Torrian Gray reflects on the performance of Tech's secondary against Ohio State

After digesting the game film of Virginia Tech's 42-24 loss to Ohio State, defensive backs coach Torrian Gray summed up his unit's performance pretty succinctly.

"We weren't particularly sharp," Gray remarked. "We were kind of average as a group."

According to Gray, the primary reasons for the struggles (gave up four plays of 40+ yards) in defending the Buckeyes passing game came down to the Hokies' secondary not executing their assignments, plus the sheer talent of the Buckeyes' wideouts to get open.

Another reason Tech's secondary wasn't up to typical DBU standards may have to do with CB Brandon Facyson not being his normal self.

"I thought he was just okay," Gray noted about Facyson. "He wasn't the Brandon of two years ago."

Going forward against Furman, the secondary coach said the current two-deep is not set in stone and he's not averse to make some changes to the defensive backfield.

"I'm going to play the next best guy even if he's not in that particular spot on the depth chart if the guy knows what he's doing," Gray added.

"Overall, as a group we're not where we want to be."

More tidbits from Gray

With CB Kendall Fuller wearing a sleeve on his knee, Gray said his top corner is battling through a "nick" and the he's getting treatment on it.

Regarding the double-move that OSU's WR Michael Thomas made on Fuller, Gray pointed out that Fuller had been aggressive and was breaking on Thomas' routes throughout the game, possibly leading to Thomas' decision to change it up and trick Fuller.

Gray admitted that starting rover Desmond Frye "missed a few tackles" but also made "seven or eight good plays" during the OSU game.

Looking ahead to Saturday's matchup with Furman, Gray was complimentary of the Paladins, who are coming off a 38-35 loss to Coastal Carolina: "They're a well-coached team. They've got a couple of good receivers (Jordan Snellings and Antonio Wilcox) who are very good on that level (FCS) and will give us a challenge if we're not on our game. So we respect them and it's about us getting better."

Player quotes

CB Kendall Fuller

ON FACING OSU WR MICHAEL THOMAS AND GOING FORWARD:

"Just move on to the next game. The guy made a couple plays. Just move on and get better."

ON EVALUATING HIS PERFORMANCE OVERALL AGAINST OSU:

"You're never happy when you get any plays made on you. I did some good things, a lot of plays that I took away. You know, two passes I know I gave up, but you know, at this level, you can't give up two plays or anything like that. But other than that, there were a lot of good things that I saw and a lot of things that I can correct."

ON HOW THE CORNER POSITION GETS PORTRAYED

"I think the media just looks at it differently. You know they have their views and things like that, but I'm going to be mad at my play if anyone catches the ball on me, so I just know that I'm going to get better."

ON IF OSU'S BIG PLAYS WERE A RESULT OF BREAKDOWNS OR BECAUSE THE BUCKEYES MADE GREAT INDIVIDUAL EFFORTS:

"A little bit of both. We're always going to give them (Ohio State) their credit. They've got talented guys, but there are also little things that we can do to get better, whether it's communication, little techniques and fundamentals."

CB Brandon Facyson

ON FURMAN'S WIDE RECEIVING CORP:

"They're athletic. There's a couple of them that stand out to you. They're athletic, they can catch the ball and make plays in open space. We're facing a pretty good receiving crew, so we just got to prepare right and get ready for them."

ON HOW HE FELT GETTING BACK IN ACTION:

"I felt good. Of course, it's my first game back, so there's going to be some things that I can work on to keep getting better throughout the year. The first game is always a test. But, I felt good. I didn't have any problems. I cramped up a little, but that's something easy that I can take care of throughout the week. I hydrated a lot, but obviously I need to hydrate a lot more."

ON CARDALE JONES' TWEET CALLING OUT TECH'S SECONDARY:

#DBU lol welcome to #Zone6 42-24— Cardale Jones (@CJ12_) September 8, 2015

"I mean I saw it. Everybody has different personalities, you know. What's done is done. We know as a group what we can do. I mean, there's nothing to it and we don't really worry about it. We don't worry about what people put on Twitter or what people put on Instagram and stuff like that. As a group, we just got to handle our business and keep pushing."

DE Dadi Nicolas

ON THE TECH DEFENSE NOT RECORDING ANY SACKS:

"I think it's unfortunate that we didn't, but overall I know we played hard as a group."

ON THE DIFFICULTY OF TACKLING CARDALE JONES:

"I'd say you definitely have to wrap him up and drive your feet when tackling a big guy like that and that's what we're supposed to do."

ON THE FURMAN GAME THIS SATURDAY:

"The coaches are still studying them and whatnot, but overall we want to go improve something. We obviously have a chip on our shoulder from Monday night. We're about to play our four down type thing. A little bit more of our regular fashioned defense."

ON IF THE QUICK TURNAROUND TO FACE FURMAN IS A CHALLENGE:

"I'm going to have say, 'no' because that's exactly what we're doing right now. I mean, the coaches do a great job of still giving us the same type of rest, but overall, I think we're mentally there and getting everything off and rolling."