What Happened at Syracuse

In loss, Hokies prove they were contenders

Forget what you read on Twitter and message boards. Virginia Tech’s game at Syracuse was a success.

Not a total success, but a success nonetheless.

Sometimes a team plays better and still loses. That’s sports, folks.

No need to fire everyone and start over.

In fact, Pry & Co. deserve a ton of credit for their strategic thinking, both in the game and during the days leading up to it.

There are still issues within the program (e.g., recruiting), but compare how the Hokies played on Saturday to the Knox Kadum, Boston College game in 2021.

We’re talking about a night and day difference.

The on-field product looked so much better on Saturday, and a lot credit for that goes to the coaching staff.

Coaching clinic

Brent Pry catches a lot of flak about his decisions on gameday, but he made a number of extremely wise strategic moves last week, without which the Hokies would have been toast from the get-go.

First, the CIA should consider recruiting Pry because the psychological warfare he waged on Syracuse last week was top notch.

In the Tuesday press conference, Pry pronounced Xavier Chaplin and Bhayshul Tuten probable for the game. Everyone in Hokie Nation breathed a sigh of relief, and no one in the media, local or national, was any the wiser.

Reporters were invited to visit practice on Wednesday. Andy Bitter of TechSideline noted that Chaplin and Tuten didn’t do much in the session he observed, but Pry treated them like a limited hangout - revealing information he could not keep hidden (everyone saw them limp off the field last week) as a distraction that enabled him to keep secret more important information (the Drones injury).

No one outside of the program suspected Kyron Drones was hurt and would not play, even though Pry admitted after the game that the entire team knew early in the week that Collin Schlee would start.

Pry handled all of this marvelously.

Then, in the game, it was the coordinators’ turn.

Tyler Bowen called a game that played directly to Schlee’s strengths for all but one drive.

On Tech’s fourth possession, leading 14-3, Bowen called a couple of plays that involved deep drops, requiring Schlee to read the Syracuse defense and make a medium to long throw. Schlee was sacked both times, and it was clear that he struggled to get through his progressions.

This was masterful by Bowen because it allowed him to test the offense’s ceiling with Schlee behind center.

He quickly discovered that Tech could not move the ball down the field in the passing game unless it was working off the run. This fact was reflected in Schlee’s PFF grade, which at 64.5, was lower than all of Drones’s this season, save for the Marshall game.

This series directly influenced Pry’s decision to play conservatively at the end of the first and second halves.

There was clearly an elevated chance of disaster had the Hokies asked Schlee to take a five-step drop, read the defense, and throw the ball 15+ yards down the field.

Unless the situation forced the staff’s hand, Pry & Co. were going to avoid at all costs throwing the ball in predictable situations.

It was the right call at the end of both halves.

Late in the second quarter, Tech held a 14-3 lead. Another three points would have been nice, but at the time they were not worth risking a turnover, especially with Syracuse set to receive the second half kickoff.

At the end of regulation Syracuse had regained momentum and tied the score. A turnover or a quick three-and-out would have given the Orange a chance to win the game outright, without the need for an extra period.

Overtime favored the Hokies. The brief stoppage in play gave the team a chance to pause, reset momentum, and get everyone on the same page.

Tech entered the game with one of the best redzone defenses in college football (remember all those turnovers the defense has forced this year inside its own 10-yard line), and the offense had done a great job all day of converting opportunities into touchdowns.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work out in the end, and the Hokies are now 0-2 in road games that go to overtime and in which Kyron Drones is not available for the extra period.

Given the same backfield injury scenario against fringe top 25 teams like Vanderbilt and Syracuse, all but a handful of the very best teams would see the same results the Hokies have, namely losses.

Finally, Chris Marve did exactly what was necessary to give the team a chance to win. He dialed up one uber-aggressive call after another.

The secondary held up well in press man coverage for most of the game. It got burned some in the second half, but so did Bud Foster’s famed bear defense at Ohio St. in 2014.

It gets overlooked because the Hokies won, but in that game a 14-point, third quarter lead evaporated in less than seven minutes of game time, resulting in a 21-21 tie with 11 minutes remaining in the fourth quarter. The play that ignited the Buckeye comeback was a 53-yard catch and run in which Hokies CB Brandon Facyson, left on an island, missed a tackle on Buckeye WR Michael Thomas.

Overall, the coaches did a great job at Syracuse devising and executing a winning strategy. In the end, it just wasn’t quite enough.

Play on the field

Film study guys are better positioned to discuss tactics and reporters can add more about in-game management (the clock run-off late in the first half, etc.) but a few things stand out from the advanced stats and PFF grades.

First, and most importantly, Tech thoroughly outplayed Syracuse.

The Hokies’ EPA per play was much higher than the Orange’s (0.28 to 0.18). Tech’s advantage in this metric was fairly small in the passing game (0.27 to 0.23), but huge on the ground (0.28 to 0.12).

Tech’s EPA per play balance in the air and on the ground was excellent, and it enabled the Hokies to keep the Syracuse defense off balance.

As a team, Virginia Tech’s offensive line numbers were excellent (3.5 offensive line yards per rush and 11% stuff rate allowed), despite some shaky play on the interior of the line (the G-C-G starters all graded out around baseline, and the backups were not any better).

In addition, the Hokies were, overall, the more explosive team, even though Syracuse had a slight edge through the air thanks to Mansoor Delane’s missed tackle that turned into a long touchdown.

Speaking of Delane, other than that one play, he had a great game, notching the second highest grade (84.0) on the team. Only Aeneas Peebles grade out better (86.6).

On the down side, the inside linebackers struggled. It looked like Syracuse, which having played its previous game on a Thursday had some extra time to prepare, did some things to cross up the linebackers’ reads.

As a result, LeQuint Allen had some big holes up the middle to run through. The Hokies were never able to fully fix this issue, and it cost them down the stretch.

Moving forward

If the Hokies wanted to have any chance to beat Clemson, they had to sit Drones and Tuten at Syracuse. Now, the question is, how much will those two recover before 3:30 p.m. on Saturday.

The good news is that Chaplin played the whole game at Syracuse and did not appear to suffer a reinjury.

Sam Brumfield also looked a lot better this week. He only played 15 snaps, but he graded out at 73.9. I also saw him on special teams. All this indicates that he is now mostly healthy and probably working back into full game shape.

Keller may continue to start (the tie goes to the younger player), but the snaps will probably be more evenly split in the final three games.

One final point I want to make is about expectations vs. results.

I see a lot of chatter about how the Hokies would be 8-0-1 if football games were 58 minutes long and how the staff should be getting better results with “all the talent” on this team.

Data backs up the first claim, but not the second.

There is a lot less NFL talent on this team than many fans probably realize.

The Hokies entered the Syracuse game ranked 52nd in team talent (Syracuse was 48th) and 24th in SP+. Sure, in-game management has at times been poor, but that is not the real issue.

The coaching staff is getting a lot out of the talent on the current roster, but it needs to recruit and sign more talented players.

Currently, the Hokies have the 45th best 2025 high school class of commits. That is just not going to cut it.

If Pry & Co. ultimately do not work out, it will be because they did not improve recruiting enough.

The record in one-score games over the last three years is just as much an indictment of the talent level as it is game management. More talent makes each individual in-game decision less consequential.