We won, but... Man, our offense was putrid. Defense and special teams played mostly well. We're fortunate gt isn't very good.
This was exactly the type of performance that Shelton wrote about. The coaches can point to the win and say we're fine but the fact is our team just isn't good.
Forums:
DISCLAIMER: Forum topics may not have been written or edited by The Key Play staff.
Comments
In defense of the Defense, this was a pretty damn good game. They kept a P5 team out of the endzone, and they've now an average of 11.3 ppg over the last 3 games. If they continue to stay hungry and Marve continues to scheme, we are looking at a very strong finish to this season.
This aint it
All true. But like French pointed out in the Miami analysis, good teams find ways to win even when they don't play well. Bad teams find ways to lose even when they outplay the other team. We didn't outplay them, but managed to win. Not sure what the future will be. Just hope Tuten is healthy and we go into Syracuse healthy.
This is the right take. GT is solid and trending up. Not every win can be a blowout.
That freshman WR and freshman QB they brought in are going to be a problem in coming years.
Good news - in today's CFB atmosphere - in a year or two, that freshman WR and freshman QB will likely be on a different team in a different conference and we won't have to worry about them
I'd argue the other way- they will more likely be there 6 years to annoy TF out of us.
I'm with the OP that this wasn't a great win as far as in-game optics went. Final score, absolutely. But this win could easily get tucked in the W drawer as if it had been a 49-6 blowout. Hopefully everyone will keep grinding and not slip up in the dome next weekend! Go Hokies!
What did you expect in year 3 of this rebuild?
Well, at the very least, I'd expect our offense to be able to get more than 5 first downs in the second half against a 4-3 GT team when we return a bunch of starters and have one of the best RBs in the conference.
SP+ had it as a 8-point Hokies win. They beat a pretty good predicative system's expectation. Georgia Tech isn't dreadful either, but VT could have been more convincing.
Yea this is where I'm at. There will be ugly games. Defense stepped up. Team did well enough to win comfortably.
That was one of the least comfortable 15 point wins I've ever watched tho
Yeah, it's not often I'm so anxious for a game to end when we're up 15 points. I really wasn't enjoying the fourth quarter.
Really? Defense kept them shut down. I felt pretty confident the whole time GT couldn't really get anything going.
Neither could VT at a certain point. Reminded me of Beamer teams, where we were completely dependent on the defense.
It's nerve-racking for me when we start at the GT 26, and end up with a 55 yard field goal attempt.
It wasn't a dominant win, but think about it this way: VT had scored enough points 16 minutes into the game to secure the win.
Or to look at it another way, at the scoring pace Georgia Tech was on, they would have needed another 11 quarters of football to take the lead.
Once we scored our 3rd touchdown with about 5 minutes left in the 3rd quarter this game WAS OVER.
I've watched enough football in my life to know that all it takes is one busted play, one bad turnover, one bad special teams play to change everything.
That lollipopped throw to tuten in the right flat where he got blown up for a loss looked incredibly close to a pick-six
Yea. We were one missed tackle, one blown assignment, one luck bounce from a busted play leading to a TD. Although, it would be hard for GT to do it twice and also convert a 2-pt conversion or get another FG. So, I personally felt comfortable for a win, but uncomfortable that it was going to be unnecessarily close. And if shit did hit the fan, I had no confidence the offense would do enough to get one more score to retake a lead.
Also of note. It's interesting that Pry only has 2-score or better wins in the ACC, which also means no "backdoor covers" to get into 1 score. GT probably should have backdoored their way into a 1-score loss. It's a weird stat that we as fans want to focus on and compare to other coaches, but we also should consider the fact that no opponent has backdoored into a 1-score VT win.
This describes multiple losses in the Pry era thus far. So in my opinion, all the reason to celebrate Saturday's game not turning out that way
I concur. Also don't forget that there were some big breaks that did not go our way. Several easily corrected timely penalties. A blocked FG. A muffed punt that was recovered inside the 5 that wasn't. And an incomplete pass that looked a lot like a fumble that would've been recovered for a safety.
It wasn't the prettiest win but I'll take it.
Exactly.
If you can't score or burn clock on offense, a busted play or two on either side of the ball can spell points for the other team.
It's a win. GT was also all the way down to their third string QB. They had a rough day at the office. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad we won. It was a disappointing performance from the offense today.
I mean they went to their 3rd string because we made their backup look awful. The same guy who completed the comeback on us two years ago. It's noticeable improvement on a day when our entire offense seemed off.
It's good to know I'm not the only crazy person who feels this way.
I'm thrilled the defense came to play. I'm glad we won. But our offense was completely listless for most of the game; maybe I have lingering trauma from the Stinespring era but seeing us win with the offense pooping all over the field doesn't make me feel great. It's just like Shelton wrote about. Winning is enough for the status quo. But the inconsistency is a sign of lack of progress and that's concerning to me. I think everyone here would generally agree that we needed to update our offense under Beamer a long long time before he hired Loeffler but he never did because we won a lot of games exactly the way we won today. Usually I'd be okay with that except that I don't trust Marve to put a solid defense on the field every single week like Bud could.
In the 2.5 years we've seen these coaches they have been mostly mid. Bowen has shown the most potential out of the two coordinators but neither are consistent and I just don't feel great about them. We'll end up winning 8 games this year and people will say we're on track and we won't see any changes. Then when we start 2-3 next year people will be up in arms again. It's a cycle I'm tired of already.
"maybe I have lingering trauma from the Stinespring era."
I'm 100% with you on this one.
I think we all need to relax about a bad performance from the offense. It was the first time since 1999 we'd scored at least 23points the first 7 games of the season, we were due for a poor performance. Every team has a stinker even Georgia only put up like 13pts against kentucky earlier this year. We were lucky enough to have our worst offensive performance of the season and still win by 15. Now if we come out with another one against Cuse i'd sound the alarm but i expect we'll come out hot next week
I sure hope you're right. Coming out hot next week and breaking the curse by winning a damn game in the dome would do a lot for this team and fan base
Cuse is not better than GT. We just beat GT with 230 yards of offense in an ugly game. If we lay a stinker vs. Cuse- it's mental and proves the dome theory- meaning we aren't mentally tough enough to win there. I firmly believe this if we lose- its mental. There won't be 25K fans there, so its not the "crowd" and this isn't Cuse with Donovan McNabb and a huge DL under Pasqualoni. If we lose to them, we weren't mentally prepared.
Reading this makes me happy that we had a bad game against GT (and still won). I hope that the GT game motivates the team.
Predictive system does not adjust or take account for pre-game or in-game injuries. That 8-point win is based on stats with Kings and Haynes in the backfield. Most of these predictive models also mute trending (aka recency bias), and VT has been trending up and GT down.
But, your point is still taken. GT is not garbage, and VT shut them down. Just also worth noting that predictive models are not agile.
They also covered the spread, right?
Indeed. But I don't think it's a leap to suggest the win-spread was due to the ineptness of GT's offense, which was inept due to the loss of their key players.
Do you think VT still wins by 8 if King and Haynes play the entire game, if VT's offense and defense play the same as they did? I don't.
Do you think the spread is 8 if those two aren't injured?
The spread was at 7.5 to start, pretty close to SP+. So, yes, that's about what I would expect the spread to be with both healthy. The spread jumped to 11.5 by game time, which only reflected the King injury.
Maybe I'm giving King too much respect, but, for comparison, I think he's played better than Drones to date. He would have loosened up the defense, adding several more conversions via the QB run. He also would've hit a deep pass or two. I think you can easily find 7.5 more points with King at QB that would've covered the opening spread.
I don't think you are at all. Married to a GT family, so I watch a lot of GT. He's pretty good, and a great fit for the offense.
Edit: Oof autocorrect
Anyways, I guess my point is that we covered the adjust line that accounted for King being out and Jamal Haynes entering the game injured. So... we did what we were supposed to do?
The score differential does reflect the expected outcome. But, I think the actual gameplay showed GT's backups are worse than expected and VT's offense was worse than expected.
If King and Haynes were healthy, their offense would be way harder to defend. They would've converted more 3rd and 4th downs, been able to make more explosive plays. I think VT was very fortunate that GT was banged up and currently don't have good roster depth.
And VT had some health issues too, but the offense was the worst than it had been all year. 10 punts? 237 total yards? Gave up 11 TFL? 2 for 15 on 3rd down? And it's not like GT's defense has been great. They're ranked 61st by SP+.
But two TDs on trick plays and another score gave VT 21 pts and bad GT play allowed for 15 point differential.
Philo hit some good passes. You're assuming that the guys that dropped passes would have caught them if there was a "better" QB. QB's can't make receivers catch balls (assuming a well thrown ball).
This also assumes that just GT would be better, but maybe if those two play an entire game, our offense plays better as well. I mean, we played Miami well, who's to say we can't play other teams well, or only have one down game on offense, or that either our offense or defense could make up for if the other has a bad game? That's why we played Miami well the games. We won. Let's keep doing that.
King brings a lot more than Philo. A whole lot more with his legs and passing.
I agree their WRs are not good. But I think King is easily good for another 7.5 points as mentioned in the comment directly above. He's not Pavia, but he's the most like Pavia on VT's schedule.
I hear ya, but saying King plays and is worth another 7.5 points assumes a fundamental difference, yet you expect us to play the same. I mentioned in another post that we'd been averaging I think it was 33 or 34 points over the last 3 games. Even if King adds 7.5 points, maybe we don't play as crappy and get an additional 7 (or even just 3) and we still cover the spread.
There were at least three, maybe four, dropped passes on 3rd or 4th down for GT in the second half. While Philo had some ridiculously overthrown passes (just slightly more ridiculous than Drones'), he was putting them on the money on the important downs. IIRC.
I mean, it's sports, so there's a ripple/butterfly effect and all. It's a hard hypothetical to answer. My position is they could have played much better, but they exceeded the on-paper expectations I've seen. To me that's a step forward for this program.
Yea. Ultimately, I think that is correct, especially based on outcome. I just think the process to get that outcome relied too much on two unsustainable factors: (1) GT's offense inept without King and (2) VT's offensive success was all built upon trick plays.
All three scoring drives relied heavily on trick plays; and two of the TDs were actually scored via trick plays. I know it's sort-of Bowen's thing to have one or two trick plays a game, and for the most part they have succeeded. But he had like 8 in the last game (if you include the double reverses). I don't think it's very sustainable when about half of the offensive total yards and 3/3 of the scoring drives are via trick plays.
In the end, they found a way to win and won comfortably, regardless of the opponent's health and the means.
If it matters, the highest spread I saw in the past week was VT -11.5, and we outperformed that 🤷♂️
Our offense today
It was a battle of who can be worse. VT tried, but GT being out a starting QB and RB (i.e., the offense) had nothing going for them. GT's WR core reminds me of VT 2021/2022 era.
GIFtory request: The 3rd or 4th down in 4th quarter where the freshman QB throws a dart to a wide-open GT WR (Rutherford?), and hits him in the chest and then he falls back 5 yards, with the ball falling to the grounds. Quite emblematic of the game. (Only sort-of kidding...)
If that was an LT3 pass it would have looked like
We went 2 of 15 on 3rd down. We lost in almost every statistical category. But we were +2 on turnovers,and that was the difference.
Ugly win is still a win...FAM
The OL didn't play great and we didn't run well which is no surprise against a good run defense. Our defense was solid when it mattered. Jenkins and Pene had stellar days, Keller was solid once again.
The offense scored touchdowns every time we made it to the red zone. GT is a solid team and we were fortunate to catch them without King.
Busch Light says it was a good win. Suck it GT. GO HOKIES!!!
Busch light has never been wrong
Unless you have an allergy to Busch products. Then after about one, it's very wrong.
It's a shame...
that's a weirdly specific allergy. Weird because it suggests they have a unique ingredient they always use or their standard process introduces a unique allergen.
Rice.
but you would also be allergic to Japanese beers. Maybe they've never had a Sapporo. Or maybe it's the specific rice used in Busch.
I have some issue with true Bavarian beers, which make me nauseous. Probably something with the local wheat and/or barely, which is sad because they're delicious.
Haven't ever had an issue with Japanese beers.
My mother and I both get splitting headaches if we consume more than one Busch product.
I think beer allergens are a bit hard to narrow down just because there are so many different ingredients and how it's made allows for them to all interact differently in each beer. I have (what I assume is) an allergy to something in IPAs, and I think it must have something to do with the way they are hopped and the oils they release or something. I can handle hoppy pale ale, rye, lagers, etc. with no problem at all, but halfway through any IPA and I get a raging headache.
If it happens in IPAs but not Pale Ales then it most probable is from histamine.
Histamine will be formed during the brewing process with higher gravity beers forming higher amounts of histamine.
By definition, IPAs will have a higher gravity than Pale Ales. The allergic reaction could be to that or to higher sulfites from more hop.. Though if you do not get a similar reaction to wine, I'd rule out sulfites.
Buddy of mine would get sneezing fits from ipas ans hoppier beers. Definitely the histamines.
My wife does the same thing.
Interesting! I do get it every once in a while with wine but not enough for me to confidently say it would be sulfate. I have thought about that before because my mom is very sensitive to sulfates, but it's not the same for me with wine vs beer. Sounds like it could likely be a reaction to the histamine. Didn't even know that was a thing!
I once read through some research regarding beer allergens and the most probable allergen in AB products was a protein in the rice. There's not usually enough hop for the allergen to come from a different source, though possible. It would probably occur in a different beer if it did come from a different source.
Can confirm Sapporo has zero rice.
You mean you can be allergic to water? I'm pretty sure that is not possible. Molecular weight too low and not enough chemical complexity.
I know you're making a joke, but for anyone wondering, it is in fact possible to be allergic to water. The condition known as aquagenic urticaria is very rare though. It only affects about every 1 in 230 million people.
Okay, I had to look that up. You are right. A long, long time ago (when I can still remember how that music used to make me smile) it was assumed that you could not be allergic to low molecular weight compounds or those without enough chemical complexity (i.e., simple repeats of homo polymers). Idea was that they could not form a fixed 3D structure capable of binding to things and causing the reaction. Learn something new every day, I guess. That is bizarre.
well, accordingly to Wikipedia, the theory is it's not water itself but water solubilizing some allergen on their skin or water reacting with some compound to form some allergen. So, the logic still stands based on the prevailing theories.
Ah, thank you! My over 30 year old VT Biochemistry degree is still correct!
Did note that it was theorized to be something dissolved in the water and not the H2O molecule itself that causes the reaction.
Not every game is going to be perfect. Good win by two scores still when our offense brought its D- game today. Yeah they didn't have King but we did what we were supposed to against a backup.
Feels a lot better to say a win is a win about a poor performance than to be pissed off about a boneheaded loss in a well played game.
Hopefully Tutens healthy and offense will be back clicking in the next game.
It could be worse.
Let's all enjoy a cold one, get everyone healed up and go win at the cuze! Just Win Baby.
I mean if we win every remaining game by 2 scores where the game wasn't in doubt since early in the 2nd quarter, I'll take it.
Are we doing FAM vs MEH threads still? It's like 1995 and I'm playing Mechwarrior 2 - Choose Your Clan.
I mean we've only done it a few times
were you looking over my shoulder? Literally was watching the MW2 intro and some gameplay yesterday. Core childhood memory for me
A call to trial - justice by combat,
Great memories here too. Was recently watching the same videos on YouTube.
MW5: Clans just came out the other day 👀
We are so spoiled. When we play really well but lose like at Miami, we say there are no moral victories. Then we play like today and actually win, but we aren't satisfied because we didn't "look" good?
"Meh" thread???? We had a win over a decent team, with a backup quarterback (which many of us have PTSD with), where it never felt too close or like we were about to completely blow it. Might be a boring win, but a 15 point win without a heartattack I will take every week
At no point in the game did I think Georgia Tech was going to win. At the very least it's a very solid 15-point win.
Really worried about Tuten, Delane and Chaplin. Crossed fingers waiting on the report tomorrow or Monday.
Tuten was walking around downtown after the game.
If we're gonna meh something it should be the accnetwork broadcasts I'm so tired of them muting the crowd and band noise. Our broadcast sounds like a damn day 1 golf tournament.
The announcer called Tuten, Drones like 7 times in a row.
"Drones empties out of the backfield"
"Drones takes the snap"
Referring to either team as just Tech.
That's always been one of my big pet peeves about playing GT, the announcers say "Tech" or the cheerleaders breaking out their "Let's Go Tech" placards. 🙄
My wife was pissed off the whole game over the muting of the crowd. We just watched the last several minutes of the SMU-Duke game and the super sparse crowd sounded three times louder than our packed house. Victims of our own high decibel fans, I guess.
It's a choice by ACCnetwork. ABC and ESPN broadcasts of games I've watched this year include the fan noise you frequently have herbstreit and Fowler raising their voice to combat it and it makes for a great game to watch...not sleep to
IMO, at this point a win is still a win. Every game isn't going to be a blow out or pretty. The offense isn't going to always put up eye-popping numbers......but in the past, this is a game we probably lose. I get that some may not be happy about the performance, but sheesh, I'll take an ugly Win over a pretty loss anyday.
I haven't watched yet but I'll say this- we won, we covered. GT is trending up and we've won 3 conference games in a row for the first time in....how long?
Again, I haven't watched yet, but the thread title tells me the jist. And my comment to that is would y'all rather have played like this next week in the Dome? Because we were due for a game that we look vulnerable again, and I'd rather it be at home to GT.. (knock on wood that we don't continue this next week.)
2019: Wake, GT, Pitt
2019 was also the last time 4 and 5 in a row: UNC, Miami
2011 was 6 and 7 in a row: Miami, Wake, BC, Duke, GT, UNC, UVA - bookended by losses to Clemson
2010 was 8 and 9 in a row. Add in the end of 2009 and it stretches to 12 in a row
Totally forgot about 2019. I thought it was longer ago than that. Eeesh, my brain🤦♂️
We went from 3-8 two seasons ago to complaining about not beating a team bad enough. Just pointing that out.
I am very happy that we won that game. Last 2 weeks we have faced some legitimate adversity and prevailed. That alone is a big step forward for the program over what we've been the last 5 years or so.
With that said, our offense struggled badly when GT hyper focused on stopping Tuten. We have to have something else to go to, we cannot be that one dimensional. If a team is that keyed in on stopping the run, our passing game has to open up. Seeing the line get blown up again and again was disheartening. I thought we were past that.
Also, our defense got bailed out so many times with GT mistakes. So many dropped balls on plays that would have extended a drive. Not complaining, we've been on the other end of that so many times lately that it's nice to benefit from terrible execution for once, but they need to tighten up, because it's not going to get any easier the rest of the way.
Is this really where we are, complaining of a 15 pt win?
It's actually a really good sign.
Seems like just yesterday we were complaining about losing a game because we had two players with the same jersey. This is real progress IMO.
I also take it as a good sign that the loss due to 2 players wearing the same number has now become a Quality Loss
Reality is not complaining. We had 230 yards of offense and they were playing their 3rd QB and lost their best player on offense during the game. We were manhandled at both lines of scrimmage for the most part. The silver lining is that Pry won his first "ugly" game as VT coach. That is progress, yes.
A little context. Yes, it was ugly, but we held them to 6 points. The next fewest points they were held to was 13 by number 12 ranked Notre Dame. After that, the next fewest points was 19 Louisville. So we held them to 7 points less than the 12th ranked team, and two touchdowns less than just about every other team they played, and we kept them out of the end zone, something that no other team has done. Yes, they were without their starting QB, but Philo looked pretty darn good. I'd be surprised if he isn't the starter here on out for them until their first string guy is healthy again.
As for the offense... Yeah, I'm not going to talk about the offense. Although - They did score 21 points, which isn't horrible. And it was weird how their defense really seemed to have our number.
It wasn't weird. OL was sleep walking and not applying the same technique and effort as they did vs BC.
Any update on injuries?
1) OL has to be better
2) When OL is better, Drones has to find a way to stretch the field. Another game where there were limited shots and all misses over the top. GT was not respecting any kind of deep threat.
3) It may be time for Reddish to take more reps from Phillips.