Inexcusably awful game and clock management week after week after week after week. We will never win close games when our coach spots the other team multiple scores a game.
Forums:
DISCLAIMER: Forum topics may not have been written or edited by The Key Play staff.
Comments
You really run a hurt QB on second and forever?
After running the clock out with 29 seconds and 3 timeouts when you only need about 35 yards to get one of the best kickers in the country into field goal range? Absolute chicken shit coaching. I like Pry but he is not the guy.
End of 2nd quarter how does he not know he already called a timeout to argue that point? Even then, call the 3rd and run an out to get into fg range.
30 seconds. tie game. 3 time outs. qb thats been slinging it. kicker that can hit from 60. in a dome. just not smart.
When he was interviewed by the radio guys at the half, he was content with the explanation that there just had to be a 10 second runoff. He is in so deep over his head it's insane.
What he said on TV was there had to be a 10 sec runoff, or burn a timeout....uh, ok... so burn a timeout
A timeout that you can't carry into the half anyway.
OK, this was a robbery, but you pay the ransom and move on. We needed the time more than we needed the timeout at that point.
He could have taken the timeout or not. He was hoping for a quick play to get them into field goal range that he could take the timeout after THAT play. Then the player made the decision that he broke away for a lot more yardage than expected so tried to get into the end zone. Not ideal, but I can see it. Ideally Schlee doesn't fumble the ball in the first place, so we don't have to question the coaches' use of timeouts.
they snapped it with 0 seconds onnthe clock
Yeah, I think the experiment is over. He's learning on the job, slowly.
I want Pry to succeed really badly. But it's so difficult to defend him after this loss. A more skilled in-game coach would have won this game (and others earlier this season).
This is the heart of the issue. We are giving away wins while hoping (against lots of contrary evidence) that Pry will figure it out.
Our Recruiting isn't exactly lighting the world on fire either.
I say..go the Cuse route and hire a schmuck who can recruit the paint off a wall. At least then you can rationalize piss poor gameday decisions with your 5☆ Recruits.
Pry needs to decide whether he wants to be a FBS Head Coach or a cheerleader and he needs to do what's necessary. Replace Marve and hire someone to call him chicken shit when he tries to go turtle and phone it in instead of going for it.
He claps more than Vanna White
They are both about equally good at coaching football
I find it hard to support the argument "Learning on the job" when 12 year old me had better understanding of time management playing Madden on a PS2. I literally don't understand how you can continually fuck up games while being paid millions of dollars
With no limit to "coaches" on the field there is no reason to not have one purely for clock management, to not account for that is bad
Who should we hire? Polling the experts....
Someone...anyone who understands how to use a timeout?
The bar for improvement isn't really high at this point...
Yeah the end of half clock management is an absolute joke
But at 21-3 that shouldn't matter. Marve called one of the worst defensive games we've seen this century. Absolute joke of a game plan and it absolutely should cost him his fucking job
Pry is not a good Head Coach and he's not getting any better.
And fucking Marve could make Brad Cornelson look like a genius.
This Staff got Outcoached by a bunch of former position coaches in their first year.
Time to clean house.
No!! But he is fucking terrible at clock management. He needs a clock management guy immediately. Dude is fucking clueless. Literally 3 times this game he's clueless on clock.
No wonder we lose close game. I still want to keep coach but god damn he can't have control of TOs.
Why pay someone else, in addition to the head coach already, money to do what a decent head coach can do?
He could pay a grad assistant $50K a season and get significant improvement in clock management. Same person could probably also double up and make sure special teams players don't have duplicate numbers.
At this point, Pry not only graduated from Mike London's school of clock management, he got a master's and is working on his doctorate.
I get that it would be cheap, but I don't think that's the only negative Pry has... we'll see if he has the Fuente loyalty issue or if he can drop an axe when he needs to.... That's my deciding factor
I completely agree with you. Fixing clock management should be simple. Firing his friend and mentee, who is vastly under performing, is a different story. I really hope Pry can put the program above his personal loyalty and hire someone better than Marve. Find a DC that can make adjustments after halftime rather than looking absolutely lost.
Is it possible that he's clueless on clock management because as a DC it's never been something he's had to worry about? I'd assume that your offensive guys are much more clock conscious because as you get down to the end you start calling the plays with the biggest upside that chew the least bit of clock whereas on the defensive side you're just trying to keep the clock going and as long as it's counting you don't care?
Just a hypothesis and in no way is it defending Pry.
This is your ceiling folks with Pry and Whit. This is it- losing to dogshit ACC teams. Get used to it. This is what we get. Losing to fucking Syracuse at the dome - while playing zero defense in the second half- fucking none. And of course a 1 score game- we have fumbles, critical penalties highlighting what shit coaching we have. This is the top- we aren't climbing any hire with Whit and Pry. Get fucking used to losing to shit teams. Also- VT football will never win a game at syracuse again. I said never and I said what I said.
Definitely Whit's ceiling.
Get used to losing to shit teams? I think we are all very used to it at this point.
Aren't we like 2-10 all time against Syracuse in the some? Pry just carrying on tradition today
That's what I was going to say.
We've never had a coach who could consistently beat Syracuse, no matter how good or bad they were.
We beat them like a drum in Lane, so I'm not buying the whole Syracuse is tough to beat thing.
And here we are again, 5-4. Having largely beaten no one. We got super lucky against BC (coaches almost choked that one away), got lucky GT's starting QB got hurt and couldn't get anything going. We're going to get steamrolled by Clemson next weekend and then play a damn good Duke team. We're going to be clawing our way to 6-6 again. Inexcusable. I'm pretty much done on Pry at this point, but he's at a bare minimum going to have to hire better assistants this offseason. Honestly I just want Whit to leave or retire and the new AD cleans house at this point. Pry is a salesman and that's about it.
Sad part is I expect a bit of regression next year.
This was the year we needed to win games to help drive recruiting and compel portal transfers to join the program. That has been squandered..
I like Pry, but he's just a loser. I don't see him taking the program back to prominence.
A bit??
We lose Tuten to graduating and the NFL and we lose Drones because he can't possibly be so dumb to not transfer to a school with a real QB coach.
3 wins next year, at best, with this staff, although I guess you are correct, that's only a bit less than 5 wins.
Yeah
Remember, this is the one program in all of football who returned the most senior talent, with basically every offensive and defensive starter returning, and we are a .500 team making freshman level mistakes.
And it's not like the recruiting is lighting it on fire. It's better than it was under Fuente, but that's a very low bar to clear.
I didn't believe it was possible, but you've made me even more sad.
My apologies. Pry is the one to blame for the sadness, however
I think Pry could still get one chance this off season to maintain hope and the narrative of forward momentum by making staff changes, but unfortunately my expectation is that isn't going to happen and you are probably right that he doesn't quite have what it takes despite doing so many things right as the face of a program.
Joe, I wish to unsubscribe from the Key Play...what do I need to do .
Leg to offset the downvotes. I'm not leaving TKP, but I may need to pull back a bit from Here for a while....we shall see. I can't hardly take the vitriol around here from some people anymore. I'm just not a negative person and I've got more important things in my life to worry about. I'll still be watching next week, don't know if I'll be part of the game thread though. Too much pessimism for me.
It's not pessimism when it's true
Then maybe negative environment is the right way to put it. Even if it's true, hanging around a bunch of people being incredibly negative just ain't fun man. And people never seem to look at the positives - like scoring 31 points on the road with backups.
The negativity certainly isn't fun, but VT just isn't providing an enjoyable product. I don't blame people for venting/being negative. I think the fan base is at a breaking point.
In the words of Herm Edwards, you play to win the game. Moral victories don't count in the W/L column. Those are things to look for in year one when everyone knew we would be rotten and rebuilding. Not in year three with the production we returned and a good bit of media hype behind the program for the first time in a while. While it's certainly a positive that the offense performed well with starters out, it unfortunately gets overshadowed by an epic defensive and coaching collapse that now puts us at 1-12 in one score games under Pry.
And it's not just Pry. By and large, this program has been stuck in the mud for almost 15 years, dating back to last several years of Beamer. See his quote post ECU loss "they're exhibition games" and "preseason games"
On the enjoyable product topic. I at least think our games are fun to watch. The talent we have makes for explosive plays on offense and defense which adds to the frustration when we flounder and do nothing for quarters at a time.
Offense runs for 0-1 yards 10 times then breaks one for a TD.
Defense is Swiss cheese then gets a big sack or a turnover.
Yeah, we definitely have some great plays, just wish we could be more consistent with them. I think having better linemen on both sides would help. Well, I've seen where our D-line penetrate, but then just aren't fast enough to catch a QB that starts running. And on O, there's stuff like what happened when our lineman just got pushed back and stepped on Drones' ankle.
I think our roster is getting better, like I've said, just slower than most people hope.
Yeah, but I think it's fairly justified in today's CFB world. Look at Indiana. They're fucking stomping teams after being a laughingstock for years. In year one of a new coach. Fucking Indiana. A true basketball school. Why can't we, a football school (at least we used to be, before Whit...) have at least a fraction of that "acceleration"?
To be fair, the fall to mediocrity started in 2012 (you could argue earlier, but I digress), and Whit was hired in 2014.
Boy I was thinking Whit was here in 2012.... I stand corrected, but believe the overall point stands.
For every coach that has instant success, how many do you think are mediocre or bad. It's great to say we want that, but what are the odds of actually getting it. If there was a predictor of that, Florida, Alabama, or probably Liberty (but only if that person was also a despicable human as well (specific to Liberty, in case that wasn't clear)) would have hired that person.
And then there's something like Norvell, going 10-3, 13-1, and then 1-8 this season.
It seems like people think it's easy to go hire a super successful coach. Sure, you can point to coaches that are very successful in a very short amount of time, but isn't the norm and isn't easy to identify as a hire.
Fair point, but I didn't say I'm looking for exactly that. I said a fraction of the "acceleration" (for lack of better term). Like, is improving our win total year over year too much to ask for when you return 84% of experience, including 2 of the most exciting players you've had in years, and have a very manageable schedule? Just an improvement? Because at this point I'd be ASTOUNDED if this staff wins 8 including a bowl game this year.
We can accept 6-7 wins being our peak at Virginia Tech. That's fine. Give Brent Pry 8 years to try to figure out timeouts and winning close games and hope you beat UVA to make the Gasparilla Bowl. That's cool. It's been 12 years of this now. We can settle for that because we are special and can't find a good coach. 6-7 wins and Enter Sandman. Awesome. Or we can do what Tennessee did and find a real fucking football coach and win 10 games and be in the ACC Championship mix. Whit and Sands have a choice here.
Keep paying discount salaries and we're going to keep getting cheap results.
And I don't for a second buy that we cannot financially support a Top 25 paid staff. We just choose not to because we'd rather slash expenditures than invest in an effort to make money. Sometimes the best way to make more revenue is to invest. We saw it happen in basketball when we paid Buzz and staff a Top 10 salary in all of basketball only to see the program immediately take off and turn into a legitimate contender by the time he left. The exact same, or at least seeing our football program turn into a conference title contender, would happen if we legitimately invested into football.
But instead we'll take an unknown first time head coach and 2 first time coordinators because its cheaper than paying for someone with experience. And the results are predictable. Teams that fail at the little things because the guys in charge are learning on the job. The clock management issues and having 2 players on the field with the same number, and being unable to make midgame adjustments, that's all because its a coaching staff that has never done it before. And that's what we get for always taking the cheap way out.
Yes, our ceiling right now is 7 or 8 wins with a team of seniors against a cakewalk of a schedule because that's what we are paying for. If we wanted more than that, we'd have hired someone who knew what they were doing before they got to Blacksburg.
Bingo. Marve sucked in the second half Saturday- sucked. Pat Narduzzi - a real defensive coach- gave him a clinic on beating cuse and he ignored it. He played soft up 21-3 and that's when McCord- a former big time recruit that can throw- will kill you. Make McCord throw 50/50 balls you fucking idiot. Don't let him sit back and throw into zone coverage. Also- teach your LBs how to fit gaps after 3 years. Marve was actrocious and unacceptable the second half Saturday. And if you are grinding your teeth hoping we beat UVA to not ruin your thanksgiving weekend. Thank him. And to your point, Whit wouldn't pay for an experienced DC. So here we are
what happened to all the salary money we aren't paying now? Crooks and Brookes are cheaper than Joe and Brad. Combine that with Duffy vs Brooks and we are spend a lot less on salaries than a few years ago. So where is that money and why can't we use it for a DC?
Plus, should be "recovered" from Fuente's buyout. Marve did receive a 2-year extension last offseason, but it's unclear whether any of that is guaranteed or whether VT can buy it out. There might not be any cost to terminate the contract. It's typical for coordinators to have an at-will contract, so I presume that's the case.
The first TD was man coverage, just no safety or LB help so a 5-yard hitch and a missed tackle turned into a 55-yard TD. The second TD was right after a screen for 41 yards, so unclear to me whether it was man. In both cases, Marve fired a blitz that didn't hit. Which, of course it didn't because they were dinks. They were just dinking and dunking all game. The third TD was an RPO where Mose Phillips ran into Delane. I honestly have no idea what Phillips was doing. It's one of those plays that would be hilarious if it was the other team. And then Syracuse just ran the ball or threw RB screens to win, with the last play in OT a 10-yard rush from the I-formation. Straight garbage.
It's called "poverty thinking."
How long was Tennessee mediocre with how many coaches before they found that one though? All I'm saying is what if Pry can get to 10 wins, it just takes him 5 years to get there? Or do we go through 20 years of finding the wrong coaches before we find the right coach? Tennessee went through 7 coaches between 2009 and now. That is a LOT of buyouts. Granted, some probably left for other programs, and 2 were probably interim, but it's still a lot of changes.
And there are some examples of coaches that were really successful, but it wasn't immediate. It took Beamer 6 years, during which he peaked at 6 wins, and went2-8-1 in his 6th season before winning 9 games in his 7th season. We knew Fuente wasn't going to do any better over time because of his recruiting, but Pry is slowly doing better.
I am not content to only win 6-7 games a season, but I"m also not so impatient that I think a new coach needs to win 10 games in 2-3 seasons.
Put percentages around it. How likely do you think it is that pry wins 10 regular season games in the next 2 seasons?
And how likely do you think that once he achieves that he can get us there with relative frequency?
OK- lets play along. Year 5 for Pry is 2026- VMI and ODU at home. If he doesn't win those, this whole example is useless because he is simply not a good coach, but lets play. That's 2 wins. At Maryland- can he beat a P4 OOC team? He hasn't yet. Maryland is not Oregon. Toss up. - Home against JMU- that is a loss for Pry- for a myriad of reasons, chief being they are mentally tougher than we are and will want to beat VT with all they have. Unless we sign the next Cam Ward in the portal- loss. Road schedule- at Miami, At BC, at Clemson, at Cal. Lets say we split those 4 road games- Pry has shown he can not win consistently on the road in conference BTW.. so we are at 4-4 likely case, 5-3 very best case, IMO. Then we have GT, UVA, NCSU, and Pitt at home. We sweeping that? To get to 10 wins in 2 years, you are talking about winning on the road at either Clemson or Miami. You are talking about being mentally tough enough to beat a JMU team that lives to beat you. You are beating a P4 OOC team for the first time in ages, and you are talking about sweeping Pitt, BC, GT- something we haven't done in ages. REALISTICALLY- 10 wins is not happening in 2026.
Lets look at noted football power Indiana, shall we? They have been ranked in the AP poll in any given year FOUR times prior to this year since 1994- 30 years. FOUR times. They were 9-27 the past 3 seasons before this one. They have not won a bowl game since 1991. They have not won the B1G since 1967..... They hired JMU's coach and brought in a bunch of JMU's players with no ties to Indiana and they are undefeated and have a clear path to the 12 team playoff in YEAR ONE. I'd say that guy can coach? Or maybe this is just a miracle year, but it seems he knows what he is doing. Perhaps Whit Babcock- who I am told has a super secret full proof comprehensive interview process, and does more research than anyone- perhaps he could find a guy like that ??? 1. A former HEAD coach somewhere, 2. A guy with a system that works, 3. A guy who's players follow him and play hard for him. A unicorn I know, but Indiana- a basketball school- did it.
And Cig might flame out at Indiana because he can coach but can't recruit, who knows, but I would have been happy to find out at VT instead of Indiana
Yes because VT is special and doesn't actually run a multi million dollar athletic program. No, they all come to merryman to eat donuts and allow their AD- who has a terrible illness - to remain in that role in that state of declining physical health, because? You aren't serious about winning championships. Jim Weaver was a fine man and did great things here, but you can leave him in a smaller role in the department while he battles a debilitating disease. That would have been best for both parties.
I wouldn't frame it as harshly as you suggested, but you're not wrong. At some point in the mid-late aughts, VT said "This is enough," while Everyone else in college football said "let's keep going"
While Whit/Sands deserve some (one could argue most) of the blame for the current state, Steger and Weaver certainly deserve some too.
I get it, I really do. I like winning. I'm a very competitive person. And it was awesome having so many 10-win seasons. I was just explaining what the other poster was getting at. Losing is bad enough, some people just don't want to get on here after a loss and read a lot more negative stuff. Some people do want to vent.
I'm just hesitant to totally to throw up my hands and say we should be done with Pry. I've posted a bunch about us averaging 30.7 ppg this year. If we'd done that under Beamer with Foster's defense, we may have had a couple undefeated seasons under our belt. It feels like our offense has gotten better, and with a really good line seems like it could be even substantially better. If we hadn't let them score 28 points in the second half, we win that game. If we're going to let someone go, I think it should be Marve.
But our recruiting is getting better. I know people have said we're not so much raising the ceiling, but raising the floor. Maybe we can develop those guys that are coming in and it's better than some of the low floor guys we may still have on the roster because we can't just overturn every position for an automatic upgrade.
And, the other thing is, for all the calls to fire Pry, I think they forget something - getting a new coach doesn't guarantee improvement. There have been coaches who were very successful at some schools that go to different schools and don't do anywhere near as well.
Sure you can make the excuse for the backup QB, but what about the other 10 one score losses?
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice?
3 blown double digit leads, with the first 2 coming in 2022. I don't wanna fire the guy, but you can certainly make a compelling case for doing so. And Marve absolutely has to go.
1-12. Do something now if you want your job. I stopped my triumph donation after Rutgers and my athletics money is going to T&F until this program is serious about football. We are doing less with more in a way that only Miami can best.
The thing that pisses me off the most about the wasted time at the end of regulation is the fact that Brown gave Pry the nicest gift he ever could by kicking the extra point instead of going for 2. Let's be honest here, the way our defense was playing, had Brown gone for 2, they probably would've gotten it. But he didn't. Instead, he kicked the extra point and left the game tied with about 30 seconds and 3 time outs. That 30 seconds was more than enough time to try to get into FG range for Love. And what did Pry do with it? He pissed it away and didn't even try. CHICKEN SHIT COACHING!!!
Yeah but he was scared. The man has no killer instinct, he coaches a timid, scared game and gets the results he deserves
LOL, so he decided to put the game in jeopardy instead. Dude is overdosing on crazy pills.
I honestly don't get it. He's coaching scared because he knows if he doesn't get it turned around he and his staff will be gone. But what do you have to lose? You won the lottery getting a P4 coaching job handed to you when no one else was considering you for same anywhere, and if you blow it and get fired, you will land a P4 coordinator job somewhere very quickly. Maybe even back with dear old James. Why not just throw everything you have into it?
Congrats, you have now put your job in jeopardy instead. Scared money don't make money
Agree 💯. That quote just proves it.
Cuse only had two timeouts... After you ran it on first down, Pry would havebeen able to gauge if Cuse was gonna force the issue and call timeout on their end....
Once they didn't call timeout, Pry should've called TO, seen what we should've gotten on second and go from there.
Not to mention the fact that Schlee played better than Drones had about half his starts this year. Not saying a healthy Drones wouldn't have been better, but Schlee played better than any reasonable person could expect.
It makes zero sense. Backup QB to get you in FG range or backup QB in an OT on the road where you ahve ZERO momentum. In that game situation/environment we are winning that OT less than 20% of the time, but I think we get into FG range at end of regulation maybe close to 50% of the time. His explanation is simply not acceptable; he needs to own that mistake to show he understands. You had let your backup QB throw the ball all game, it is what got you the big lead to begin with. Sad and disappointing.
This is what needs to happen:
Whit needs to make a lowlight reel of all the stupid decisions Brent has made leading to this abysmal 1-11 record in close games. Go through them 1 by 1 and say "what was the thought process here? Did you consider the alternative? How did you decide? In hindsight, would you have done it differently? Why did you make the same mistake again the next time this situation arose?" I mean for God's sake, time management and/or not knowing when to try for a field goal with one of the best kickers in the country has cost us 3 games this year
This is what truly needs to happen, and I hope happens:
Big money donors and the Board put some pressure on Sands to either fire Whit or push him to retire with grace at the conclusion of this academic year. Have the decision announced months in advance so you can assemble an AD search committee and start the search in earnest. Pry is told he has to make assistant changes and he has next year under the new AD to prove himself, or else the new AD is cleaning house and bringing his own hire in. That's how you light a fire under the asses of this country club AD.
It needs to be a complete house cleaning at the administrative level. They have to remove all the Ballein influence. It's a rot throughout the core.
Agree. The President/Board need to assemble a really strong AD search committee when Whit's departure is announced and make it clear this new hire is coming in to drastically restructure/evaluate the AD. Not assimilate with the country club. I hope they hire a total outsider.
Hire a total outsider:
Rich Rod is probably available.
Ducks!
If we are hiring Rich Rod as AD, something has gone terribly wrong.
I don't know if anyone has noticed?? But Rich Rod is not a good football coach? Anybody pick up on this the past 15 years? Weird.
And just like that, the past what? 10 years? It's like they never even happened...
Why is that fucking loser fossil - who has been on staff for 37 years... 37... still associated with our football team?? Fucking retire already you fucking prick. Find someone for 1/16th of the price to book hotels for Pry. FFS.
Unfortunately, I'm afraid none of this matters until the "Apex Predator" in all of this decides to become a "football school" and invest the appropriate dollars.
Though I have emphatically stated fire Marve, if the dollars don't shift upward to hire the "right guy" then the definition of insanity sets in. The next guy will be Marve 2.0 more than likely.
The same goes for Pry and Whitt. If the money isn't there now and won't be infused into the program then here we are as a program and here is where we are going to stay regardless of who we hire and fire.
It feeds into your statement about the last 15 years.
I was SCREAMING at the TV at the end of both halves and calling him a chicken shit p***y for coaching scared. In both scenarios he had more than enough time to drive to within FG range and give our 90% FG kicker with a long of 57 yd a shot to get ahead and win it. Hell, at the end of the 1st half he could have even scored.
The man has no killer instinct when it gets to the end of the half/game. He'd rather layup then go for blood. He'll go for trick plays or 4th downs during the game when it may or may not matter, but when the game literally comes down to it, he'd rather play for OT than try and win it and have to settle for OT.
I'm pretty sure had they gotten the 2 point conversion, we would've had a better chance of winning actually because it would've forced Pry's dumbass to try to win.
With how the offense played and 3 timeouts, we probably had a good chance to at least get a long FG attempt. And you're in a dome and Love has hit a 57 yarder this year.
Everyone who watched knew we were cooked in OT, but Pry couldn't wait for it. And sure enough, 5 plays later the game was over
So we got the timeout back, and we chose NOT to use it and allowed the 10 second runoff with 17 seconds left in the half and just outside of field goal range?!?!
🤬
That quote is just absolute BS for a HC. If the communications aren't clear, hound the shit out of the refs until everything is crystal clear. The officials owe that to each HC...it's part of their job. You don't have to go full Narduzzi on them. But Pry was way too calm, collected, & passive about how things played out to later claim he didn't fully understand what transpired.
He is so confused at all times when it comes to clock management/timeouts that he just deferred to the refs and decided it would be easier to just run the clock out and go to the half.
He told Burnop after the game that he didn't want to try a long field goal and decided to go to the half and regroup. So you did want to try for a field goal one play before when it was 1st and 10 with 2 timeouts, but now that it's 2nd and 14 with 2 timeouts you want to save your timeouts and run the clock out? Bullshit. He's either lying and can't bring himself to admit he fucked it up, or he's so stupid when it comes to clock management that he doesn't even realize that he fucked it up.
At this point he seems beyond saving.
I agree that he needs a clock expert, but I doubt but maybe 10% FBS coaches know the exact rule of calling a timeout, having a replay go negative resulting in loss of yards. Logically, the clock goes back to when the knee was down and he gets his TO back. And if that is what happened and he didn't call a timeout after he got it back, then yea, that's on him. But why was there a 10-second runoff?
Lame. He is paid millions per year and any job has accountability to know the rules - like them or not. I think you are wrong as well - most coaches know the rules. It should be acceptable to not based on some assumption nobody can clear a low bar.
This is easy stuff. Figure it out and accept nothing less
TBF, he did. They refs f'ed that one up.
What is the f'ing rule that there is a 10 second runoff for a replay that is negative for your team. And he called a timeout. But they didn't grant it after the replay. Blame him for the end of game clock management, but the halftime shit is on the refs or some whackass rules.
He admitted post game they offered the timeout back which he was given the option to use and he declined, which triggered the run off. Pry decided to take it to the half. He screwed it up.
Bingo - he was lost as to figuring out the combination of time left + yard line + timeouts + choices and made a bad choice because he wasn't smart enough to already know the refs were making a mistake.
I can't recruit, build a roster, coach the positions etc. I do however, know those rules and was screaming at the TV that they were wrong. Why can't Pry?
yea, I'm not sure there is a scenario one declines to use their T.O. there. The only reason to not use the timeout is to just let the clock run out, so why did he run another play if he didn't use the timeout?
So, he went into the half having two TOs left?
Yes, so he finished the game with six unused. Two first half, three second and one in OT.
At the end of the season he can turn in all un-used TO's for prizes...
Grossly underlegged comment. Appreciate the chuckle.
OK. Now I want to know what he was told by the ref. I need to hear that conversation and how he ended up not taking that time out. I was under the impression that the refs just decided to take 10 seconds and run the clock.
After that replay, you take that timeout 100% of the time, if no other reason than to figure out what the strategy is for that last 17 seconds. Even if the plan ends up kneeling it to go into half, you still have to take the timeout to think about it after you know the exact down and distance, time left on the clock, etc.
And, if they did take that timeout and the next play was that Coney run, they probably would have had about 5 seconds left after Coney was tackled to try a FG try. But, butterfly effect, no guarantee that run is as successful after a timeout.
Even with all the game management gaffes, Marve is still my major problem here. His defenses are bad and his play calling keeps missing at critical times. Just atrocious. Pry needs to make a change, if not just to make him a scapegoat to cover his own ass. But really, it's because Marve is not good enough as a position coach, recruiter, and defensive play caller.
The scoreboard only showed 1 TO left at the end of the first half. Still one to many.
Yup, the whole staff needs to go. Feel bad for Bowen, the offense hasn't been the issue but Marve can't coach his was out of a paper bag and Pry is clueless. Most talented team we've had in a while and these guys are making peewee football coaching mistakes.
hard disagree about the offense, in past games the offense has been the problem and defense kept us in it. I think both coordinators should be gone
I think Bowen has shown potential and growth compared to Marve. But I do overall agree, too much learning on the job.
Yeah, it's like they take turns being the problem of the week. No consistency.
I agree there are reasonable arguments you could make for one or the other being the bigger problem. My feeling is fire Marve, but I'm not an expert. In some ways I don't think it matters for the program (edit: relative to the critical importance of firing someone and Pry proving he is willing to make changes to the staff based on performance) which one or both are fired, and a lot of that specific decision might depend on who can be hired to replace them. I think neither coordinator should be considered safe, you put together your list and start contacting possible replacements for both, and you focus on trying to hire the best available option from there, possibly retaining one of the coordinators if you can't find a better option.
Bowen needs to either schedule cupcakes the first four games or get an offensive identity sooner. Waiting until the fourth game is too late (this year and last).
I don't really understand why we hired two first time coordinators, lack of funds I guess, but could we have gotten someone who's had success at the lower levels as an OC/DC?
Definitely wasn't lack of funds. He had a very large budget for assistants. He chose to underhire (using that "we're going to outwork everyone" mantra).
Based on what metric? Tech's salary pool is mid even in the ACC.
Whit had a budget of all coaches salaries to work (would have put us top 3-4 ACC salary range...at the time). He hired Pry "under" the budget and the remainder was to allowed for assistants.
If memory serves me correctly Pry spent about half of what he was allotted (left). Whit was to take back any over budget asks (and they were going to approve...they understood the necessity to get food assistants).
Keep in mind this was before the major NIL push, so they had pretty good fund raising for admin/facilities (and Fu's buyout).
Source?
I have never read anywhere that Pry spent half of his allotted budget.
So you are thumbing your nose with 31 points and 455 yards with backups? Yeah, maybe the D had to keep us in it before, but maybe Bowen has learned enough to keep the O competitive. And maybe with some GOOD o-linemen, we could be a fair amount better.
Our offense has only scored less than 30 points 3 times this season, and not once less than 20 points. We scored less than 20 points 5 times last season. Our O has gotten better, lots better.
Our D held opponents to 20 or fewer points 5 times last season, with the best defensive outings, 10 and 13 points scored against us. The season isn't over, and we've already held 4 teams to 20 points or less, including 2 games where we held opponents to less than 10 points. Our D seems like it's getting better also, just not as much as the O.
Yes, the season is disappointing, but I don't know how we could have thought we'd honestly be contending for ACC champs when our O line was suspect last year and we schemed around it. We didn't really upgrade our O Line, they just got more experience, but until we improve our line, I still would have expected losses (maybe not quite as bad) like we had against Louisville and Fl. state last year.
It's been a long fucking time the VT defense "kept us in a game" WADR
I get your point and agree with you but.... GT last week?
GT beats us last week with QB1.
we gained 13 yards total on 7 drives in the 2nd half against GT and had 1 TD drive. The defense played nearly the entire 2nd half and still only gave up 6 total points
I hear everyone, and it's a disappointing result, but we scored 31 points and put up 455 yards on the road with a backup QB and 2nd and 3rd string running backs. I mean, I gotta give it to the O on this one. How many times over the past 10-12 years would we have BEGGED for the kind of offensive performance we put up today? And we did it with backups.
The D started well, then the wheels fell off. Did the D started well playing more preventative? (I remember under Beamer that never really worked for us either, if we stopped being aggressive on D, people usually climbed back) Did the defensive guys just think we were crushing them so relaxed rather than keeping an edge? Or did Syracuse just start making plays they hadn't been? Or some combination of those 3.
Or maybe it was the guy who commented that we hadn't allowed a touchdown in 7 quarters. /s (maybe?)
The backup thing gets thrown out the window when you are up 21-3 with 19 minutes left in the game. It's clearly not the backup RB or QB's limitations when you have an 18 point lead late. They did their job. Also the "road" thing is meaningless when the stadium is half full. only losers make that excuse. There were 25K people there. Less than our spring game. Who cares if its "road" at that point? Again we had a 3 score lead in the 3rd Q. There was nothing positive about losing to an unranked Syracuse team and giving up 35 points in the second half. Nothing positive. The fact that a RS Senior portal QB with starting experience can complete passes is ONLY a surprise at Virginia Tech. Also -Malachi Thomas- a RS Junior who has started games here- being able to run the ball again is only a surprise to VT fans. The defense sucks. Sucks. I have been saying it all year.
Didn't I just say the defense fell apart?
Schlee, Coney, Thomas, Gosnell, and the D players played their hearts out. Tackling was suspect at times but its impossible to be disappointed with what the guys did on the field. Schlee in particular showed up with a chip on his shoulder.
Coaching is a completely different story.
"D players played their hearts out"- maybe. But they got steamrolled the last 19 mins. So somethings wrong. They just aren't good or not in the right spots.
Technically it was the 3rd and 4th string RB's. PJ was number 2 until injured.
Two reasons you can't fire pry Yet:
I don't see anyone getting fired. But any assertion to fire Pry should carry the assumption Whit goes or is gone too.
What's the ceiling on the off the field? He's massaged the balls of every VA high school since day 0 and has gotten a few great in-state prospects, a lot of developable options, but has he turned the tide on PSU, OSU, others coming into VA? I don't think so.
The tough thing is I don't think we have any idea how long building recruiting relationships from where Fuente left us should take, and not just the relationships with the schools, but the local players that some of these other schools may have been in their ears since their freshmen years (or possibly earlier).
VT just isn't a major football program. We missed that boat when we had the chance, but it's been too long now. We need a really strong coach to lead VT and someone who will not completely go out of their way to sabotage relationships with recruiting in our footprint like Fuente did. Recruit those mid-tier players and sprinkle in some higher level guys here and there and through the portal. Coach, coach, coach and develop guys like we did in the Beamer era. That is VT football.
Sounds like we need...
... Brent Pry.
Sure - I'm just saying there's an order of operations here. Need to get a new AD in first.
He hasn't raised the ceiling, but he is continuing to raise the talent floor. He's secured competitive NIL. He has booster support (or had... we'll see).
Maybe these are things that are 'done' and he can't grow them further.
An interesting question is - how much of his time and attention that could have been on coaching has had to be devoted to fixing the recruiting relationships (or lack thereof) Fuente left us with, grow the recruiting machine bigger than what Fuente understood it needed to be, securing NIL funding (him coming from PSU was probably helpful because nobody else related to football had experience near the top of the P5 to say what we need to be competitive), then evaluate the roster and fix unbelievably stupid stuff like 10 RBs on a roster, before trying to actually field a competitive team.
Basically, most coaches walk into a program and the foundation is already there. Given how Beamer did things, then Fuente coming from Memphis, we needed a lot of foundation building done, and Pry was going to be the architect rather than hiring someone else (could we get Saban as a consultant? 🤔).
I mean, take a step back. For everyone saying Pry is an experiment that failed, imagine what the ideal situation would have been. Say we had 10 of our biggest alumni football supporters all become trillionaires and all donate 10 billion dollars apiece. We could hire Saban for a couples years for a billion dollars (because why else would he come here), we.could hire as many staff people we wanted, and out-NIL every other school out there for the best players, and potentially NIL them into passing on the draft for several years.
Considering that was never going to happen, who do we realistically think we could have hired, that could have taken the staff, roster, recruiting relationships, NIL situation, etc, and be as successful as we want to be in 3 years? Given where we were when Pry was hired, I have a hard time believing anybody in our price range could have done any better. We weren't the program Beamer had, and even then, we WERE heading into obsolescence.
I think it's hard for most of us to imagine how bad, not just in wins/losses, but where the program was, given that, for a lot of us, it feels like we were a 10 win a year program for so long and played for a National Championship not that long ago.
Maybe we wanted to be better than where we are now, but we're better than we were last year, even though our record doesn't show it. I mean, look at us playing Syracuse last year. We were on our home field, had both Drones and Tuten, and
still lostwon 38-10. This year, we're on the road, without both Tuten and Drones, and we put up only 8 points less than we did last year, and it was still 31 points.I mean, if everyone on here knew we were playing without Drones and Tuten today, I'm pretty sure we would have thought we'd get blown out, and score maybe a total of 10 points.
I mean, I get it, I'd rather be sitting at 8 wins right now, but it seems like we're doing better this season than last year. We played two good teams last year, Florida State and Louisville. Louisville DESTROYED us, and FL State beat us pretty handily. This year, we've played one really good team - Miami, and we arguably beat them. We only have one other good team to play this year - Clemson. And writing this, I'm actually feeling better about how we may play them than I had up until now. I honestly think we are better than last year despite our record. If we lose to Clemson and then beat Duke and LOLUVA, we're 7-5, or one win better than we were last year.
And for anyone who says we should be much better than- I'd point out two things. As I mentioned, we didn't upgrade our O-Line, and it's hard to be good with an O-Line good teams can take advantage of. Second, doing about the same or better isn't a given. Ask FL State how it feels going from 13-1 last year to 1-8 this year.
Yes, I get everyone wants to be substantially better, and our losses have been disappointing. But they were all winnable. I mean, hiring a new football coach other than at a blue blood is always a crap shoot. Pry may not be winning as many games as we'd want, but look really really hard at what we looked like last year and then look hard at how we look this year. I think we're better. Our recruiting has been better. I think we'll be better next year. I mean, if we keep winning one more game than the previous season, would you all take that, feeling like we'd get back to winning at least 10 wins a season, just taking longer than we'd want?
If Whit gets fired, and we fire Pry, what are the odds we get a coach that can come in, recruit better, and get us to 10 wins and eventually the playoffs? I mean, if next year we split the difference on close games, we have 2 more wins and we're 7-2 with 2 more wins likely. I think we'll get there, and based on the improvement, it feels like we could do it next year.
Wow, and I sincerely apologize for the novel.
Edited in a couple places for clarity.
We won that game last year 38-10 while putting up over 500 yards of offense and holding them to less than 150.
Yeah, I just noticed I read the score backwards when I was responding to someone else and averaging points last year.
But still, we scored 38 last year with both Drones and Tuten and scored 31 this year against them, on the road, with backups at QB and RB. And we're averaging almost 31 points per game, up from #6.2 during the regular season last year and 28.6 after our 55 point win against Tulane. And last year, same time, we'd just gotten blown out by Louisville and were only averaging 23.6 ppg. And we're were averaging 26.1 ppg before Louisville .
We'll see how we do against Clemson, but it's hard to imagine getting blown out by them considering LOLUVA just scored 31 on them.
And we're ARE averaging 30.7ppg this year. Do we REALLY want to get rid of Bowen? If we had a sound defense, that would be good enough to win most games.
Bowen is learning on the job and I'm not sure how happy I'd be watching him take want he's learned someplace else
EDIT: "some place else and win"
30.7 ppg isn't something to sneeze at. And considering it's 4 ppg higher than last year, or 2 ppg after our 55 point win against Tulane, that seems like a substantial improvement. If we improve 2-4 ppg next year, that would put us near top 20 scoring offenses (and some of the scoring leaders are not in P5 conferences, so may be easier for them to beat up on weaker opponents).
Against FBS we are 37th in scoring tied with PSU and 0.2 ppg behind UGA.
We are are 25th in scoring average against P4 teams
Hot take, this game plays out the same with drones and Tuten starting.
Agreed.
1. QB and RB weren't responsible for the boneheaded coaching errors.
2. Drones and Tuten don't play defense.
3. Drones doesn't make half the plays that Schlee made with his arm. That dude can throw.
Maybe we don't get the sacks that Schlee had with Drones, and maybe Drones can run the ball in other instances. And maybe some of the times we got caught on runs, we don't get caught, like Coney at the end of the first half.
Why do you say that? Maybe we have 7 or 14 more points on the board if they play.
I'm merely looking at the outcome if the defensive performance and game management are the same. We could score more in the first half or game, but we've seen the offense underperform when those two are healthy, i.e., Georgia Tech.
That's due to in-game coaching failures. Vandy, Miami, and Syracuse were all lost due to poor in game coaching.
And it's not just this season. It's been a trend over the last 2.5 seasons.
But what's most concerning is I can't think of a single coach who was bad at clock management, had a bad record in close games, and turned it around. I'd love to see examples. Maybe Mario Cristobal will make the turn. But it's not common.
Its not even just "poor" in game coaching decisions.... its lack of ability to match a 12 year olds level of clock management
Sometimes you can just tell which coaches played EA NCAA and which ones didn't.
In my head, I imagine this scenario where a grad assistant sits down with Pry and makes him play NCAA with 5 min quarters, and every time he makes a bad clock management decision he gets an electric shock and a verbal berating.
Fair enough, but one way to fix those close game problems is to make the games not close any more. Through the same point in the season as last year, we're averaging 4 points more per game. If we had a corresponding decrease in points scored against us per game, we win every game this season. Let's fix the defense.
But even then Vandy beat Alabama. And Miami is undefeated. Last year we got thrashed by really good teams. FL State beat us 39-17. Louisville beat us 34-3. We arguably beat the best team we've played this year, where last year, I'd argue they would have destroyed us. Yes, better clock management may have sealed the Miami game, but we didn't lose it by at least 22 points like we lost against last year's good teams. And, oh, by the way, Miami is averaging 47 points per game. Last year, I doubt we would have even been in a position to win against Miami.
So yeah,clock management isn't good. It still feels like we're getting better. And what if he does get better at clock management (which I'd argue is easier if your offense and defense are consistent - maybe some of what he did today was because his defense wasn't stopping them any more, so he felt he needed touchdowns rather than field goals or something).
That's not realistic. How many teams in college football history have gone through a season without a one score game? Come on now.
This is the crux of the problem. Players are improve but our ceiling is not moving.
Fair, but we've had 4 one-score games. If we can make two of them more than one-score games, we're a 9 win team this year. And maybe he gets better at clock management as well. And then all of a sudden, we win those games where clock management is the problem. Am I saying he WILL get better at it? Not necessarily, but I'm interested to see if he can. The losses are frustrating, but I don't feel like this is a bad program the way I did with Fuente toward the end. I feel like we're improving, just not as quickly as everyone would have liked.
Last year we only had 3 one-score games, but that's because our losses were worse. Our greater than one-score losses last year were by 19, 22, and 31 points. So, yeah, we won (potentially) more games last season, but we weren't competitive in 3 of them. We have been competitive in every game this season. That's a step up from last year.
I feel like we're improving, I'm not sold that it's a given we do better with some unknown hire, so I would like to see how we do next year.
Edit: improving our ppg by at least 2 points from last year is encouraging. That seems like it should elevate both our floor and ceiling, especially if we can do it again. But we need consistent play and improvement on D as well.
And at the end of the day, Pry is 1-11 in one score games. He's had 12 chances to have that one more play or that one other turn of events go his way and it's only done so once.
If it's just one of two times, that's luck. When it's 11 out of 12 times in 2 and a half years, that's skill
This is how I feel about the situation.
Agree, however Pry needs to have those hard conversations with himself about changes on the coaching staff. I'm not saying fire everyone or someone because I don't know what changes need to be made. However something on the coaching staff has to change. Add a time management manager, add more assistants, shuffle some positions, promotions/demotions, something has to change just like Pry does with the roster. The coaches can't be exempt from that process.
It's simultaneously the most maddening and most encouraging thing. If clock management is our biggest problem, at least that should be an easy thing to fix. We need some self reflection from Pry, serious criticism from Whit (not holding out hope for that), or honest feedback from below from one of his lieutenants. Recognize the issue and address it.
Hire an analyst. Play some EA NCAA. Watch some YouTube videos. Just fix it!!!
Only one I can think of is Andy Reid, and he only did it because he lucked into an all-world talent in Mahomes. At the college level? Virtually unheard of
I can tell you right now, there is no control group for coaches that have been as bad in one-score games as Pry. Because there simply are none.
Scott frost comes to mind immediately.
Scott Frost was 5-22 in one score games. By stats alone, he's over twice as successful in one score games as Pry (1-11)
Well said. No apologies necessary for the novel, I'm stoked to hear your thoughts.
I'd add... according to Wikipedia, Pry is 15-18 during his coaching tenure (last updated Nov 2 2024).
And famously 1-11 in one-score games, no?
I think it will be difficult to turn the tide against Big Ten or SEC programs, so even if Pry's relationships with the coaches in Virginia were 110% maximized the topmost talent in the state I think will still leave for the OSU/UGA/Texas types of programs most, if not all, of the time.
I also think that we needed the transfer portal to become more competitive in the short term, and I think the Tutens and the APRs and the Drones of the world were necessary for us to be not-bottom-dwelling while the in-state relationships developed, and that has obviously helped out tons. Without them... disaster.
Pry was hired Nov 30 2021. Had little time to bring in his first recruiting class and start to develop those relationships in VA. Somewhere else in this conversation there was a note about senior laden teams - and these seniors are Fuente's plus transfer portals, so I'm not 100% laying this at Pry's doorstep, though one would think that after a few years of new coaching I could have expected that even Fuente's recruits could improve.
I'm also not seeing anyone getting fired. I'm also not entirely pleased with the results we've seen on the field. And I'm also not sure we're seeing Pry/Marve/Bowen ceiling yet.
So I'm still hopeful... maybe to a fault.
I think we can compete with them. The top programs it will be difficult, but winning fixes a lot. If we can win 9 games next year, and kids see that we're close to playoff level, that may lure them over money alone. And putting a couple more people in the league with the current coaches will probably help as well.
Have you looked at next year's schedule? We aren't winning 9 games next year
Last year, looking at this year's schedule, would you have thought we'd potentially be able to beat Miami if they were undefeated?
Miami put up 508 yards and ran for 165 against VT this year. Yeah we had a chance late, but let's not pretend that we played great against undefeated Miami like some epiphone and turning point. They dominated our defense all night. When we needed a stop, we couldn't get one. The final score was not indicative of us being on equal footing with Miami. not close.
My point is that we WERE in it, and we didn't get blown out. After last year's blowout loss to Louisville, I would have guessed we'd get blown out by an undefeated Miami team this year. It's not like we got a bunch. Of instant contributors in the offseason, we just kept a lot of our team, so few additions, but more experience. More experience, to me, doesn't mean we avoid blowout losses to really good teams. But we didn't get blown out.
We lost 3 games last year by more than one score, the worst was by 31 points. I don't like losing, but I'd rather be competitive than lose, and getting blown out tells me that we weren't nearly as good as the other team, so, even with a winning record, I would say we're not a very good program.
Assume this was a typo or autocorrect for 'epiphany" but my imagination thought "hmm epi- like epilator; and imagined a phone to remove body hair!
Turns out it IS a brand of guitar.(One example below)
To your last point, I will admit I have 0 evidence to back this up but it's kind of noticeable how little defensive talent from PSU followed Pry here. And we're still seemingly not winning those in-state recruiting battles. Pry is on the record that Franklin is a mentor for him, I feel like Franklin is cutthroat when it comes to similar recruits and Pry is more passive because that's his mentor.
Again, I have no proof of this, just the vibes I get.
3. His buyout is (if my math is correct) almost $10M after this season.
3. Like it or not - VT is a 6-6 Wake Forest program now. 12 years is a trend- not a blip. This is what we are. We need to accept it or we will drive ourselves crazy. We aren't going to win 4 ACC titles at Virginia Tech ever again until the entire admin is replaced AND we find a real football coach AND we invest in it. This is clearly who we are. Some magic light is not going to turn on. Fighting for a bowl against UVA- that's VT football for 12 years. It is what it is at this point. This is the program.
We can vent all we want, but Pry isn't getting fired...at least not this year. Donors are not going to pay for another buyout (we haven't recovered from Fu). He does need to do the deep look in the mirror and admit he doesn't have the tools (his and his coaches) to be successful. He needs an experienced DC (he's getting less leeway because he was supposed to be the great DC mind...side vent-never should have been allowed to be the DC the first year, that cost him a year of learning how to be a HC)...and I think replace OC or hire a co-OC that can teach Bowen (good designer, but terrible at in-game adjustments and using the strengths of his players). You just cannot be a first-time HC, with a first-time DC and first-time OC. Learning on the job at this level gets you too far behind. Pry has to win (big) next year or he's not going to be renewed...and he's losing a lot of talent this year (this was the year to show massive progress and what the future looks like).
yea I think there has to be options from the lower levels for both OC and DC
I know we're not happy with the wins vs. losses this year, but we're scoring on average a fair amount more points than we did last year. We're averaging close to 31 points per game this year, and last year averaged 26.2 during the regular season, and 28.6 adding a 55 point performance against Tulane in our bowl game.
We want to fire an OC who has us averaging almost 31 points per game???
Fire marve. Any offense with a pulse has put up points they didn't deserve on us. Bowen is figuring it out. 2nd string QB and RB and we still put up 31 points.
I want pry to succeed so bad but he needs a legit assistant head coach with real experience to guide him. Replace marve with a legit DC and see what happens.
I don't care who you are. If you have a senior laden team in college, that result cannot happen. Even if you have a young team, you cannot collapse like that and keep your job.
Today is the 2019 Duke game for Pry. It's the game where the veil is lifted and you can no longer deny that he's in over his head. They have spent 3 years coaching up this roster and it just isn't good enough to beat first year head coaches of mediocre at best ACC squads. Our expectations have to be higher than this
Fucking Fuente Deja-vu
We're regressing under this Staff
Except in 2019, we had all our starters playing against Duke. We were playing without 2 of our best players on offense. I feel like this one is on the defense. They scored 28 points in the second half.
I don't know what to tell ya dude. If you want someone that's going to get us to 10 wins in year 3, we're going to go through a LOT of coaches. And we will most likely have a lot of years that are worse than this year. We scored 31 points and 455 yards with freaking backups.
I thought we agreed it was going to be "Fry Pry"
As much as I do think at least a couple staff members should go, I don't think ANY of them do, especially with how the roster is about to look next season. I doubt they will convince the big donors to commit to it in what looks like it could be another lost season. Need someone better attuned to the roster to confirm or deny but my current thought is a regression in the secondary and defensive line, not much improvement in the O line or Linebackers, and a turnover of Tuten, Lane, Jennings in WR/RB. Drones prob comes down to NIL, as I dont see him having done enough to jump to NFL. What year are the Gosnells? Felton?
Just seems a big step back is coming which from how this team went, could be a 2-3 win season. Sorry for the extra depressing thoughts but really want to prepare myself mentally for Babcock doing nothing, Pry doing the same and the die falling where they may.
Can't even look forward to basketball Monday thanks to the state Whit put that program in.
Lane, Jennings, Felton, S. Gosnell are all gone. But Greene, B. Gosnell, and a lot of highly rated WRs are around. Coney had some nice runs today, Thomas is back. Chaplin is back. There has been enough shown that we won't be empty depending on the QB.
Stroman, Phillips, Reddish, Lovett, Keller, Woodson are all back with atleast Burgos on the line.
I like Brent pry, but if he can't find a guy to help mentor his in game strategy and a new dc then he's got to go
Yup I really do think pry can succeed here but not with his current staff
I'm sure this won't devolve into anarchy on here /s, but how many wins does Fuente have with this roster?
Would he have managed the games better?
Fuente is 9-0 with these players and strength program
Mmm... maybe. Maybe I'm cynical when I say
Fuente is 9-0 with these players that he might not have been able to recruit and the strength program he definitely didn't develop
FTFY
No way this team is 9-0 with JHam coaching the D
Agree.
That's one of the things that I never could wrap my head around from the start here.
We fire Fuente and hire Pry, supposedly a Defensive Guru in order for him to bring in a D.C. with even less experience than our prior D.C who clearly was in over his head??
Shocked this hasn't been a smashing success.
Not even close. Corn's offense would consistently underperform Bowen's week on week
Fuente is probably undefeated or maybe 1 loss with this team. But he never would've had this team to begin with. He wasn't a bad in game coach at all.
Funete was a football coach who was good at being a football coach (and not much else).
Pry is a football coach who is bad at being a football coach (but good at everything else).
Put them together you maybe onto something...co-head coaches. Pry is the head coach on non-gamedays, Fuente is the head coach on gamedays.
I think this is where Whit's inability to understand Football really shows.
Fuente seemed like a homerun hire on the surface but clearly had no ability whatsoever to handle the people skills aspects of Coaching. I cannot imagine that a good vetting process could not have ferreted that out--I highly doubt he was Mr. Personality @ Memphis and suddenly devolved upon his arrival to Blacksburg.
So we hire Pry, who is the polar opposite of Fuente from a personality standpoint but is an awful Gameday Coach (much like his previous boss). A clear expectation should have been set that as a First-time H.C., the expectation was going to be that he would hire experienced Coordinators--if he balked on that, let him walk.
Its like Whit either doesn't do the legwork or simply doesn't understand Football well enough to judge who has the skills to be successful. Mike Elko was available at the same time as Pry and VT definitely would have been a more desirable stop than Duke. It harkens me back to the ridiculous comment he made about talking to other Athletic Directos and being told VT was "very hard to prepare for," during the Fuente era.
As someone has previously suggested on this Board, we need to hire a Football Director (or kindly aid Whit in finding a place to move on to) because Whit simply hasn't demonstrated any ability to handle Football. We can put Ballein out to pasture (10 years too late) and give the new Football AD his salary.
Be careful what you wish for, because you damn well know John Ballein would be the football director if we formally made that position. He's already doing it now, and if we wonder why we are so unbelievably stuck in the mud with our culture right now, that's why
Ballein focuses on Baseball, Volleyball, and Men's and Women's Basketball. He's not on football and hasn't been for nearly a decade.
First of all, the Fuente hire was universally lauded.
Second of all, Fuente didn't fail because he was charismatic; he failed because he had no recruiting or roster management strategy.
We hired Pry because he had a history of successfully doing things that Fuente failed at, and knew how to fix those things:
Whit could very well go 0-2 on football coaching hires, but hiring coaches is a crapshoot. Everyone fucks it up.
Yeah outside of talking like top 3-4 coaches it's all like stars aligning.
I'm still in the camp that we're better off backing pry and forcing his hand to fix the coordinator issues.
You don't think those two things are related??? You think players are going to play for Fran Brown at Syracuse because of his extensive experience and X/O expertise??? They play for him because of his personality and his ability to relate to players on their level.
Fuente Recruited lots of top players---he just couldn't close on nearly any of them. The "strategy" was inconsequential, he wasn't going to close on any top Recruits whether he was recruting VA, TX, or the friggin Moon.
You cannot convince me that there weren't people at Memphis (or tangential to the Program) that could have provided some insight and given some "warning signs" that Fuente didn't have the chops to Recruit and Press the Flesh at a level that was required for P5.
Let's be honest here, we hired Pry because he was the best we could afford. By most accounts, he was no higher than 3rd on the WishList.
He also had a relationship with Ballein, which multiple people with "sauces" have indicated played a role.
Ballein may have a new title within the Athletic Dept. and may not have his hand as directly in Football as in the past, but if you believe he doesn't still exert some influence over people who are involved in Football operations, you are beyond naive.
None of that changes the fact that any A.D. with experience and logic wouldn't let a First-time H.C. hire two green coordinators just because he had signed top-10 Recruits from the State.
Lol I knew this question was coming.
First of all, while Fuente doesn't have Bill Clinton's charisma, but also isn't some socially awkward weirdo either. When I met him, I had a fine conversation with him. I was 26 at the time (holy shit, time has flown by), so it's not like I was some 50 year old football coach talkin ball with him. So, I think he was good enough in this area
Also, in general, recruiting isn't about sweet talking someone; it's about convincing them that this is the right place for them to be. Fuente was able to do that plenty in his first 3 years; even the 2019 class was decent.
Strategy matters a lot. We had limited resources. How you use those resources impacts your results. Fuente recruiting a place that was a 3 hour plane ride away means that he can afford to spend less time recruiting those players in person. There are scholarship limits - giving 12 running backs a scholarship means that other position groups will be lacking depth.
Fuente's issues were not just 'personality'
The only warning sign was that Fuente had never been in a P5 program, so there was nothing suggestion he could (or couldn't) recruit at the P5 level. He was the OC for an undefeated Gary Patterson TCU team before they were B12. He HC'd at Illinois State and Memphis.
Beyond that, the College Football landscape was about to undergo a huge shift. Before 2015/2016, there was still this notion that a headcoach could be a 'ball coach'. Every National Title winner (except Urban Meyer) prior to that had been a coordinator first. Dabo hadn't won a natty yet (though he was knocking on the door). Coach O hadn't won a natty yet. Your top coaches at the time were Saban (ball coach turned CEO), Urban Meyer (never an OC, but credited with helping to develop the 'smash mouth spread'), Gary Patterson (defensive mastermind), Dantonio (Defensive Mastermind), Bob Stoops (defensive mastermind), Chris Peterson (offensive genius), Gus Malzahn (offenive genius).
Beyond that, Peterson, Malzahn, Urban, BK, and many other successful head coaches were hired from the G5 ranks with limited (if any) P5 experience.
All this to say - the Fuente hire was very in-line with head coach trends of the time, and it seemed like a fit for VT.
Were there misses in the interview process? Clearly. But I don't think anyone at VT realized how far behind we were at the time, so no one understood how risky a hire without P5 experience was.
Just because he was someone that we could afford with (at the time) the third highest ACC salary doesn't mean that he was a budget hire. His experience recruiting the state, running a modern recruiting operation, shmoozing donors, running a deep support staff was exactly what VT needed.
He got a referral from Ballein. Doesn't change that his experience made him a fit for VT.
This I 100% agree with. 100%. We all called this as it was happening. The Solid Verbal called it out. TSL did. Everyone knew this. Could not agree more.
Look, I feel like at some point, we're just playing a game of semantics here.
Fuente's personality clearly played a major role in his failure. Part of the reason the roster was so uneven was because of massive Portal departures year after year. There was near constant chirping from players, ex-explayers, and parents that played out in public. The culture was screwed from the top.
The reason we had 12 RBs is because Fuente couldn't close on guys who were are actual targets at major positions. Thus, we ended up trying to convert guys--see Lawson, Keller, and Pene for example. Those 12 guys were never gonna be playing RB, they were projects because we had no natrual LBs or WRs on the roster.
Recruiting clearly fell off when Galen Scott forced his own firing.
With regards to Whit, guy has swung and missed on 2 Football HC in a row. Whether it is simply bad luck (I don't believe this to be true) or ineptitude, he's proven he cannot progress this Football program beyond low-mid ACC status. Time for some new blood.
But at a "football school" no AD fucks it up twice in a row and keeps their job
I hate to break it to you but we're not a football school anymore. We stopped being a football school when Steger retired. IIWII
You're absolutely right, though. A football school doesn't tolerate an AD making two failed football coaching hires. I would be absolutely SHOCKED if Whit doesn't make the next football coaching hire. Because, as an institution, VT has shown me over the last decade that we are no longer serious about football. It's a sad reality.
I think this is an oversimplification. I think a LOT of people probably thought that Beamer ran up a string of ten-win seasons and got us to the national championship with a lot less money and support staff, so new coaches should be able to as well. And it was just a matter of finding the right coach who, could do all that with a lot less than every other school out there.
We needed to show people how bad things could get and then needed someone from a big boy program to tell us what we needed to do to be competitive. From everything I've heard, Whit got Pry money for everything he wanted, from support staff to NIL. That doesn't happen if there aren't a lot of people that care about football for VA Tech.
I've been told that this was a university wide issue under Steger (that Sands has worked hard to change) and that I believe it's still an issue with our donor base.
If you're not leading an arm race, then you're by definition playing catch up. VT isn't poor, but we also haven't been close to leading any arms race since Weaver made Beamer's staff the third highest paid nationally in 2001.
I believe that VT hasn't done what we need to if we want to frequently be a top 25 AND I simultaneously believe that Pry is leaving wins on the table with poor coaching.
Like I said above:
Yeah this is where I'm at too. There's no need getting emotionally invested or upset over anything related to VT athletics until Whit Babcock is gone and a new AD can come in and reset Merryman. You cannot under any circumstance let him choose another football coach at this point. It's why I've stopped donating and don't go to games or buy tickets anymore. The poor coaching hires are a symptom of an AD who doesn't get it and is running a department in disarray. There's also no accountability. And the coaching fraternity talks - who worth their salt would want to come work for the buffoons at VT at this point? And I don't think VT makes the decision to fire Whit either (because I seriously doubt Sands really prioritizes athletics) and Whit seems to mesh well with the power circles down there. He's going to have to leave or retire at this point IMO, even though MBB could also crater this season and baseball and softball are slipping fast. WBB is in total rebuild mode.
So for my mental wellbeing and sanity as a Hokie, not going to dwell on it much at this point. Nothing substantive is going to change until WB is gone.
Perfectly stated - can pry accept his flaw and fix it? Most coaches are egomaniacs who can't - Pry might be an exception, but who gives him the hard truth s to what he is right now and that's a BAD in game strategic mind.
Fuente would never have this roster because he couldn't recruit worth a shit and drove out most of the good ones we did get
Accurate take. As I come back at thsi with a cooler head.... fuente also coached scared a lot. It was refreshing to see pry actually try to score at ends of 1st halves his first year
To be fair though, you buy rosters now.
Not totally - kids still want to win and definitely want a program that would potentially get them to the NFL.
Pry needs to hire an assistant whose sole job is time clock management.
I mean I thought they just had cheat sheets for this stuff like the old "go for 2 or not"
Pry just doesn't get the game management stuff for some reason. So pay someon else to do it. He's doing most of the other stuff right.
I think the Pry era is now pretty clear. This was a dismal performance. Headscratching decisions left and right. No consistency from the team.
I like Pry a lot but I just don't think he's head coach material. Not yet. He may be a great coach someday but he's got a lot to learn and as a program VT just cannot afford to have a coach who still needs training wheels in charge. He's got to go.
Sadly, I just don't think he will. And I doubt very seriously that he'll make any changes in the off-season. I think VT, as an institution, has lost the thread a bit as a football program. The culture just isn't there. It started eroding with the departure of Steger and I don't see it coming back. Sands doesn't give a fuck about football and Whit, as good as he's been for other sports, just doesn't understand how to run a big boy football program. And the coaching hires he makes reflects that. We need to hire a serious P5 head coach who will bring in legitimate coaches with serious P5 experience.
I just don't see that happening. I think we're going to be stuck with 6 win teams for the next decade or more unless we see some big changes at the top. I wouldn't count on it.
Not just leadership... boosters too. You want a "legitimate coach with serious P5 experience," you gotta pay the going rate.
Fair enough. I don't think we'd be able to financially compete with most of the sec but VT isn't some hobo program. We can make a big enough hire if we want to. I don't subscribe to the idea that VT is impoverished
We're not impoverished. We're a top 25-40 program depending on who you ask.
But can you name a program at a similar level to VT who went out and hired a 'legitimate coach with serious P5 experience?'
I just want a really good coach at this point. JMU somehow continually hires really good coaches out of nowhere that aren't household names. Maybe VT should just forget trying to hire the slam dunk and hire a really good ball coach, regardless of P5 or not.
This is my thought, but it's not that simple. 2/3 fbs head coaching hires are gone after 5 years. Even hires that looked fantastic on paper - Luke Fickle, Lincoln Riley - aren't looking great three years in.
Or at the very least hire 2 coordinators who have a proven track record at the P5 or G5 level.
If Pry had given himself 2 experienced proven coordinators when he was hired, completely different story now, but we have a staff where everyone is learning on the job. Bowen appears to be a solid hire, albeit a work in progress. Marve, not so much.
Which isn't good when you still need the head coach to learn how to be a head coach
Why you got to bring me into this? I ain't even applying for no job. I'm retired!!! /s
The game day experience reflects it as well. Just don't have anywhere near the enthusiasm we once had. Hell, look at the name of this website. Now ask yourself: how many people are shaking their keys on third down? I'm usually the only person in my entire section.
That's wild. I haven't been to a game since 2017. Can't imagine this.
In fairness, many including me -have only fobs no actual keys.(I leave my house key(not keys,plural)) in the car cause I don't want to end up losing them. And honestly, I'm too busy yelling til I'm hoarse on nearly every defensive play (using hands as a megaphone) to shake keys even if I had em.
This has not been my experience this year. I've seen bunch of people shaking keys and being loud all game every game this year. Crowd was fantastic the last 2 games.
Do we currently have a Jerry Kill like person on the staff? If no, who would be a good fit for a position like that?
My first call would be to Jerry Kill.
Would he even want to give us the time of day after the last clown show in town wouldn't listen to a damn thing he had to say? Lol
It was a joke. If we don't have a jerry kill like guy, then who? The Jerry Kill
Oh I know you were joking, but I'm just kinda thinking out loud... because I would "kill" to have Jerry Kill around right about now.
I like Pry way more than Fuente, but I'm starting to think more and more that Fuente with the financial support Pry has had would have way better results.
I think the players enjoy playing for Pry, even if he hasn't won the close games.
So, no, Fuente wouldn't have better results. When he recruited good players, they left.
Dear Brent Pry.
Please do everything you can to win during regulation. This means set up to kick a field goal, and then kick it. Don't hold out for overtime. Because we SUCK at overtime.
That is all.
1000 times this. The most frustrating part about that decision to play safe for overtime in this game especially is the added context of depth issues resulting from numerous injuries at seemingly every position. It's hard for me to understand how anyone could consider the way the second half had been playing out and come to the conclusion VT has a better chance of winning if the game goes longer. Have to make every effort to end the game as soon as possible in that situation.
On top of that, I have previously appreciated that Pry has in many cases been appropriately aggressive on trying to score as much as possible, by going for 4th downs and not taking a knee. The conservative play calling at the end of the halves in this game seemed to me like a break from his usual tendency, with the explanation of having back ups in the game, when I think that couldn't have possibly been a worse decision under those circumstances.
the backups were crushing. give them a chance.
I agree, but will restate differently.
Pry - your offense played better than your defense in the second half. If you have a chance to win the game on offense and NOT rely on the defense in that situation then you take it!
You have to have a feel for the trend of the game and adjust risk-reward decisions based on those FACTS and not fears.
I'll take you one further
Our offense is now executing a cohesive scheme better than we have seen at VT since 2010, with one exception of 2016. And this is notable because it includes games where QB1 could not play, our best OL was hurt and we were down to RB3. The team has bought in offensively and we are legitimately making it work.
But it all unravels because of poor game management by the head coach and even worse, vanilla defensive play that gets absolutely torched when we aren't dominating 1v1 battles at the line. The LB play has been awful under Pry and that was supposed to be his strength.
It's a very frustrating time because on one hand we should be happy, but on the other, how much of that is just because we got so used to how awful Tech became under Fuente that a mediocre football team feels like it's enough of an improvement to be happy.
Been saying all year the defense sucks, and it's absolutely true. They needed ONE stop late ONE against Vandy, Miami, and Cuse... and could not deliver. ONE defensive stop the last 5 minutes of that game yesterday, we win. Miami converted a 4th and 19 against us in the second half. We needed ONE stop against Vandy- couldn't get it. I personally do not give one fuck about a sack by APR in the first quarter. And nobody else should. I could not give a fuck about Delane batting a ball way in the first Quarter. I give a fuck about winning defense for 4 quarters. Stopping the run when you have to. Getting ONE FUCKING STOP to win the game. This defense has sucked all year.
It's not just this year.
Marve defenses cannot get a defensive stop late in the game when we need it, and that is the primary reason Pry is 1-11 in one score games here. If we had any semblance of a defense that could nut up and and stop the opposing offense with all the cards on the table, we aren't talking about the plausiblity of firing Pry this season. But they consistently get caved in when it matters most, and it's long past time to admit that Marve just ain't it. He doesn't know how to adjust to stop the opponent. He doesn't know how to scheme a defensive stop when the game is on the line, and most worryingly, it really doesn't matter the quality of the opponent when we get into these situations.
Wow. Glad I could not watch the game. so disappointing, and for what sounds like the same exact reasons, loss after loss, season after season.
You would be correct.
Translation: "We will never win close games when our coach lets the other team score more than us."
[eyeroll]
To me, the clear issue is Marve. I get people want better clock management, but the actual percent likelihood of getting points in either situation was probably less than 10% with Schlee (especially an injured Schlee in the 4th). But, there is also not a great excuse for not going for it.
But the major issue is that Marve switched his defense in the 3rd quarter and starting blitzing with his terrible blitzes that never hit. And when all they've done is dink and dunk all game, then LET THEM FUCKING DINK AND DUNK AND MAKE THEM DRIVE THE ENTIRE FIELD. Especially when their receivers are prone to drops, OL prone to penalties, and their QB prone to dumb throws. The two long plays (5-yard hitch, RB screen) should never been plays that get them back into the game. Marve beat himself. It was 21-3 and then it was 21-18 in a matter of minutes.
(I'll note that Pry said in his post-game press statements that a major issue was not making them drive the entire field. I hope, maybe, that's a sign he is not happy with his D-coordinator. Please, please, make the change this offseason!)
Two other issues:
Felton is proving to be a D2 receiver. He has all the measurables but none of the intangibles. His route running is really bad and cost VT the game. On 2nd or 3rd down right before the 4th quarter FG, he had a 1-on-1 corner route that any decent WR would run the route and be wide open in the endzone. He ran it so slow, and made his break so late, Schlee was waiting on him, and couldn't wait any longer and then had to tuck and run. (I am also of the opinion that none of the WRs have gotten better under Mines. Great recruiter, but why do the WRs play so meh?)
Schlee got re-injured right before that FG and he shouldn't have played that OT. On first and goal at the 10, he had at least 5 yards, and potentially a TD if he tucked and ran instead of throwing that ball to Felton who was blanketed (of course).
Hit on a couple things here:
-While Bowen largely deserves credit for putting up 31 points without his two best players, he continues to situationally befuddle me. It was obvious Schlee was hobbled/beatup by mid-4th Q if not earlier. It was ABUNDANTLY obvious in OT when he refused a walk-in TD to attempt to force a throw into Gosnell. Yet, on the final backbreaking play of the Game, we choose to have him running? He lost the ball because he was clearly trying to protect his lower extremities rather than the ball....but why put him in that position??
We probably still lose the game even if he doesn't fumble there, but it just screams to me how inattentive and strategically lacking we are in the Coaching Dept. They did a similar thing with Wells early in '23. We don't learn from mistakes, we just continue to make them. It just feels like at times, other coaches are playing Chess and ours are playing Candy Land.
Second, to your point on Felton---completely agree. We should be giving some of the younger receivers more snaps (particularly in the Portal era). His routes are incredibly lackadaisical so he struggles to separate, his hands are subpar, and he doesn't use his size well. I just don't get it.
Lets see more Greene, Fitzgerald, Wiggins...Felton is what he is at this point.
Yea. The OT playcalling didn't make sense. And they need to keep better tabs on who is healthy. If Schlee can't go, then don't force it. Should have taken him out as soon as he didn't take the run on 1st down.
I don't suppose our defense could actually stop a team in OT? Is that out of the question? Actually tackle them or get in the way instead of an untouched TD?
That might be asking too much. It is interesting that Stanford even went I-form in that OT. Marve's defense was like a sieve.
Something to think about - if we hold our opponents this year to the number of points we held them to, or at least less than 21 points, we're undefeated. (Hopefully that made sense, so any team that scored more than 21 points, we hold them to 21, but we already held GA Tech and Stanford to 6 and 7).
And also, looking back from Pry's first year, we have improved at least a little each year:
PPG
2022 - 19.3
2023 - 28.6
2024 - 30.8 (to date)
Defense (points scored against)
2022 - 24.7
2023 - 23.9
2024 - 22.3
So, Bowen has improved by 11 ppg since he started (holy shit!), but Marve has only improved by 2.4 points less per game. Bowen's highest scoring game in 2022 was 29 points. In 2023, the highest scoring game was Tulane for 55 points, and had 6 games 30 points or more. This season, Bowen's highest score was 42 points, but already has 6 games with 30 or more more points (tying last season's total but with at least 3 games to go).
For Marve, in 2022, he only had one game holding opponents to 7 points or less, and gave up 28 or more points 4 times. In 2023, we didn't hold anybody to 7 points or less, and allowed 28 points 4 times. This year, we've held 2 teams to 7 points or less and allowed 28 points 3 times with 3 games left.
Looking at that, I'd think you'd say keep Bowen, get rid of Marve. But we have improved every year (assuming similar performance for the rest of the games this year).
I'm not saying you are wrong, but ppg is one stat and yes it's pegged to the defense, but not solely. Things like field possession, offensive effectiveness, special teams and turnovers affect this stat as well.
This is a data point yes, but by no means a clinching argument for a conclusion
I hear ya, but ppg for a season against various opponents I'd think would provide some good data. Season over season improvements have to be encouraging. Ignoring everything else, you have to score more points than your opponents to win. Scoring more points on average from the season prior, and allowing fewer points is a trend you want to see. The improvement from season 1 (in the Pry tenure) to season 2 is pretty darn good.
The marginal improvement on defense, especially not being able to make stops in critical points is worrying at best. And how many times have we jumped to big leads only to let our opponents score several times in a row. It's like we expect to cruise to a victory so don't try as hard. Or something. I mean, how do we hold them to a field goal for a half, then let them score 28 in another???
Points is irrelevant here. If you watch our games, when we score a TD to go up 4 late in the game for example, THAT is when you need a defensive stop. Because 6 or 7 or 8 is more than 4. So you lose. Good defenses get stops when they need them. Just like great offenses. When Mahomes needs a TD or first down, he gets one. Who gives a fuck if he throws for 400 yards and they lose? Nobody. When VT has absolutely HAD to have a stop on defense this year, we can't get one. Period. That is poor coaching, that is poor defense.
"When Mahomes needs a TD or first down, he gets one" ......... See 11/4/2024
probablem for us is that the "phonecall from upstairs" doesnt go our way
Bitter just posted a stat that said if the game was over at the 2:00 timeout in the fourth quarter each game, VT would be 8-0-1.
Coach is literally fumbling the decisions in game management and clock management in every close game, doesn't know how to close
This says it all!
How about if we eliminate every third quarter? /s
You can't say it's clock management. Letting an opponent score 21 points in the third quarter or 28 points in the second half isn't clock management, it's the defense falling apart.
Sometimes it bites us in the ass, sometimes it doesn't. I mean, the offense started slow the first few games of the season, but we were still scoring a decent amount.
I remember close games under Beamer, the other team marching down the field, and then the defense holding strong and getting a turnover or just getting a stop. This dense can't get stops when it matters. Which then forces the head coach to be a timeout jockey. I'd rather Pry suck at clock management and have our defense get stops.
Well. This is quite a damning stat.
Ulp.....
Basically have 3 tiers/branches of action that happen at the end of the season
1) No action
We go into the offseason patting ourselves on the back because the staff is growing after another disappointing season. Marve and Bowen keep their jobs. Pry hits the recruiting trail, says some nice things that get a small percentage of fans off his back. We come into next year about the same as a mid/mid-low ACC team. Fans probably start to disappear, we accept we're just a metallica song and a sorry program
2) Re-action
Pry takes a long look at his staff. Fires under performers, brings in experience that the staff is crucially missing. Likely raises the floor and ceiling slightly for this team. We come into next year with some question marks but slightly higher expectations, maybe we go from a 6-6 average team to an 8-9 win team that maybe gets a special year or two. Maybe it doesn't work and we stay stagnant mid-acc.
3) Action
BOV sees this clearly isn't the path for football. Whit/Ballein/Pry are all fired we dump a pile of money into the program and decide we're a football school. We hire a legitimate proven AD and eventually football staff and pay out the butthole (there are a lot of sub paths here that probably lead us back to 6-6). Inject a lot of energy and hope into the program and pray it works. We elevate to the top of the ACC again or we fall on our face spend a pile of money just to remain 6-6.
3 seems unlikely - 1 seems most likely - 2 with an injection of funds/structural changes bordering 3 seems most necessary.
If we beat Duke and UVA, it's number 1 for sure. And then we hope Shane Beamer doesn't blow us out with Pop Watson at QB starting his first game.
If we get to 7 wins and anything other than this happens I will be SHOCKED (except I think Pop transfers)
I mean I agree with you but I also think that if any changes are made, our best course of action is to take a bit of a hybrid approach on #2 and #3.
First, Whit is let go, Ballein stays as interim AD but is removed from the job search. National search for an experienced AD at a school that consistently outperforms expectations in football.
Second, Pry makes internal changes to the coaching staff to cut dead weight, double down on what is working, and bring in help in areas that need it. A new DC and a clock management coach would go a long way into improving our performance on game days. And by doing this, he knows he is out to prove himself over the next year or 2 to the new AD that he is the right man for the job.
Unfortunately, what I think will happen is Whit and Pry are fired, and Ballein is left as interim AD in charge of the hiring team for both openings.
Yeah 3 has a whole lot of ways that it can happen....there's only like a couple good outcomes and I think VT being VT we'll avoid the good outcomes and go straight to the shittiest possible solution of "Ballein is left as interim AD in charge of the hiring team for both openings."
I'd be shocked if either Whit or Pry lose their jobs after this season.
Whit depends on how basketball and football both end up. But I agree Pry is safe this year.
oof...imagine having your job security tied to this basketball team. i'd already be looking for a new job
Pry is going to get 4 years if he loses to ODU next year. He will get 5 years if he beats ODU and doesn't go 1-11 in 2025. That's where we are. He's safe for next year. But I am not bullshitting you when I say there is real smoke amongst the top donors around ODU. If Pry loses to them again, he will be fired.
The bar is on the floor.
Why in the world you put Ballein as interim AD? He needs less responsibility and influence, not more.
Why not someone semi-competent like Brad Wurthman?
There must be some fucking Virginia Law that mandates you keep 80 year old employees around the athletic programs. Fuck.
I don't believe Pry is losing his job this year (too expensive to buy him out right now anyway). It's the first year the team has really underperformed during his tenure. He proclaimed, "ACC title game or bust" before the season started, so I hope he knows the team isn't meeting expectations.
The heat will really turn up next year if there's a regression. Is the staff going to be able to develop the players they have brought in to fill the holes left from graduation and transfers? Is he capable of directing the NIL funding to address the issues on the team? Signs are not currently pointing in that direction.
It will really be indicative of his ability to run the show if he makes necessary changes to the staff. He seemed to think he had the ingredients to make a run this year at the ACC, and that didn't pan out. If he sticks with the same horses next year and regresses, then it's totally on him.