High School Pals C.J. Reavis, Desmond Frye Battle at Rover Amid Shuffling in the Secondary

Reavis and Frye's showdown at one safety spot is just one piece of the complex puzzle in the defensive backfield.

DBs coach Torrian Gray has plenty of work ahead to find a starting secondary. [Mark Umansky]

Spring football is traditionally a time for experimentation, but even a quick glance at the Hokies' secondary depth chart might have your head spinning.

At this point, the only fixed point of the team's defensive backfield is (of course) a member of the Fuller family.

Kendall may be on the sideline this spring recovering from wrist surgery, yet he still remains the surest thing in a chaotic unit. With corner Brandon Facyson out for the spring once again, and rover Kyshoen Jarrett and free safety Detrick Bonner now trying their luck at the NFL draft, very little is certain about how Torrian Gray's group will shape up come summer.

The team raised eyebrows at the start of spring practice when the new depth chart came out and listed Donovan Riley at rover after he spent most of last year playing cornerback. But Gray says that's hardly an accident after he showed flashes in spot duty at the position.

"You go back to the Georgia Tech game last year and there were times when he was the best player on the field from the rover position," Gray said. "We put Kyshoen (Jarrett) at nickel and Riley was our rover. And physically, he's 210 pounds, he's great at the point of attack, he can tackle, so it may be a strength for him."

Now, just two weeks into practice, even that situation has flipped. The team is giving Riley a shot at free safety to clear the way for two other young players to get reps at rover.

"We've got Desmond Frye and C.J. Reavis alternating at the rover spot, and Riley is at free safety right now," Gray said.

And it's not as if Riley has stopped playing corner either. Gray wants to see how last year's nickel-corner-turned-Facyson-replacement Chuck Clark fares at free safety, alternating Riley and Clark at cornerback.

"Chuck's at corner, I want to roll him and Riley some at boundary corner and free safety because you never know how an injury's going to go, if you get Brandon back or not," Gray said.

Facyson's health remains the elephant in the room in any discussion of the secondary's future composition. If he returns to his freshman form, the calculus in the backfield gets a lot simpler; he starts with Fuller, the team finds a new rover, and Clark and Riley battle for the free safety and nickel spots.

Gray says the initial prognosis for that scenario seems promising.

"They're saying all indications are he's going to be fine and cleared in the summer to go, so we're assuming that's going to be the indication," Gray said.

But Gray also isn't willing to emerge from spring ball without some extensive contingency plans in place.

"I'm just trying to get some flexibility, and do some things with some guys this spring," Gray said. "We've moved some guys around, and we'll sort it all out once we get more information with Brandon, but we anticipate he'll be back."

All of this shuffling could obscure the brewing battle at rover. Replacing Jarrett is no easy feat, and with Riley occupied at a handful of other positions, it seems the main competition will come down to Reavis, a sophomore, and Frye, a redshirt junior.

Reavis says he's only played at rover so far this spring, while Frye has flipped between both safety positions.

Even still, it seems that a head-to-head position battle is set between a pair of players that have ties stretching back to their days at Thomas Dale HS.

Frye says the two became friends when Reavis arrived as a freshman at the Chester, Va. school, and Reavis notes the two quickly "hung out all the time," playing FIFA on Xbox.

"He won last time, but I'll get him back," Reavis said. "He's got bragging rights right now."

Frye is willing to seize those rights with gusto.

"Overall, I'm better, completely," Frye said. "Any game."

He says he isn't afraid to keep up that trash talk when the two take the field.

"I always mess around with him like 'man, I don't even know why you're out here,' but I'm just playing with him," Frye said. "It's just competition, pushing each other. We always compete, we're always going at it with each other."

Even with that competition, Frye says he's still tried to look out for Reavis once he arrived at Tech.

"It's good having him around, I'm always looking out for him," Frye said. "When he was a freshman, I was letting him get used to things, trying to tell him what was going on, how he supposed to do stuff. And he did the same thing with me."

Gray sees that Frye's tutelage has given Reavis a chance to develop since he first stepped on campus. He only played 11 of his 116 plays last year with the defense, but Gray notes that he has seen a marked improvement from the sophomore so far.

"He's a kid with a high football IQ, his development mentally," Gray said. "He didn't play a lot last year, but he was in the meetings, so I think his IQ is pretty sharp and I think he's on par to do what he needs to do."

Reavis believes he got plenty of help from the two starters ahead of him on the depth chart in the intelligence department.

"It helped a little bit, being behind Kyshoen and Bonner," Reavis said. "They were really smart players, so I tried to take that from them."

Frye's challenge this spring will come physically rather than mentally. He's still recovering from a torn left labrum he suffered in practice early last year that he had repaired with surgery.

That meant that the whole rest of the season he was consigned to rehab and no-contact drills, making the spring his first taste of tackling in a while.

"I was just doing rehab the whole time," Frye said. "The beginning of spring was my first time getting back to contact work."

Frye admits he was both "rusty" and "nervous" coming back this spring, but he says things are gradually getting back to normal as he becomes accustomed to the physicality of the game once more. Yet he still uses his right shoulder when it's time for the team's infamous Oklahoma drills, because, after all, "them boys compete."

Gray's taken notice of his strong return to the field, and still remembers the promise he showed before his season was derailed. But he won't yield any details about any kind of pecking order at the position.

"He's always been a high football IQ guy, he's been a good tackler for us, he's had a great spring last spring, so that's why him and C.J., we've got those guys tied at the rover spot right now," Gray said.

That type of statement makes perfect sense given the snarled secondary depth chart. But Frye and Reavis are both hoping for a few more twists that mean they get to share the field rather than fight for a spot.

"I've been thinking about it all the time, I think we could both do it," Frye said.

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