So I just stumbled across this on Twitter, and it made me wonder to myself 'what is the bare minimum level of success I expect out of VT this year'.
Virginia Tech has won more than six regular season games once in the past eight years (2019) and just three times in the last decade (2016, '17, '19).I'd love to be wrong with 6-6 but there are so many new faces on the roster and coaching staff, and your most important player... https://t.co/rKUHmF4Fd6— Mike McDaniel (@MikeMcDanielSI) August 27, 2025
Seeing 6-6 predictions across the board, and then that explanation at the top? And then I saw some other predictions over the weekend that really topped out at 8 wins over the course of the year and.... Man, when you really start to look at it, the widespread feeling is that we are expecting to lose to any team this year with a pulse. To the extent that we are a bit of a pushover.
So I ask you all, what are your expectations this year? If you were going to draw a line and say 'ok this is working lets stick with this' where would that line be and likewise, where would you draw the line where you're resigned to the current makeup just not working out and bigger changes would need to be made.
Comments
Bare minimum of success that I would expect would be 2-10. As in, this is the worst I could reasonably see.
Bare minimum of what I could tolerate would be 5-7 with the team starting out with many tough loses as the new systems are put in place. But no bad coaching, the team sticks together and finish strong. A similar scenario finishing 6-6 and losing the bowl game to go 6-7 is pretty much the same to me.
Bare minimum of what I would not be annoyed with = 7-5 + a bowl loss to be 7-6.
Slightly better = 6-6 with a bowl win to be 7-6.
I would not call that "success".
I was interpreting it as what is the bare minimum that this team could do. As in what was it's minimal level of "success" (i.e., wins) Yes, definitely don't consider it successful!!!
I have no expectations anymore. Have no clue who is exactly on the roster and how they play. Have no clue of schemes on each side of the ball. Have no clue if Pry improved his in-game coaching. Until I see the first game and how we do on the field, I have no clue what to expect anymore. Too many unknowns to even try and make a semi-educated guess.
All that said, GO HOKIES!!
100% this. In today's CFB, it's tough to know with all the transfers and such. We could strike lightning and have some new faces, along with returning faces, and a surprise or two from players who have developed since they arrived at VT. Or we could be a rag-tag bunch with terrible coaching that continues to underperform.
I'm more resigned to a "how did we look?" measure of success. If we continue this bullshit up playing up to our superiors and playing down to our inferiors, big changes will need to be made. If we get bit by the injury bug and only win 4 games, maybe there will be the case to give them another year. If our opponents end up being better than everyone expected, but we hang in there for nearly all of those games, then that will be improvement from last year.
I'll add that I would also want to see systematic improvement through the season. If we look solid on offense the first half of the season and then finish the back half tripping over our own
dickslinemen, dropping wide open passes, fumbling a lot, etc., then clean house.13-0 .......
With this many new faces, I'll set my expectations after the first week that said I'll be disappointed if we can't win 6 games. Our schedule is once again plenty easy enough.
I would like to have competitive games that don't have me disappointed with silly mistakes
bare minimum to bring everyone back is 6-6. A good season will be 8-4. To hell with new faces and players, It's time to shit or get off the pot.
Let's go
I honestly think 8-4 is possible. We just don't know what we got in the box, but it at least gives me hope for the year. Minimum to feel ok about things would be 7-5. 6-6 would depress me. Again.
I just dont see 6 wins. None of these accounts for a game we should win but lose anyways. We lost a boatload of talent and right now the transfers seem better than what we would have had without them but they aren't Peebles and APR talent. They might surprise me.
Minimum expectation? Play well enough I can watch a game live without giving up on the season. Likely translates to at least 5 wins, with at least a couple of those losses being exciting to watch, and not shitting the bed against teams that can't beat anyone else or Loluva.
6 wins at a minimum. If we can't get that after 4 seasons then burn it down.
Computer models like VT more than VT fans and pundits do. It's not surprising after a letdown year with 5 losses within 1 score. I will side with the computers and expect Pry to have his best year with a minimum of 7 wins in season.
The coordination will be better, Pry's time management will be better, the depth will be better, the O-line will be better, and the conditioning will be better. The team will be better.
This is where I'm at. If we had won half the one-score losses last year, we finish 8-4 or 9-3 and this year's conversation is so much different. And it was the little things that caused most of those games to be losses.
I believe that better coaching, better scheme, and better conditioning will fix those little things and put us in a better position to come out winners in close contests.
I'm having a hard time with what our record will be due to all of the unknowns, but I think we'll have a good feel after the first two weeks. That said, losing the first two, then going 6-4 is probably my minimum. But I believe we win at least one of the first two which sets up a better team mindset to to go 7-3 in the rest to finish 8-4.
And I'm putting my money where my mouth is, as I just booked a last minute trip to Atlanta this weekend for the game. Hoping to be feeling good as I continue on the way to Blacksburg for the Vandy game.
Last paragraph and user name check out 👍
Will be at both myself- though long planned not last minute lol
And the schedule will be harder.
I know I want to see 8 wins minimum to feel better about where the program is going. I'm not sure we'll get there, even with a deeper roster (which I think is debatable), improved coordinating, and improved conditioning.
Add to the unrealistic hope- to not have a clear and obvious bad call NOT get overturned...AND to not have a 'non-indisputable call' overturned after a 15 minute review
The 0-4 prediction against NC State surprised me. Are the Wolfpack supposed to make some wild swing this year? They were 6-6 last season with some bad losses and scratched out some weak wins.
No. They are projected to be middle of the pack, and slightly lower than VT in most projections. For comparison, here's SP+ rankings. VT is ranked 42.
SP+ Rankings of Opponents:
S.Car - 17
Vandy - 54
Woff - FCS
ODU - 101
NCSU - 46
WF - 79
GT - 41
Cal - 64
UL - 24
FSU - 39
Miami - 14
UVA - 74
VT has essentially 5 should be wins, 3 should be losses, and 4 tossups. And they should be slight favorites in 2 tossups and slight dogs in 2 tossups. Arguably, Cal is a tossup with VT more than slightly favored.
Is this last year's SP+ or conjecture for this year's start?
It's preseason SP+, which takes into account quality of returning production, new production (recruits/transfers), and weighted historical performance.
Maybe because they were able to scratch out wins, while we were 0-fer in close games.
Well they are absolutely throttling ECU early. Their offense looks like something that will give us a lot of problems
I would call ECUs offense putrid but I think that would be giving them undue credit.
I just dont think NCSU is that much better than us...I would expect a close game. Good thing we know we can trust Pry there...
And as much as we despise ECU, NCSU is same level or a notch above us given the length of time they've had around them, in general.
Imagine having confidence in a team executing well because they are experienced.
Sigh
VT and NCSU are basically the same teams but their head coach is better so I get the call here. Until Pry proves to me that he has gotten over his severe case of head-ass in calling tight games I think the edge goes to the other team in any even match up at this point.
Could argue that they're the same program, but VT landed an HoF coach for 25+ years and NC st didn't.
Honestly, no clue on overall record, but a winning one would be nice. like 7-5. It would also be nice if we don't go 0fer on one score games this year.
I remember the days when the fifth fuller wasnt thaaaat off base from me at the beginning of the season. Now im in the dc camp :'(
It's not a bad place to be in. DC can deliver some epic rants by the fireside. Hilarious to watch. Just ask him about "point differentials" or "Pitt QB play against Tech" or even (recently) "Ride your ride".
My expectations are to watch football and drink lots of beer.
And get irrationally pissed off
I think its very rational to get pissed off watching our games
True, I guess I meant pissed off to an irrational degree, lol
I'm hoping for irrational exuberance. Not expecting, just hoping.
Much better than half the student body leaving by halftime...
No more goddamn fucking bullshit two of the same numbers on the same field at the same time.
And not a single boneheaded penalty. All season. All of this nonsense should be cleaned up by now.
To not have a SINGLE one is I think unreasonable for kids/young adults; to not have a single one cost us a game or to not have repeated ones? Thats's reasonable to me....
I realize that what I'm asking for is astronomical but I give Pry zero mistakes on this based on how many we had last year.
I can see anywhere between 2-10 and 8-4. I really don't know what to expect from a team I know like 4 players for... But, a loss to either or (god help us all) both of Wofford and ODU and it's the fucking torches and pitchforks. No exceptions.
Don't leave the difference between a win and loss up to the refs/replay. For me to feel good about the program again is going to take at least 9 wins.
It's a tall order but I'm tired of moral victories and "could have been worse" seasons.
Competence. No dumbass penalties or mental mistakes. Everyone playing their nuts off.
Absolute bare minimum for me is that we field a team every game.
Hey now- it's supposed to be reasonable ATTAINABLE expectations..... /s
Minimum expectation is that we are in one score games with majority of P4 opponents and win half. Blow out the cupcakes. Beat UVA.
Given the schedule, the roster, and the coaching changes, I don't think I'm being unreasonable. Mathematically, that'd be 7-5.
Lose ODU, Wofford, or UVA, unless it's our only loss and we win the natty, and that's a failed season.
Keep our abysmal record in one-score games, and that's a failed season.
Don't look competitive against all competition: failed season.
Less than 8 and we should fire Pry, unless recruiting takes an unprecedented upturn or there's some terrible injuries but he still gets us to 6.
I think we beat SCar, lose to Vandy, beat ODU/Wafford in an unconvincing fashion, then go .500ish in conference. 7 wins.
Agree on all parts, but flip SC and Vandy and I don't think we get to .500 in conference play.
I've got us 7-5. If it's 6-6 we should make a coaching change. 8-4 and we can start thinking about how this staff might be turning things around.
That might sound like the difference between fired and extended might be razor thin, but this staff doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt anymore.
I would like to lose games because our players just aren't as good as their players. I'm tired of losing games because of ridiculous coaching, bad preparation and poor game management (in addition to their players being better than ours).
If we go 5-6 and look competent if overmatched in each game, I'll at least be only sad and not frustrated.
You also forgot losing games to the conference who wants their darling team/Heisman candidate to go undefeated and make the playoffs.
That was all of 2022 and it sucked.
Stop losing to Duke, Pitt, Syracuse, ODU, Vandy, and teams of their ilk. Upsets happen from time to time, sure. If we want to be anywhere close to what we were or sniff the success Clemson rode for better than a decade, we need to stop losing to these teams.
I think VT will win 4 games, minimum. Might get one or two more that we shouldn't. I think 6 or 7 wins is absolutely the best we could reasonably hope for.
Whatever is going on in Blacksburg is broken and has been broken for a long time. I don't think it'll get fixed over night and I don't think we can expect anything much better than what we've had for the last decade until there are major changes. I genuinely hope I'm wrong.
I don't even know how to have expectations at this point.
We lost a lot of high-level talent and its doubtful that the new Transfers are nearly going to replace their production. I honestly don't know much about half of the team and even less about the scheme.
All the coaches we hired should be upgrades from those they replaced but it still feels like too little too late.
Pry as a Gameday Coach has been colossally disappointing and I don't think that there is a light-switch that is going to suddenly go on to remedy that.
The Athletic Department as a whole seems to be completely lost at sea, listing aimlessly.
My sense is we find a way to scratch out 6 or 7 wins---(NCSU isn't that good, I think we find a way to go 1-1 to start and by the time we play FSU, they may already be in dumpster-fire mode). But honestly, that might be the worst possible outcome for VT Football. If we tank, then Pry clearly has to go and there is at least hope of a fresh start and catching lightning in a bottle with the next hire. If we win 8 or 9, maybe we can actually start to turn a corner.
But if we win 7 (assuming 6 Regular season and a Patsy bowl win) its an excuse to keep on doing the same stuff that hasn't been working--and my sense is there are forces within VT Athletics that have no qualms with that.
Sorry for the overwhelming optimism here.
The minimum bar to clear every season is make a bowl game and beat uva. These are incredibly low in this day and age. Uva sucks and 5 win teams have played in bowls. That is the floor.
The bare necessities to quote Baloo are:
Man I miss drinking because I'm happy during VT games....
I will say this streak of shit has caused me to be much more apathetic towards losses. It used to ruin me for days on end if we lost. Now it's almost expected. With that said. 12-0 BABY!!!! NATTY DARK HORSE.
I'm so with you.
The last time I can remember drinking because I was really happy watching a VT game: Think it was the 2020 win vs. Virginia. Remember Dax jumping around crazy on the sideline with some long score right before halftime.
The last time I was really angry with VT losing: The bowl loss against Kentucky in 2019. Though I am glad that I no longer get that bent out of shape over a game.
I was legitimately angry after Vandy last year. Our coaching was SO poor in that game, the playcalling was terrible, and then they ran Drones into the ground, and then kept running him making a bad situation worse. That was the moment I really legitimately questioned just how competent this coaching staff was, they couldn't hide behind the excuses anymore.
Hate to say it and I like Pry a lot culturally but it sure seems like we get out coached pretty much every game. I would love for that narrative to change but honestly when is the last time you've heard somebody reference "genius game plan" or "strategic halftime adjustments" and our coaching staff in the same sentence?
Bowl game vs Arkansas in 2016
Ah the sweet memories!!!
BINGO.
It was a MasterClass in how to lose a winnable football game. Every part of our coaching Staff sucked.
Bowen's 1st Half Gameplan was absolute garbage. Marve apparently didn't figure out that he needed to watch NMSU tape after Vandy took their entire offensive staff. Pry had no idea what he was doing from a game management standpoint. And, despite all that, we nearly won only to lose in significant part because we couldn't figure out how to not put duplicate numbers on the field. Then the cherry on top was putting an obvious hurt Drones out to try to clean up what was.a coaching clusterfuck when with even mediocre coaching we would have been up by 10 at that point.
With months to prepare, that's what we produced. It was obvious that the Pre-Season hype was completely unwarranted and this Staff just flatly wasn't very good. I want to like Pry but nothing that he has done has convinced me that he's not inept.
I am right with you on pry and last year's staff. The problem wasn't jimmies and Joe's. It was absolutely x's and o's.
I have faith that our new coordinators and o line coach can produce better results. If pry shits the bed in the first 6 games, let Montgomery take over for the last six and reset for next year. The portal allows you to change quickly, and we dont need to see more pry failures for 2 more years.
I really don't know. It's terribly unfortunate for Pry, and the entire fanbase, that the they couldn't make something happen last year with a solid roster. Now, forced to rebuild, having two new coordinators... I just don't see a path for more than 5. Pry should have gotten the job done last year. Better game management would have given us two more wins. Slightly better defensive preparedness would have gotten us another one or two.
In any event, I don't see more than 5 wins on the schedule.
Bare minimum: improved O-line play... Too many drives stalled or 3-and-outs due to Drones not having enough time to let the play develop or have time to throw it.
I don't really have any high expectations for defense tbh. I expect very similar to what we saw last year, so I am hoping offense can help mask those deficiencies with more points on the board
Also... Time management HAS to be better but that isn't saying much.
Maybe we need to hire Kurt Warner as an assistant quarterback consultant. Recalling his days in arena football, in the move "American Underdog", where he had to train to throw the ball within 3 seconds. Negates poor protection from the offensive line. Slight humor meant here.
Minimum Expectations:
Beat Vandy (Just like ODU, you get one loss to them. Never again. Plus I want a win over a non-conference power 4)
Beat ODU
Beat Wofford
Beat Wake
Beat Cal
Beat UVA
Then Pry really needs to steal one of the GT, UL, or Miami.
He gets to 7 that way, I'd be okay with the season and having him stay longer.
Here's our timeline:
I think that we lose to South Carolina but crush Vandy (we lost last year because Pavia beat us with his feet which I dont think happens against a 3 man front this year).
We win the next 4 games (I have no idea why people are saying NC State will beat us when they just dont do that) which will put us at 5-1 record going into GT. I think we beat GT in our first 50/50 game and we dominate Cal because going west to east is brutal to go to 7-1. This is where everybody will be losing their minds talking about playoffs and the ACC title game.
Unfortunately, things change here and we lose to Louisville, FSU, and Miami to be at 7-4. People will start calling for Pry's head because he cant win big games and everybody will start gossiping about Gruden coming here to take over.
Then we close out beating UVA for 8 wins and a decent bowl game to make us feel better because the team looks like they're improving.
After the season, we announce that Gruden is our first GM and that Barstool is now an official sponsor and Lane Stadium gets renamed "Third Leg Arena brought to you by Barstool Sports".
i really appreciate the optimism here.
I wish I shared it. I don't think there's any way we sniff a win against GT, a team that could very likely be in the ACCCG. NSCU is a tough one for me. No one down here in Eastern NC thinks they will be good, but they do have some weapons on offense and "Desperate Dave", as they say down here, coaches his best when his back is against the wall.
I don't give us a chance in any "50/50" game until this coaching staff can do two things: (1) Stop mismanaging the games so poorly. (2) Close out a close game.
With that being said, and with my O&M glasses on... Maybe we are this years ASU!!??
Brent Pry has beaten non-ACC P4 teams exactly 0 times as a Head Coach. We lost to NCState in Raleigh last time. We haven't really beaten a team with a pulse in over 5 years. Our best wins are against ACC teams that finish 7-6. We're a trash team in a trash conference and until these coaches prove me wrong on the field I will refuse to believe that we are anything other than trash.
We beat Miami last year. The
refsACC just stole it from us.Edit: Fixed.
The refs had it right. The league stole it from us.
Fair. I've fixed it now.
I get what you're saying - and I don't completely disagree. We beat USC on FedEx field. We won the Sugar Bowl vs Michigan. But non-VT fans who go and look at those in history won't see that. As far as the history books are concerned, Pry has 0 wins against non-P4 teams and his best wins are against middling ACC teams that can barely win half their games. It's not a good look for him.
After looking through the amount of game changing bad calls we've had over the years on a big stage.... man we've gotten fucked. We are due some damn dork magic. The ball always seems to bounce the other way when it comes to us getting a break. I'm ready for a few years of reverting back to the mean to balance out the scales of life.
Fuck the mean! We could use at least a decade of things breaking our way.
And I STILL think it would be close as to whether our all time breaks fell close to 50/50.
A decade? How about a generation
Can't argue with that.
Not to mention we have played against a ton of legendary QBs over the years- can't remember all but a few include Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, and Andrew Luck and I know there are multiple others....
The great Kellen Moore!
(Sigh. I'm sure we're all trying to forget that one. And Kellen Moore wasn't great talent physically, but knew how to run that system, dinking and dunking it all over the field.)
Ken Dorsey was the same
Forgot about the blocked field goal that we returned for a touchdown against Liberty, only for us to have called a timeout to ice the kicker. They then of course proceeded to make a career long kick after the timeout to win it.
Update - I was drunk at the time and misconstrued the horrible consequences of being a VT fan into my own fan fiction. See actual correct circumstances to the even worse way we lost below.
That's not what happened.
He predictably tried to kick the shit out of the ball, kicked it right into the line and we housed it as you expect a team to do in that spot.
Because we called the TO, Freeze saw there was no point in trying that again, so they went for a play to try and just get some yardage, and we inexplicably gave a 20 yard cushion to the WRs. The extra yardage they picked up put them into the kicker's range, and they predictably won.
An all time shit for brained coaching move. One of the worst series of coaching decisions I've seen in any level of the game.
This was maddening to watch then and maddening to read now
You're right. I had blocked that from my memory. Fuck. Happy Friday.
I still thought the 2nd kick, while closer was his longest
I know its been a few, but the way I remember it, the first was going to be an attempt at like 15 yards beyond his career long. An absurd attempt that was always destined to get blocked.
I believe the second attempt was close to his career long but maybe shorter by a couple yards. Still not an easy kick, but definitely in way more of his comfort zone. And with his practice fuckup our of the way, he sent the winner right down the pipe.
As the old saying goes, never interrupt your enemy when they are in the midst of making a mistake.
everything tracks with my memory, i just thought the 2nd kick was still his long too, just not as long
I thought it was the stupidest thing I would ever see in my life until last year's Miami game when we somehow outdid ourselves multiple times
And yet we still won that fucking game if not for the ACC front office calling in a decision to keep Cam Ward in the Heisman race. Seriously, why the fuck was someone in the replay booth on the phone during that review? So goddamn sketchy
Outside of the overturned call against Michigan, this was the biggest horse$h!t call against us that I can remember. I was right over top of that play in Fed-Ex. YOu could definitely see it live, but then when I watched the replay... Wow! There was a solid 12-16 inches of space between our WR (I think it was Josh Morgan) and the USC DB. We were going to almost put the game away right there.
This was compounded by the absolute trash calls from the SEC crew in the first quarter for "not enough men on the LOS", which was a point of emphasis in the SEC that year. It absolutely crippled the offense that first quarter.
I had forgotten all about that.
egregious.
also the BS roughing the passer call that let usc score
I think it might have been Josh Hyman in the USC game
Everyone remembers the BS OPI call that cost us points at the end of the second half, but the real reason we lost that game was Xavier Adibi tearing his bicep and being out for the second half. He was basically spying Reggie Bush and containing him all first half. Without him, we didn't have anyone that could keep up with Bush and he killed us after halftime. If even if we score a TD on the drive of the OPI call we still wouldn't have been able to stop Bush's two long receiving TDs in the second half.
So you're saying we have a coach on staff that knows a thing or two about having a linebacker shadow a Heisman candidate. That could come in handy.
Yes but we dont have an Xavier Adibi type player on our roster, just on the staff
If he plays, Caleb Woodson might be motivated enough to earn back his captaincy.
I do agree this was the biggest issue, but you cant really complain about an injury, bad refs are fair game.
Yeah, no doubt this had a bigger impact. However, if we go down and score a TD on that bogus PI call I do think it changes the complexion of the game substantially.
Yeah, most of this was TIC, although I don't think we'll suck this year. How we play against South Carolina could convince me that we'll win 10 or win 3.
My optimism stems from my thoughts that the OC and DC last year were god-awful. If they were halfway decent, we would have won most of our games last year, and we played Clemson close, even with those awful Coords. I feel a competent OC and DC that knows how to adjust at half or, even better, in-game, changes everything.
7-5, while
beatingcurb stomping loluva in the last regular season game to keep them from being bowl eligible.Last season - the team had the talent to win 8-9 games and underperformed by not closing out in several close losses.
This season - the team has (seemingly) the talent to win 6-7 games and if history is an indicator that means 5-6 wins likely the minimum with 7-8 being the upside.
Vegas has them at 6.5 wins for 2025 - sounds about right. Another year of mediocre expectations - hope I'm wrong. Felt more optimistic in Fuentes final couple years based on the talent vs. right now - that's saying something. They had preseason 8 win odds in 2020 and 7 in 2021. Needle moving the wrong way.
The bare minimum for Pry to keep his job? Winning record. For the love of God, win 7 games. Even if you have the Hokie's Seven (7-6) as opposed to 7-5.
The bare minimum of my expectations is 4 wins. And to think, a year ago at this time I was so full of hope. Well. Comparatively speaking, anyway.
Call me crazy, but I will be fucking pissed if we go 6-6 again. I won't be particularly pleased with 7-5 either. I've had enough of settling for that kind of mediocrity for the last decade. This program and its fanbase used to be massively disappointed with 9 win seasons. I'm old enough to remember it, and old enough to still hold this place to that kind of standard. I refuse to relent on that and I think the fanbase in general should refuse to accept another year of 6-6, or 7-5 mediocrity.
I don't care how many new faces are on the roster. I don't care that we have new coordinators. I have zero good will left for this staff and this AD. Lesser programs have been figuring out how to win with year-one rosters and brand new coaches. I'm no longer satisfied by a win/loss record that delivers only empty platitudes about how we are "headed in the right direction". The time to start heading in the right direction was two fucking years ago. The time for Pry & this staff to figure this shit out, was two fucking years ago. Now, it's time to win games. Period. Win games, or it's scorched earth time for this athletic department.
'Headed in the right direction' is fine when you're overturning a roster in year 1. 6-6 is fine coming off a 3 win season. In year 4, it's time. 8 wins or go home. We can find someone else to go 6-6.
This is where I'm at. It's put up or shutup time now. Anything less than 8 wins is a disappointment.
Mike Elko got f*&$king Duke to 9 wins in his first season as HC.
I'd like to be here, but, unless we are this years ASU, I don't see more than 5 wins on the schedule. And 5 might be a stretch.
I will be satisfied with visible improvements. I see the plan, I see it being executed, I see the effort, I want to see the result.
MY minimum? I expect to watch exactly 0 games, still get upset and allow VT sports to ruin my mental state, and VT will win exactly 1 game.
Other than that I have no clue. I have purposefully not read articles this summer, I have no idea who is on the team other than Drones & Watkins (they are still here, right?), and have even less insight into what our competition is capable of. I just dont think we have a FBS caliber team, so I expect us to lose to anyone that still plays at the FBS level.
We go 1 and 0 every damn week. Go Hokies!