Emptying the Notebook: Tuesday Evening Media Session 8/26

Recap and quotes from tonight's media session.

Juice running strong in Tech's second closed scrimmage of the summer. [Virginia Tech Athletics \ Dave Knachel]

As the week crawls ever so slowly towards the start of the college football season another post-practice media availability came and went. Shane Beamer, Torrian Gray, Stacy Searles and a handful of players spoke with the media this evening.

Let's get the first thing settled. There was a lot of discussion on the site yesterday after Frank Beamer said that he was planning on using running back Trey Edmunds on kick coverage this week, and whether or not that was a good thing. Does the possibility of kick coverage concern Shane?

"Not really, because we need to get him where he's back in, you know, game mode and feeling 100 percent," Beamer said. "You know the more live action he can get in games, the better. So if he can cover a kickoff, or if he can cover a punt or whatever it might be, I think that only helps him.

"He covered a kickoff today in practice, he's been working on punts since day one. Not as a starter, but getting reps as a backup so he knows that [in case] he had to go in on the punt team [...] Trey's a really good football player, you know he's not one of those guys that's just a running back. You could put him at any position and I think he's going to be successful just because he's a really, really good football player."

That probably didn't calm the nerves of anyone worried about Edmunds' health, but Beamer did have some complimentary things to say about another injury concern at the position, freshman Marshawn Williams who is coming back from hernia surgery.

"He worked his tail off while he rehabbed, and I thought that showed a lot about him as far as his maturity goes," Beamer said. "Then in the scrimmage on Saturday, just from a pass protection standpoint, some things that happened that you trust him in pass protection. And he looked very natural running the ball. You know, he's got great vision for a big guy, for a young guy he sees things and made some nice runs require good vision."

In person, Marshawn's energy is palpable. He smiles consistently when talking to the media, and the excitement he has for football is transparent. That's something that his position coach notices as well.

"He's got a lot of energy on the field that I think our offensive line feeds off that as well, really the whole offense," Beamer said. "He's a young guy, but when he's in the huddle he's trying to be a leader. He's getting on [the offensive line] about 'just give me a little bit of room and I'll make stuff happen', that type of stuff. He's got something to him from that standpoint."

I got to talk to David Wang for a minute about his newfound role as starting left guard, and he emphasized just how hard that battle was.

"We've got a little bit of depth at o-line," Wang said, "and everybody's fighting for spots right now and each week's not a given for us. The coaches let us know that, and every week we're fighting."

As a guy who's been around the team for a while, what does Wang see in the young guys he's competing with, like Wyatt Teller and Alston Smith?

"You know, I see so much potential in all of them," Wang said. "They have a few things, just little tweaks here and there, and they'll start rolling off the ball. I mean they already are, Wyatt's so, so strong, Alston coming over from defense as well, he's just a good guard. And Augie right now, as y'all know he's our right guard, I really like him. I'm happy to play with him on the same line."

Wang knows that he "definitely could" fill in if anything happened to Caleb Farris at center, but says that he knows what Searles is thinking just about as much as everyone else.

One odd thing that many of you may have noticed on the depth chart is that one of the first team corner spots lists Brandon Facyson or Chuck Clark. Gray made it clear that it is only dependent on Facyson's health.

"If Brandon's healthy, he's going to be the starter," Gray said, "if he's not all the way back just yet, Chuck will be the starter. He's had a great fall camp, so Brandon gets his treatment, get himself right then he's the guy, you know, right now. We'll kind of see how that goes during this week."

Clark has been a name that's popped up a lot, not only is he the starting nickel back, but it sounds like he's also the next man up.

"Chuck's going to play a huge role, Gray said. "If Brandon or Kendall goes down Chuck's your next corner in the game right now. Chuck's a very high IQ player, he's similar to Kendall in those same regards of he can play multiple positions. He plays corner and nickel just like Kendall, so it gives you a lot of flexibility."

However as of right now, it sounds like Facyson is ready to go. Gray will have another deep secondary at his disposal to begin the season.

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