, and both sides learned something about themselves.

Rather than jump to conclusions (Week 1 → Week 2 changes in SP+ are basically meaningless, seeing as only a few teams played actual, legit opponents right out of the gate), I’m going to review only the numbers that matter.

The noise will sort itself out in a few weeks.

Overall

On Saturday, I shared data showing that many ACC teams were underrated in week 1. Virginia Tech was one of those teams, and although South Carolina covered, the game was much closer for much longer than many people expected.

In terms of ELO, the game was worth 24 rating points. South Carolina is now up to 1729, second on Tech’s schedule only to Miami (1752). Louisville is the only other future Tech opponent over 1700.

The Hokies are now at 1575 rating points. Based solely on ELO, Virginia Tech should be favored in their next seven games.

Quarterback

I’ll skip the headline numbers, which by now most readers have already digested from other sources, and instead focus on two things that seem to have flown under the radar:

1. Sunday was the first time that Kyron Drones had taken game reps since the Clemson game last year. It had been nearly 10 months since he played a snap in any semblance of good health. It has not been confirmed, but there is a good chance Sunday was the first time Kyron got live reps period in 2025. He missed the Spring Game, and coming off surgery, I doubt Pry & Co. let anyone hit him during training camp. When you factor that in with Carolina’s constant pressure, it’s no surprise that he had mechanical and judgement lapses. He has a lot of rust to shake off. I would not expect him to hit his stride until the NC State game, at the earliest.

2. Last week I listed the Drones/Montgomery fit as a factor that could possibly cost the Hokies a game or two this year. In that regard, I was pleasantly surprised by the progress Drones displayed. He completed 3 out of 8 passes that travelled more than 20 yards in the air. Those three completions were good for 85 yards. Last year, he completed 9 out of 28 such attempts for 312 yards. The year before he completed a dreadful 9 out of 42 for 412 yards. He put many of the deep passes right on the money Sunday afternoon against very tight coverage. And he would have had a couple more completions had his receivers been able to complete the catch as they went to the ground. Then, of course, there was the completion to Ayden Greene that got called back due to the chop block. But you get my point. Whereas in past years Drones often wildly overthrew his receivers, against the Gamecocks he consistently threw passes into tight windows where only his receivers had a chance to make the catch.

Running backs

We know Terion Stewart was injured and did not travel with the team, but Braydon Bennett’s absence from the game was notable. I doubt PJ Prioleau is the true #2 tailback. Perhaps that position group has been hit by more injuries than Pry has let on.

Defense

Caleb Woodson did not start, due to his DWI charge a week ago, but he played the most snaps (47) of any defender. That tells us a few things:

• He’s the leader of the defense

• He’s much better than his backup, Antwone Santiago

• Pry was confident that playing him would not negatively impact the team’s culture or discipline

Defensive line

The constant player rotation was excellent. There were no hands on hips. The burst at the end of the game was just as good as it had been in the first half. Sure, LaNorris Sellers had a few big runs on the final drive, but he was scrambling away from pressure. One does not expect to see that level of pressure against an SEC opponent late in a game that was no longer in doubt.

The players that Sam Siefkes targeted in the transfer portal, namely Kody Huisman (27 snaps, PFF 77.4) and Elhadj Fall (22 snaps, PFF 84.7), played their roles to perfection. Notably, they were the two highest graders per PFF on the defense.

Linebackers

This week the starting WLB is listed as Jaden Keller OR Michael Short. While the Hokies will probably continue to play both guys, I would expect Short to get more than 50% of the snaps against Vanderbilt, and possibly as many as 75%. Just look at what each player did against South Carolina:

• Jaden Keller: 31 snaps, 49.0 PFF grade

• Michael Short: 24 snaps, 77.2 PFF grade

Keller received the second lowest grade on defense, while Short received the third highest. Siefkes is not a sentimental guy. Short has earned more snaps, and he will very likely get them this week.

Secondary

Isaiah Brown-Murray held up alright (PFF 66.6), but Dante Lovett (54.5) and Caleb Brown (35.0) really struggled. The rotation was pretty even between the three, but I would expect IBM and Lovett to play “starter” level snaps and Brown to be in the 15-20 range (he got 21 against South Carolina) moving forward.

I was surprised to see Jordan Bass in the game late. Perhaps Prioleau played him out of frustration. Quentin Reddish (PFF 65.1) was ok, but Tyson Flowers was sub-60. Both Bass and Sherrod Covil received grades in the mid-60s. The rotation there will probably continue.

Isaiah Cash (PFF 63.8) and Christian Ellis (PFF 51.7) split the nickel snaps equally, but Cash graded out much higher. I don’t think either is a true nickel, so it will be interesting to see how this competition evolves.

Subscribe now

Share

I pondered this issue all summer, but only in the last few days did I hit on what I believe is a solution worth sharing.

ELO vs. Spread

Two metrics for which we have data are ELO and the game spreads.

ELO is a rating system originally developed to rank chess players. It is a retrospective metric, meaning that it looks backward at who a given team has beaten.

Meanwhile, the spread looks at individual matchups and reflects betting action. If those putting their money on the line suddenly shift in mass toward one team or the other, the spread will reflect that change in sentiment.

To create a baseline expectation, we can plot all the matchups in a given week on a graph that has the spread on the y-axis and the ELO delta on the x-axis.

Overlaying a trend or average line onto the graph creates a line of expectation at each level of ELO delta.

Virginia Tech vs. South Carolina

ACC teams in the chart above appear as either maroon (when the ACC team is home) or orange (when the ACC team is away).

Maroon dots above the dashed line represent games in which Las Vegas believes the ACC team, playing at home, is underrated compared to its opponent (the ELO delta is greater than it should be).

Likewise, orange dots below the line represent games in which the traveling ACC team is underrated.

The Virginia Tech at South Carolina game is the orange dot below the line with a box around it. The Hokies, who are technically the road team despite the neutral venue, have an ELO delta of -108, but are only 8-point underdogs. As the graph shows, the expectation is that the home team with that level of positive ELO delta would be closer to a 10-point favorite.

The Hokies enter week 1 with an ELO of 1598, a bit above the midpoint of 1500. South Carolina, meanwhile, has an ELO of 1706 which is good, perhaps reflective of an 8-4 P4 team with an average strength of schedule, but not the #13 team in the country.

So, if Las Vegas is correct, not only are the Gamecocks not the 13th best team in the country, but they might not even be a top-25 team.

For all the hype about LaNorris Sellers, the sober take may prove accurate. South Carolina plays against teams currently ranked in the top-25 in six of its final seven games.

If the Hokies were to win the game, South Carolina could conceivably struggle to gain bowl eligibility.

Three other matchups involving ACC teams

Overall, ACC teams are overrated in comparison to their competition in only 3 out 12 games if we take weeks 0 and 1 together.

In addition, there are three games in which the ACC team is very underrated compared to its opponent

1. Notre Dame (ELO = 2173) at Miami (1736)

   1. The Irish are only a 2-point favorite in a game they should be favored to win by 17 if the ELOs for each team are accurate

2. Georgia Tech (1536) at Colorado (1634)

   1. The Yellow Jackets were a 4-point favorite in a game that the home-standing Buffs should have been favored to win by 10

   2. Georgia Tech won 27-20

3. Syracuse (1499) at Tennessee (1776)

   1. The Vols are 14-point favorites in a game they should be favored to win by three touchdowns

Ultimately, the results of this weekend’s high profile non-conference games will define the relative strength of the conference.

As play begins, though, those whose money is on the line believe many ACC teams will outperform expectations.

Subscribe now

Share

Although the new numbers do not contain any real surprises for Virginia Tech fans, they do paint a clear picture of where the program is at the beginning of Brent Pry’s pivotal fourth season as head coach.

Virginia Tech ranks 40th nationally and 9th out 17 ACC teams. In the national ranking, the Hokies are one spot below Georgia Tech and four below Cal.

In turn, the Hokies are ranked five spots higher than NC State and six above Stanford.

Conference comparison

Given their point rating of 712.19, the Hokies would rank as follows if they were members of the other power conferences:

• Big 12 - 6th place out 17 teams (including VT)

• Big Ten - 11th place out of 19 teams

• SEC - 16th place out of 17 teams

The Hokies’ talent rating would place them first in every non-power conference.

With all the talk about the Big Ten and SEC breaking off and forming a super league, it’s pretty clear that from a quantifiable talent perspective, the SEC is in a league of its own, while the Big Ten is about on par with the ACC. The Big 12, while still well ahead of the non-power leagues, trails the other power conferences.

The major difference between the ACC and the Big Ten is that the latter is top heavy, with four of its teams in the top 15 (and two in the top five) compared to only two ACC teams in the top 15 (and none in the top five).

That advantage evaporates when we zoom out - both conferences have 12 teams among the top 50 nationally.

The SEC has 8 of the top 15 and 15 of the top 50 schools. Meanwhile, the Big 12 does not have a team in the top 15, but does manage to place 10 schools in the top 50.

Virginia Tech outlook

Talent matters, but when setting win expectations it is equally important to consider the talent of a team’s opponents.

The Hokies will play a challenging schedule in 2025, but there are no matchups against truly elite teams.

The toughest test will come against Miami, #15 nationally in talent, but Tech gets the Hurricanes at home in late November.

The next hardest game, this week against #18 South Carolina, is at a neutral site, albeit one much closer to Columbia than Blacksburg.

The only other game the Hokies will play against a top-35 opponent is on the road at #19 Florida St. The Seminoles are coming off a disastrous 2-10 season in which they were (supposedly) the 13th most talented team in the country. In addition, the Hokies will have an extra week to prepare for that game.

Another major factor working in Tech’s favor is that the Hokies will only play four true road games this year, and none of them is a guaranteed loss, although the Team Talent model I created does not expect a win at Florida St. under any scenario.

Speaking of that model, I kept things really simple. The table includes each opponent’s talent ranking and the delta from Virginia Tech’s. From there, VT Win Chance was calculated by starting at 50% and adding 0.05 for every spot higher in the rankings Tech is compared to its opponent or subtracting by the same amount when the Hokies are the less talented team.

The binary predictor simply considers which team is more talented. The best case column swings all games in which Tech has a 45% chance of winning or greater into the win column, while the worst case column moves all games with a 55% chance of winning or less into the loss column.

Overall, the baseline win expectations, in both the detailed (VT Win Chance) and the more crude (Binary W/L) come out at seven wins.

The best case scenario is nine wins, while the worst case scenario is five. Subjectively, I can see a path to victory in every game, but a realistic path to defeat in only nine games.

If the Hokies lose at home to ODU, Wofford, or Wake Forest, we would likely be looking at changes in the team’s, and the athletic department’s, leadership.

Last season the Hokies lost all the 50/50 games. The floor is lower this season, as doing so would cost the team bowl eligibility. However, the ceiling is higher than most realize and the baseline is one win better than in 2024.

If nothing else, there is reason for (guarded) optimism in Blacksburg as we embark on the start of another college football season.

Subscribe now

Share

It has been an offseason of great change in Blacksburg.

The dismantling of the 2024 team and coaching staff began before the season even ended.

New coaches and new players trickled in throughout the winter, then again in a burst after spring practice.

There are lots of new names and faces - so many that matching the former with the latter is nearly impossible. And does anyone feel like they know who is wearing what jersey number is this year?

Yeah, me neither.

There is no precedent for the amount of change undergone by the Virginia Tech football program in 2025.

Rather than fill your inboxes with random guesses, unsupported by the evidence that doesn’t exist, I laid low and observed.

I filtered out the hype (the positive press for running back Marcellous Hawkins arrived just as it became clear that Terion Stewart’s injury was likely to keep him out of the opening contest against South Carolina - color me skeptical), noted what the coaches did and did not say, and kept an eye out for emerging leaders.

The 247 Team Talent Composite ratings should be released this week (last year they dropped on August 27th), and at that point we will start to get a sense of the floor, ceiling, and likely outcome for the 2025 season.

In anticipation of that release, today I will review a list of variables that I believe will have an outsized impact on determining the result of the 50/50 games on Tech’s schedule, which will ultimately swing the fanbase’s perspective on the season.

I have grouped them by their likelihood to have a positive and negative impact on the Hokies’ season.

Factors most likely to have a positive impact

1. Surprise

   It’s been covered ad nauseum in the Techosphere this off-season, but no one knows anything about the formations or personnel groupings the Hokies will use early in the season. That will work to their advantage for the first two to three weeks, and could produce two wins that would have otherwise been losses. Remember, the 2024 Hokies were not a handful of plays from being 7-5. They were a handful of plays from being 9-3 (the last play at Miami and the two overtime losses, both of which Tech led late in the fourth quarter).

2. Less drop-off from the ones to the twos

   The 2024 team had plenty of NFL talent. The problem was that all the pros started, and when they got hurt, or just needed a breather, their backups were too often not up to the task. But wait, you might be thinking, the backups didn’t look that bad. True! But they also did not play much, a telltale sign that the drop-off in performance would have been too great to overcome. That’s how we got Kyron Drones and Bhayshul Tuten both starting against Clemson when, realistically, they were too injured to play. It’s how time and again Xavier Chaplin would get hurt, go to the sideline, and then limp back on to the field a few plays later. Virginia Tech’s offseason strategy in the transfer portal was clearly to load up on depth pieces. I expect snaps to be a lot more spread out this year at nearly every position, save for quarterback. Keeping guys fresher and healthier could net the Hokies one to two additional wins down the stretch in 2025.

3. Diversity of player types and skills within position groups

   One of the reasons we have so little idea about how the Hokies will line up and who is likely to play significant snaps is that there are so many conceivable options. Tech appears to have the players to line up, at least on defense, completely differently from one week to the next. On offense, there are multiple player types at running back and wide receiver, which will enable Philip Montgomery, the new offensive coordinator, to diversify his attack based on the strengths and weaknesses of each opposing defense. The result is that the Hokies could pose “bad” matchups for many teams on the schedule, which would add one extra win.

Factors most likely to have a negative impact

1. Inexperience along the offensive line

   This year’s offensive line features new players, guys playing new positions, and guys with little in the way of prior snaps or previous success. This one variable is a huge red flag. It could potentially cost the Hokies three games that they would have otherwise won.

2. QB/offensive coordinator fit

   I am not convinced that Kyron Drones and Pop Watson, currently numbers one and two on the depth chart at quarterback, are great fits for what Montgomery wants to do on offense. Drones has plenty of arm talent, but he struggles mightily with the deep ball, consistently overthrowing wide open receivers (ironically, the much maligned Grant Wells would have been perfect for this offense). Tyrod Taylor had this same problem early in his career and he learned how to “perfectly” underthrow his receivers, which led to more catches and a lot more pass interference calls against the defense. If Drones has not made similar progress in the offseason, then it could cost the Hokies one to two wins in 2025.

3. A program on the edge

   Brent Pry appears to have made a lot of good hires in the offseason, and the Hokies pulled a number of sneaky good players out of the transfer portal, but Pry has nearly lost the fanbase. A slow start combined with a tough back half of the schedule could doom Pry and usher in wholesale changes in the athletic department. AD Whit Babcock, who is approaching lame duck status, will not be given the opportunity to hire a third head coach. If the fans suspect a coming cascade, they could check out early and turn the vibes around the program from bad to toxic, costing the Hokies at least a couple wins and potentially the ability to hire strong replacements at AD and head football coach.

On balance

Overall, the offseason changes have moved the program in a positive direction.

I do believe the Hokies are due to revert to the mean. From a numbers perspective alone, it is inconceivable the Tech will continue to lose just about every one score game it plays in the Brent Pry era.

Eventually, that stuff evens out (like all the lost fumbles early in Justin Fuente’s tenure).

The team seems to understand what is on the line.

There has been little hype and almost no “noise” since the spring.

Seriously, since when has a Board of Visitors meeting had the ability to net so much coverage in August?

In his presentation, covered widely by the press, Whit Babcock said nothing that the casual fan does not already know.

Yet, the entire fanbase followed it down to the minutest detail because there was no news about the football program.

If we know nothing about the team, what are the odds that South Carolina knows much?

I really want to see the Hokies beat South Carolina because, aside from the obvious rooting interest, I want to know if this team and this staff know how to handle success.

Playing Vanderbilt in week 2 as a 1-0 team would provide that answer.

Pry might need a win over South Carolina to keep his job, but either way, a loss to Vanderbilt in Lane Stadium would seal his fate, even if the move is not made immediately.

The fanbase is so sick of muddling through. It’s time to find out if the folks in the Merryman Center know how to win.

Subscribe now

Share