I am trying it again. I just so happen to have the afternoon off and VT football blessed us with a live streamed Pry and Friends press conference scheduled for 12:45pm. VT football has completed 2 of their 5 scheduled "mini-camps" and should be getting a better idea of how the depth chart is shaping up for this Fall.
Not to toot my own horn, but for those of you that did not see my ESD live thread you missed out on some quality content and diaper change play-by-plays. I imagine this thread will be much the same as I am technically off to supervise my little one. Having said that I encourage anyone to post their take-aways in the comments since I will probably have to look away a few times.
Will Pry give us answers to some of our burning questions:
- Who's QB1?
- What do you think about all this realignment nonsense?
- Are you planning on getting a call from a commit during this interview?
- Have you had Lane's elevators "serviced" recently?
All this and more starting at 12:45pm per hokiesports. Also, the new hokiesports app is supposed to have exclusive content following the pressers, so take a look at that if you're interested.
Lastly, but not leastly, if you want to follow along make sure you're fully dipped y'all.
Comments
maxANDcheese doing the Lord's work here
Well, I have the feed working through the app, but haven't seen a link posted on Hokiesports yet. As usual the site is clear as mud.
Edit: found it
Came in halfway through Pry's opening remarks. He's talking about having the team be a family and a brotherhood.
Fundamentals for the program:
Accountability
Communication
Competition
**feed cut out**
Mentality
Missing fundamental is "Details," ironically.
https://twitter.com/CoachGouveia/status/1686374742641840128?s=20
Q&A begins
Comparing Vandy to VT and the talent level. Pry feels the roster is in a better place now, notes the youth of the roster, but feels we have a better opportunity to make plays. More players align in skill set, talent, and culture.
Focused on details on and off the field. Pry being more involved in O and ST operations should improve the mentality of the team and the execution on critical plays/moments
Running game has improved in Pry's eyes. Malachi looking like a different player. Also notes Black, Tuten, and the progress of the O-line.
Pry is spending more time with offense this year and able to build better relationships with all of the players. Overall, Pry is able to spend more attention on all facets of the team: O, ST, crooting, etc
HS coaches excited to see VT's invested in the state. Pry is excited that the coaches, family, and lettermen are recognizing this
Lawson has made strides and can close on people. Pry says he needs one more cycle to reach his full potential. ThisIsntEvenMyFinalForm.jpeg
GIFedit:
Mike LB competition continues to be close. Keller, Mcdonald and Tisdale all standing out.
I wonder where Snyder fits. All-American at VMI then comes to VT and isn't mentioned. This surprised me. None of the three looked impressive in the spring. (Lawson however looked solid.)
Revising my comments- just watched two series of VMI vs Wake Forest, and saw Snyder miss two tackles (one where he got Campbell'ed by the RB) so I will wait and see before casting more shade.
Pry did mention him as being in the rotation in a previous Q&A, saying he was like Dax, but a little more athletic. It just sounds like Pry doesn't like him as a starter.
I didn't have high expectations for him. Special teams type player, IMO.
Whit and Pry meet weekly. To compete for championships Pry wanted updated recruiting staff and sports science program when he started at VT. He shies away from what future changes he wants other than vaguely bringing up a modern budget.
Jones was reluctant to make the switch to defense, but is working towards the 2 deep and makes plays daily in practice.
Quan (Felton) is like an avatar out there he is so big.
The entire D-line has been working on improving pass rush. Huge emphasis this off-season
Pry also had an anecdote about Powell (transfer from UF), basically saying he had the single best rep he's seen from a DE at tech and it made everyone stop and watch. Pretty cool
I think it was the same rep that was on one of the social media clips they put out from 1 on 1 drills.
If it wasn't that one then I'm even more excited for him
Pry doesn't want to be thinking too far ahead (ODU game). Guys down the hallway are breaking film down, but he wants the team focused on camp.
CB youth is helped out by Canteen, who is playing safety as well. "the ball just seems to find him".
Pennix working out at CB for depth behind Williams, Johnson, Lovett, all previously mentioned by Pry as needing to be ready in September.
edited for clarity
That concludes Pry's portion.
I will only sporadically be adding to this until this evening. Home duties are calling.
you did say there'd be diaper changes
It ended up being the contents of our spice rack strewn about the kitchen floor. Luckily the lids all stayed closed.
Do you have the Homer Simpson model spice rack?
If my little one has anything to say about it I'll have an exact replica in a couple years.
Bowen says both Drones and Wells are making progress. Not going to say who's ahead.
I would be absolutely shocked if a decision was made this quick. I get the feeling that Wells always looks good at practice and can struggle in games. Whereas for Fuente and even at Tenn, Hooker struggled in practice and excelled during games.
Maybe get announced week of the ODU game, and they'll probably be platooned a bit is the vibe I'm getting
I got a 100% "we aren't there yet" vibe from Pry. He knows we will struggle this season, IMO.
He's said it'll be 2025 until we're where he wants us to be many times before. This year just needs to be a step in the right direction.
Sooo, he wants us competing for national championships....
Does that mean what i think it means????
I think he uses 'championships' as a catch all for conference championship in any conference or national championships
Given what he inherited I have no problem being patient. I would expect faster results if he inherited the roster that Fuente did. However, he inherited the weakest VT roster since I've been alive.
Obviously, I hope we can get ahead of schedule. I'd like to see visible improvement this season for certain.
I hate to say it because it might trigger some from the Fu era, but I think this is really year 1 for what Pry is trying to build. Last year was a very depleted roster of mostly leftover Fu players. Pry needed to weed the roster, bring in some transfers to fill immediate needs, and get a full cycle of his own recruits into the program. I think also last year the staff learned a lot of lessons about how they are going to approach the roster/build the program as well.
I think we should be better this year, but I wouldn't expect much more than 5-6 wins. I do expect to see a much more disciplined and tough football team this year though.
If we are more disciplined (less silly penalties) and a tougher team that gets outmuscled I think all of the fans will see the bus has turned around and is heading the right direction.
I said over and over again that last year was Year 0 and not much on the field mattered. As long as 5 years from now we're not labelling it Year 1 of Pry then I think all but the most hotheaded fans will be understanding.
I don't think this is that hot or triggering of a take.
We might've underperformed a little last year, but that roster's ceiling was pretty clearly 6 wins IMO. Not many teams are able to play at their ceiling.
Agree- the eye test showed me a low ceiling last year. I have really good seats in Lane. I can see how small we are. Small doesn't win in football.
Yupp still the vibe he's giving off because for every half realistic fan there's like 10 of these:
Well some one has access to the good drugs
7 would be fantastic. What are these people talking about... haha
Sounds like someone is prepping for the SEC.
Honestly, it boils down to; are we gonna kick ass or not? And if not, we need to at least beat uva
well, the one good thing about last year is we didn't lose to LOLUVa.
I mean, all jokes and disdain aside, last year doesn't count because of the tragedy. That was the right move for respect and healing.
This year, back to business of beating their ass
Bowen is hyping this offense up a little too much methinks. Most cohesive OL he's ever been around? Wow
Yea when it inevitably looks like we're running into a brick wall against ODU I'm going to be pretty annoyed about this.
This made me laugh.
Cohesive ≠ effective. Careful choice of word there.
Seriously though he was pretty high on everything in his presser. I think he could've managed expectations a little better, he's in a tough spot this year.
I took that to imply cohesive off the field, like they all like to go to dinner together. But maybe that's just because I am expecting the OL to struggle due to the inexperience, lack of depth, and lack of ability shown last year.
Haven't watched yet but if he's hyping it up and doesn't deliver that's going to be real tough on him. I chalk that up to inexperience. My biggest gripe with him.
Is okay if we die by trying the same thing we did at the beginning of last year? We don't have the bodies on OL to effectively establish a power run game. If we try that again this year we'll be effectively running into a brick wall all game.
Bowen in particular cannot afford to have the offense look anything like last year. His scheme seems to need a certain baseline level of talent on the O Line and at QB to be successful. He may not have either this year. Even if the state of the OL isn't his fault, another bad year we're putting the fate of the program on whether he can execute in '24
Not joking - did not recognize Holt in the video preview lol.
Giving me some Big Show vibes. Hopefully he can pull some show stoppers this year.
"that's it? That was easy"
All my takeaways are posted. <25 days to kickoff now y'all. LFG.
Edit: Shocked we didn't get a realignment question and disappointed we didn't get an elevator question.
Glad we're still referring to "wild turkey" packages. Remember when we tried them with Greg Boone?
BBBOOOOOOOOONNNNEEEE!
I will make some angry here, but if we are resorting to wild turkey packages, we don't have a quarterback.
Or an O-line to protect the QB
I don't think either QB is going to blow us away this year, we may as well have a few inventive plays to watch.
What makes you say that? We ran the wild Turkey with Boone occasionally when tyrod was our QB.