I was actually encouraged with the large exception of Drones. Im afraid he ain't the one to lead us to the promised land. That was yet another winnable game we lost more than I felt the other team won. If the team was ready on the first drive we mightve had a chance
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Weirdly, he had a ton of great downfield throws in this game, a few drops and an unfortunate chop block kept them from all being completed, but honestly was very impressed by his accuracy on those throws and the receivers. However, I also feel like when we needed him to be accurate the most over the middle he missed too often.
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I think this is worth a discussion. There were certainly some good throws downfield. But there were also some throws that shouldn't have been made when his WRs bailed him out by making SC Top 10 catches.
Drones is not nearly consistent enough to be a starting QB for a P4 team.
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Agreed. One prime example, they played prevent D, soft coverage and he went 0 for 4 on the last drive. He should have easily made those passes and should have kept it and run on one of the incompletions. That was a drive that should have gotten us to the red zone. Total head scratcher.
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On paper - Drones should be better than someone like Jerod Evans but he isn't. He is faster, similar size, stronger arm, etc. - but Jerod Evans was a legit fired-up competitor. Drones' issue is not his ability - he just looks like he doesn't care whether he wins or loses.
A 230+ pound quarterback going down two yards before the first down every time they run or being hesitant to take off is not them protecting themselves. It's just a lack of "it" factor. If he ran like Jerod Evans or Logan Thomas or wanted to win as bad as Tyrod - his game would completely change. That is coaching.
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Agree with all of that except this part. If he genuinely does not care, no amount of coaching can change that, and the coaches should make way for the next man up.
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I watched the game with my father in law, who is a Penn State guy from central PA and not familiar at all with Tech football, and he said this too watching Drones for the first time yesterday. That he just seems completely passionless and uncompetitive.
Lots of talk in the offseason about Drones becoming a "more vocal leader", whatever that means. I don't see it at all though. It's nagged at me for three seasons that something about him is just missing, and that's what it is - the guy just has zero fire.
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How is the "it" factor coaching? It's an intangible that players either have or they don't.
Blame the coaches for lack of discipline, poor playcalling or poor clock management. Don't try to blame the coaches because it appears a player doesn't have enough of a competitive edge.
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Agree that "it factor" is usually referring to an intangible quality of a player rather than coaching necessarily, but I do think this is something a coach can inspire in players by emphasizing playing with high effort every snap is so important that you're going to be benched if you're out there going through the motions even if you were named starter. Unfortunately to do this you also need capable back ups prepared to play, and I think in this case not having enough direct competition at QB this off season was likely more of an issue than other aspects of coaching.
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Drones moves to 0-6 when attempting over 30 passes in a game. Very clear they need to figure out some kind of running game, which may have been Bowen's strength (if we're not giving all the credit to Tuten).
There were some bad throws and worse drops. Also some incredibly placed balls and even better catches.
Overall, with the way the defense played, I still come out feeling better than I did after the Vandy loss last season. Feels like there is a path to a good team if we can hold a superstar led offense to only 17 points.
Edit: took my dog on a walk and thought about this a little more. Feels like this was a reboot to the 2022 season, with a better roster and slightly better coaching... but a lot of the errors still feel the same. I'm still a little higher on this team because of Siefkes and Montgomery, but I'm worried we will be stuck in 6-6 hell until we can develop a true identity. If Bowen could find one with Drones and Tuten, I would hope Montgomery can find one this year. But it might take until October once again.
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No sacks from the right tackle is an improvement! But yeah, Bowen was creative but predictable, especially in the passing game. Montgomery seemed to have schemed up some simple plays that could have led to a steady if unspectacular offense. Time will tell if he's a long term improvement.
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As down as I am about the loss. We got the result we expected just not how I expected. If VT can win against Vandy and takes care of business vs ODU and Wofford I'll feel pretty good about our chances vs State and ACC play.
Love and the defense look legit. Just need the offense to make the most of what they have.
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The defense looked really good for 1.5 quarters. That was a positive. But it's not anything close to a Bud quality defense that can win games on its own and the offense doesn't know what it wants to be and doesn't have the players to figure it out.
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We gave up two TD drives to the best QB we will see all year. There are deficiencies for sure, but this is the best defense we've seen since Pry arrived to Blacksburg. I agree, it's not vintage Bud, but it's miles ahead of what we've been forced to watch.
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We gave up 17 points on defense to a preseason heisman front runner and one of those tds was in "sell out to stop thebrun and get the ball back" time due to the special teams gaf
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offense doesn't know what it wants to be and doesn't have the players to figure it out.
This has been the case since loeffler was hired. At least with Stinespring we knew we just wanted to run and we had running backs and an offensive line to do it. And honestly we had above average to amazing quarterbacks to do this from 1999-2011.
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The scheme on offense and defense seems way better than last year. I'm hoping a lot of the stuff that killed us (dropped passes, awful throws, lazy tackling, rbs dancing in the backfield, etc) are week 1 things that get worked out by next week.
I feel better about this team than I have about any pry team thus far.
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Agree with all of the above, but I STILL, 4 years in, do not have the confidence that Pry can effectively manage the clock. And that will cost us games (as it has in previous years).
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I'm not sure why VT football is so frustrating in these games where we are expected to lose by double digits (we did cover the 13.5 point spread, FAM!!), but here we are.
Here's the elephant in the room for me - and it's twofold.
1. We still do not have a QB. Seriously, Drones has regressed year over year and appears to be the worst version of himself right now. He was making poor decisions, he was making poor throws (with the exception of simply throwing up contested deep balls), and he'd rather put his head down like a battering ram than side step someone for a first down. He simply isn't the QB we need to compete week in and week out. And it was clear that Montgomery doesn't trust him.
2. Pry... For as much as I love the guy, he simply cannot manage the clock, or the game. He has very little situational awareness. I know the end of the half situation can be debated (I disagree with his approach in a game like this), but with about 8 minutes to go in the 4th (or whatever it was), and down by 2 scores, you have to play with some urgency. His teams do not. Pry isn't a P4 football coach. And it couldn't be more obvious at this point.
With all that being said, I'm very impressed with how the team looked from a physicality standpoint. This is as big and as fast as we've looked since 2016. It was refreshing to see!
Additionally, the DL is really going to give most ACC teams some trouble. They looked really good today. I also thought Siefkes had a fantastic gameplan and made some great tweaks along the way. He was clearly one step ahead all day long. When USCe made plays (with the exception of the RPO's on that first drive), it was usually because they guys were simply better. That's all. I think this was a great hire.
All we can do is win next week. Mess that one up and it's going to be an ugly season.
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Regarding point 1 - I just went and checked the stats last year. There were games where the longest passes were 20, 25, 30, 31, and 34 yards. Of the 4 games we had passes longer than that, 3 of them were against Vanderbilt, Marshall, and ODU, with the 4th being against Stanford. In three of those, the longs of 55, 49, and 46 were by far the longest, with the next longest around 20 yards. Consider we had passes of 28, 36, and 37 yards just tonight, that is definitely more of a deep threat than we had last year, and against good receivers that played close with a lot of contact.
Also, at 221 yards passing, there was only one game we had more passing yards in last year, and that was against Vanderbilt. Against Miami last year, we had 189 (all Drones) and against Clemson, Drones had more than himself and Schlee combined (188, with Drones at 115 and Schlee at 73).
So Drones had more yards this game than in all but 1 game last year, with longer passes he had in most games. He IS better this year. He may not be a great P4 QB, but he is definitely better.
Edit: also, this is the first game of the season against probably one of the top 3teams we play, with an all new O-Line, new receivers, and new RBs. The offense probably wasn't going to do great this game.
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It's one game. And we had element of surprise on our side vs SC. We won't get that luxury again this year now that other teams have film on us. If he keeps it up then sure. But let's not say he's definitely better than last year after one game. He had lots of yards. He also missed some really important throws. He also had receivers drop critical balls at bad moments. This wasn't all on him. Let's see what he looks like over the next 3 weeks before making claims of progress or regression.
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Uh, did you ignore what I said about the stats? Explain more yards than all but one game and THREE long passes compared to just one in several games last year. Give me definitive points as to how he's worse. I'll give you a lower completion percentage but more yards. Plus, my recollection of some of the long "passes" last year was short passes with long gains after the receptions. These were 3 legit long passes. One of which, credit to the receiver, was made with a pass interference call against the DB.
Again, give me your criteria for how he has regressed. What stats are you comparing? My guess is it's the sniff test, which doesn't seem valid given all the stats I gave.
Again, I'm not saying he's "good" I'm just saying better than last year, at least in this game, again, against one of the top 3teams we will face, which he did worse, much worse, last year (at least in terms of yards, but when you throw for about double the yards, does completion percentage matter THAT much?).
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Weren't there at least 3 passes that absolutely should have been caught by the receivers? Percentage completion, while probably MOSTLY on the QB is not 100% on him. And also, a bunch of his plays were running out of the pocket and getting rid of the ball rather than taking a loss. That counts against percentage completion, does it not, while also not giving an indication as to his accuracy.
Give him 3 extra completions for receivers dropping balls they should have caught and like 4 throwaways for being chased down by the defense (was it even higher?) and you're talking a MUCH different completion percentage. And, was his percentage completion higher last year because he took sacks or ran out of bounds for a loss rather than throwing the ball away?
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Not all the incompletions or drops are equal though. Tayke Heath had a 3rd down drop that was chest high, straight to the hands but some of the other drops were made harder because the ball placement wasn't good.
There was the ball to a running back that would have had him running free down the sideline that he threw below the knees, which I remember him doing a lot last year (difference being Tuten had other worldly balance to make those catches).
I am not a film nerd, but I wouldn't be surprised if there were some mechanical/footwork issues on the drops, because to your point, he has some great throws were only his receiver can make a play. I don't expect perfection, but there is still room for improvement.
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The Takye Heath is definitely one, I seem to recall one to one of the Greene's that was VERY catchable, and I thought I remembered one other as well. And yes, definitely a couple below the knees - even if someone could catch those, they aren't likely to pick up much yardage afterwards.
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You may not have, but the point I was referencing said that Drones had regressed and was the worst version of himself.
And re-read your message -thought you were supporting the OP's sentiment I wrote above. I think he's a little better in some regards, definitely need to see.
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There's so much to break down here, but I won't get into it all.
For beginners, stats don't live in a vacuum. Those deep balls were a combination of good throws into tight coverage with SC Top 10 sort of catches. Those plays are not at all indicative of progress being made with Drones or with him being a serviceable QB. We can all reserve judgment until after a few games, but Drones looked as bad tonight as I ever remember him looking while in Blacksburg. There are many reasons we lost this game, not least of which is the reality that SC simply has more talent, but in the end Drones had opportunities and missed on many of them.
The most glaring opportunity? In the 4th quarter when we were 4th and somewhere around 3 or 4 yards and he ran out to the edge. All he had to do was shift a little, make someone miss, and instead he thought it was prudent to put his head down and operate like a battering ram. He had so many questionable decisions in a general sense that weren't directly related to accurate passing that it's abundantly clear he isn't our guy.
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I think Drones was even worse than his stats show.
I saw someone who is processing very slowly, making poor reads (in the passing and option game), poor decisions on throws as well as in some of his runs.
He left SO much out on the field today, and it's completely inexcusable for him to be this bad 5 years into his collegiate career.
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This is an interesting point. But I have some different conclusions.
The "improved" passing stats is likely more of a reflection of the Montgomery's scheme than bona fide improvements from Drones. That's not to say Drones will not be improved over last year, but Montgomery's passing scheme is really only a few components: (1) forcing the ball downfield when there is one-on-one matchup; (2) pass to an underneath receiver open that is schemed open; and (3) intermediate stops, outs and slants Drones did very well with forcing the ball downfield and letting his receiver make a play. He was just really inaccurate to many times with the rest of the passes. The really difficult part is that the short throws are like layups that simply require touch and placement but Drones threw the ball too hard, angled downward, and either behind the receiver or too low.
His receivers both helped him and hurt him. They did well in one-on-one matchups downfield but dropped to many short routes that were not thrown well but catchable. While the goal of the underneath routes are to catch and run, the primary job of a receiver is to catch the ball and the receivers didn't adjust well enough to make those catches (probably focusing on the YAC).
Drones's game on Sunday was definitely a bad game for Drones, but I am both discouraged and encouraged by Drones's performance. I'm discouraged by the inaccuracy and the 43% completion rate. I'm encouraged by his deep ball that put his receivers in position to make a play, something we have not seen in his game. If he can improve on the underneath routes, which are easy passes to make, the passing game will be better than the last two years.
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It looked to me as if the WR's did a great job when forced to fight for a catch but looked to YAC before catching the ball on short passes where they were no pressed too much.
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Defensive line looked really good for the majority of the game, which is a great sign for the future.
Drones is a problem. Missed way too many open guys today. The plays were there for us to win this game, the receivers were making the plays to keep us in it, and he just couldn't capitalize at all. He rushed every big throw he tried today, and was as accurate as a shotgun. If not for some phenomenal work done by the WRs, his numbers are brutal for this game
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No doubt, receivers didn't do him any favors. I'm talking about the eye test, what i physically watched. I seen a true freshman making his first start yesterday, not a fourth/fifth year QB that has started 3 seasons.
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Part of the reason we have him is because he's mobile. We seem to forget that early in his career here, he was almost expected to run the ball unless there was a wide open receiver. Weren't plays designed to mostly open one side of the field, lots of option plays?
Over the course of his career, we've been transitioning him to more of a passing QB where we just want him to be able to run on busted plays or designed QB runs.
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Hate to say it, but if you can't even score a single touchdown due to execution errors and poor QB play, you're not going to win many games. With Vandy next week and a fairly challenging ACC slate, I don't see how we win more than 5-6. Defense has certainly improved but the offense is absolutely dreadful, and game/clock management from Pry is not improved.
Unfortunately think we are in for another long season, and will be paying another golden parachute to Pry at the end of the year. Such is the state of VT football now.
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The punt return was the back breaker. The defense played well against a mobile QB. The offense made too many mistakes but I thought the play calls were generally not bad.
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I think I honestly feel worse after that. It's the same thing over and over. Flashes of talent and success bookended by silly mistakes and errors we have made over and over again. I'd rather we have been blown out but it feels like a metaphor for VT sports. It's showed we aren't willing to put in the money to really succeed but just enough to keep hope. In the current climate, I just don't think we will have any success beyond .500 seasons with the occasional 8 wins. I love everything about coach Pry except his ability to coach. And the school is going to be content with that until the very last moment. We are going to be able to bring in some decent transfers and a few good recruits that will either fizzle out here or if they improve, go elsewhere. It's the current state of college sports and we are still riding the high of 10-25 years ago thinking it's enough
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We aren't going to be playing against many track Olympians or Seller's this year. So the defense was very encouraging. Dropped short passes but many great contested catches, by way of great throw. Drones has got to get it figured out. I was fine with the play-calling and Parker Clements wasn't out there so the OL was automatically better. I have some idea of what this team can be. But, we will go as far as KD's arm takes us. I also don't understand the 'Play Pop' crowd. He played an AWFUL uva defense last year, then looked pedestrian against Minnesota's backups. He wouldn't have been able to do much better in this game.
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Hard disagree. Play Pop. There's no future with Drones after this season. He's shown us what he is, and that's a solid backup QB. Pop still has time. Let him play and develop.
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Perhaps oddly, I was so impressed by the receivers, Hawkins, and the DL that I now have a much better feeling about the rest of the year. There were frustrating things about this game, but I thought we would lose so mostly came out of this feeling better rather than worse.
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Same here. Just finished watching the 2nd half at 1230 am after getting back from a wedding and I gotta say this team is different than last year. I see peices that give me hope that I never saw last year.
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Agree there. Caveat that the S. Carolina's weakest part of their game in 2024 was allowing sacks, but the D-line did well to get to the QB, prevent QB from escaping the pocket, get into passing lanes, and disrupt the run game.
I also thought the coordination was better. The O-line was not great but definitely a step up from incompetent.
QB play has to improve though. If it doesn't, the rest may not matter in terms of generating more wins. Drones needs to get comfortable in the offense and improve accuracy.
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Offense might look better when Drones isnt running for his life. every play, but that really means we will look good against bad teams and that's about it.
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That's because our offense somehow doesn't know how to identify a hot route and Drones doesn't know how to find it if there was one... so so many opportunities today to just drop it to a guy and let them run and instead Drones runs like crazy off to the side of their best defensive player and throws some crazy pass. It is incompetency in play calling and execution.
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Quarterback recruiting and development has truly been one of VT's biggest failures since the Tyrod Taylor era. Logan should never have been converted into a QB despite his strengths, Brewer was too fragile and threw too many picks but sure was a tough young man, Hooker was never properly developed but should have been a Heisman contender with an O-line and receivers to compliment him, and Drones is just not accurate enough. Others have had similar but usually worse liabilities. It's the toughest job on the team, I know, but I sure hope Coach Montgomery can stick around long enough to competently develop a QB1 with the requisite skills to complete over 60 percent of his passes while throwing less than 0.5 picks per game. I can dream...
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Brewer knew how to throw the ball with touch, he just didn't have the strength to throw deep iirc. He was smart, mobile and made the most of his skills and high football IQ. I could easily see Brewer getting us 8-9 wins with this team having a decent O-line, talented (but young) receivers and solid coaching to go with a defense that I believe will finish the season in the top half of the conference, maybe even top third.
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This. With Montgomery scheming open receivers in the short-to-intermediate routes, Brewer would've had a field day. We would've won on Sunday with Brewer behind center.
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I don't think anyone is surprised we lost that. Our defense played a hell of a game. Our offense was pretty disappointing, but that's not new. We had the element of surprise. Now the rest of our teams will have film on us. Let's see how they do.
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What pisses me off is how close we are to being good. But it's like Fuente in year 6. At some point when you find a way to lose EVERY SINGLE TIME in a close game it's time to move on and find someone more competent. Literally catch the ball, don't throw a stupid pick, tackle the return man when you have him wrapped up and we easily win this game. We were clearly the better team. Instead stupid mistakes make us look bad and we end the game without a single touchdown. Terrible work from the staff, they have to be fired as soon as possible
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The coaches didn't miss the tackles; the coaches didn't throw the ball to the other team; the coaches didn't over/under throw wide open receivers; the coaches didn't drop passes...
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They're the ones who recruited and train the ones who do. Their talent evaluation is lacking and their player development is horrible and has been for years. Even if the current coordinators are good, it might be too late to save Pry.
If Whit does get his way and the checkbooks do open, we need a complete blank slate, clean house of everyone and bring in a whole new regime that can utilize the assets given to them.
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When you know what you have isn't working the dumbest thing to do is continue it just because of the possibility that trying something else might not work, either.
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Your comment just makes it sound like a new coach is a sure thing to utilize the assets given to them, it's not.
I think that if we don't put up a good season, we will be looking for a new Head Coach next year. I also believe that we'll have to be very lucky for it to make a difference.
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Yep. This feels inevitable at this point. I have no confidence in Pry whatsoever to build this team back into a winner. He's just a stone cold loser as far as coaching goes at this point, there's no getting past that. The same old ugly problems continue to rear their head.
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No but if they're doing those things every single time even when they're clearly better than the other team, that is on the coaches. It's up to the coaches to get the team in a headspace to get up for the game
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You can coach until you're blue in the face but if the player(s) don't have the talent/athleticism/football iq to execute, that's not on the coaches. Except for maybe playing someone else or recruiting better.
Some guys shine in practice but shit the bed when the lights are on on game day. Others can't seem to get it together in practice but are stars when the pressure is on. Coaches do need to figure out who belongs in each of those columns
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Honestly it's a top 15 team that a not great team held in check for longer than I thought. Next two games I think will tell us a lot more about who this team is.
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In the first game no team is ever as good as they look, and no team is ever as bad as they look. We made SC look like a questionable top-25 team, and were maybe closer to a top-25 team than most expect.
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SP+ also has our strength of schedule remaining as the 9th hardest moving forward, probably due to three straight games against Louisville, Florida State, and Miami.
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South Carolina is not a top 15 team, preseason rankings don't mean jack shit. I'd be surprised if that team finished with more than 7 wins this season, and we could've easily won by 2 scores if we cut out some ridiculous mistakes that most decent teams don't make
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I said it last season and I'm saying it again, if "Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda" was the game of football VT would have a number of natty's by now. We are duty bound as CFB representatives of WaCaSa.
To an earlier point, our troubles have had one thing in common, amongst others (don't get me wrong, I know there are others), and that's not having a true QB1 since Tyrod. Couple this with WaCaSa, and we would be a 9+ win season team and ACCCG contender.
Outside of landing a QB1, there has to be a time when VT can get out of their own way to a larger degree than what we have seen season on end.
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At this point, Pry has shown that he has absolutely no idea how to handle the last 4 mins of a half enough times that the only fixes are to either give complete control of timeouts and tempo to Montgomery or to fire Pry. I was hoping that Montgomery being a former HC would be able to help in these situations and give advice but today's clock management screams that Pry was still 100% in charge. It's the same shit every time, he lets time run off the clock when facing a long field, doesn't know when to call timeouts, has the offense going at their normal tempo, and still has them checking with sideline to change play calls when they need to be snapping the ball. Pry is somehow the last person in the stadium to realize that we are near the end of the half every time. And when he finally does realize it, there are only 30 seconds left, on a running clock, with multiple timeouts remaining, and we are only at midfield. It's groundhog day every game and he's done nothing to fix it.
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Not enough talk going on about this. It's the most egregious part of the day to me. I cannot fucking believe he still hasn't figured out clock management.
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What's crazy is clock management is the easiest part of the game to understand. I've seen kids playing Madden that are miles better clock managers than Pry has shown
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I was hoping that Montgomery being a former HC would be able to help in these situations and give advice but today's clock management screams that Pry was still 100% in charge
Hate to be the bearer of bad news but Montgomery wasn't the nest clock manager while he was at Tulsa either
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Going in, a number of the analyses basically said, USC-e has the two best players and that will be the difference. I thought that was a gross oversimplification but in the end, that was probably accurate.
Keep our shit together and this team can probably win 8 or 9 games. Next week is a huge test.
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First time I watched a game live since 2021 at GT. ''Twas a good time
More confident I've been in the defense since 2019
The bad:
I don't get why we can't have competent offense in Blacksburg
Offense inside the 40 has to improve.
This is the first neutral site game I've been to (I've been a fan since since 2008) where I felt like we were clearly outnumbered in the stands.
The other:
Without know how good SC is, it's tough to gauge how bad this loss is.
On Drones... I think that in any given year, there are only 15-20 college QBs who can truly elevate a team. After that, it's all about scheme fit, surrounding talent, health, etc. Drones is not in that top 15-20.
I think we got out talented today. You saw it on those missed tackles in the backfield. Players got there. Just didn't make the tackle.
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We would always be out numbered in Atlanta. Its a 3 hour drive from Columbia, SC. That's a day trip for their fans. Most VT fans would have long drives or flights and need a hotel.
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Well Pry per usual wanted to thank our fans for the strong turnout first thing in his postgame presser. Pretty obvious that's just canned coach speak at this point.
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And using Bars #'s above; if the crowd was 55k and 60-40 in favor of Gamecocks, that comes out to 22,000 or so Hokie fans which is about on par with many of our past "travel crowds"(can't necessarily compare us playing South Carolina vs us playing Bama- Bama is almost always gonna be a more fun opponent to watch and therefore folks more willing to make the 8 hour trip(not to mention we were a better team back then too)....
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I think we got out talented today. You saw it on those missed tackles in the backfield.
Are missed tackles being out talented? On several plays out guys had their arms around the ball carrier and still missed it. Finish the tackle, that's fundamentals. Another one I saw was receivers dropping the ball when it was right in their hands. To me that's not talent, it's guys being soft. Not rising to the moment, not making plays. That's an attitude and coaching issue. Maybe guys are thinking too hard about assignments, maybe they're being over coached. Either way it's a problem, and most teams don't have that issue
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Are missed tackles being out talented? On several plays out guys had their arms around the ball carrier and still missed it.
Yes? This is exactly what it looks like when a 2-star tries to wrap up a 4-star. They get there, and the more athletic player wins.
Another one I saw was receivers dropping the ball when it was right in their hands. To me that's not talent, it's guys being soft. Not rising to the moment, not making plays.
I mean, I think that's talent adjacent as well. Yes, it's a confidence/mental issue first, but more talent players have had more successful reps throughout their career and have more confidence as a result. Yes, this is somewhat coachable, but I think that's a big of an over simplification.
Either way it's a problem, and most teams don't have that issue
I think most 6-6 teams have these issues. 9-3 teams? Much less so.
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With you on catches, but hard disagree on tackling. Athleticism helps you reach the ballcarrier quicker. But the fundamentals of wrapping up the guy and getting him to the ground can be taught in practice. How many athletic defenders get where they need to be and either whiff with an arm tackle or try to make a SportsCenter Top 10 style hit and miss, flailing horribly? SO many of them, and it's been that way for years now across the sport.
You can be less talented and still be good at tackling.
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What is there to teach, stiff-arming and swatting people's arms away? Core strength? Come on. That's not teachable, that's instinctual/a matter of hard work. Get low, wrap him up, leverage his ass to the ground. If you can't, get strong enough to or move over for someone who is. Strength also =/= athleticism
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My point is you can improve on it. It's not some static component of someone's game that can't be worked on because "well, he's just not that talented."
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I never said that tackling isn't a teachable skill.
But in 1v1 situation, where the tackler (a) doesn't know where the offensive player is going (by definition) and (b) is undersized and/or slower, then of course the offensive player is going to win the match up more often than not.
How many times did Tuten make a man miss? How many times did Tyrod or Vick weasel their way out of tackles? It's not always because the defender was under-coached, sometimes the other guy is just better.
And in THIS match up, that was often the case
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Another one I saw was receivers dropping the ball when it was right in their hands.
But this went both ways. We were fortunate that some wide open SC receivers also dropped balls that hit them in the hands.
Is it attitude and coaching, or the fact it was the first game (of the season for some and of their careers for others)? If they are still dropping catchable balls in 3 weeks, then there is definitely more to it.
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Besides the first drive the D looked improved and borderline stout at times.
The O -- looked like a carbon-copy of the Bowen scheme...was disappointed in lack of anything new. Drones isn't a good passer and isn't ever going to be.
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Sellers averaged under 2.0 ypc which is not something to toss aside. Would be shocked if he has any other games that low. As said a bunch above, the defense played well enough to win this game probably. It seems like we actually have a D that can stop the run for the first time in a loooong time.
Also encouraged by the WRs ability to make contested catches and get open (we'll hopefully fix the dropsies). Feels just like last year with a good defensive front and skill players we can't quite take advantage of. And when the only major hold overs year to year are Drones and Pry, it's hard not to point fingers
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It'll be our only loss of the season, and we didn't have Terion Stewart. USCe will do really good, and so will Virginia Tech. Defense and Special Teams will keep the Hokies in all games, and the running game/passing game will be balanced and play makers will step up. It was the first game of the season and players had to knock off rust. I'd like to see a lot of Pop Watson and Rangel because Drones is on his last year and will not improve but so much. Drones should be the backup. Build up depth, have a good year, and be even better next year =)
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Maybe. After losing to Vandy, the coaches will be desperate to find something that works tho. Enter Pop or Rangel. I'm not saying it'll work but that's likely to happen imo
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After watching the Dline I think we have more of a chance than I did 24 hours ago. The teams than gave Vandy fits last year just used their lines to shut down anything up the middle.
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I just want a quarterback, ANY quarterback, who throws a catchable ball. I don't give a shit if he can scramble or anything like that, just be able to hit an open guy.
I feel like even doing that has been impossible for us since, I mean hell probably Tyrod
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If Drones puts up another stinker of a performance next week against Vandy, you have to wonder if you make a switch at QB and give them ODU and Wofford to get reps before ACC play. I just don't think Drones is going to take this offense anywhere at this point. He plateaued in 2023 and hasn't developed since.
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I just want a quarterback, ANY quarterback, who throws a catchable ball. I don't give a shit if he can scramble or anything like that, just be able to hit an open guy.
I feel like this is the opposite of what we said when Grant Wells was our qb and drones was on the bench 😭
We need QB development. We can't have QBs (or any player really) who's in the program for >2 years without showing any demonstrable improvement.
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Wish we could've pulled it off, but I did see some encouraging things. The OL didn't look terrible, which feels like a big improvement over the last 3 years.
Secondly, it looked like the LBs were the most decisive in their movement since maybe the Tremaine Edmunds years.
The WRs were also making plays. Obviously a lot of things to clean up but the fight and physically we were playing with showed and I am looking forward to getting payback against Vanderbilt
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Yet another game where we don't score a touchdown. Yet another game where end of half clock management is simply mond boggling.
I am just waiting for this program to excite me somehow and nothing about it is. I dont expect us to beat SEC teams but it sure would be nice just to get back to the days where we could punch above our weight
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I feel better about the team this evening than I did when I woke up this morning. We were really competitive with a team that's much more talented than us. WRs looked good, RBs were effective even though the #1 wasn't playing, DL and general defense was good and Laws was excellent. D would be better with Delaney, but we expected he wouldn't be playing this year since his first start freshman year l, and I think that 3 year preparation for his absence showed.
I've never been a Drones fan, he's all potential and no substance. Would've really been interesting if we'd landed Malik Washington. Definitely missed Xavier Chaplin on the line.
I'm not mad, all that matters is conference play.
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South Carolina has the 18th most talented roster (per 247) with four 5-stars and 35 4-stars on their roster. They are one of 18 teams that have a Bluechip Ratio > 50% (aka they have more 4 & 5 stars than 3-stars).
The same outlet lists Virginia Tech as the 40th most talented roster with zero 5-stars and 17 4-stars.
Not even the top 4, if we just had Sellers you probably get at least that 3 game bump. Consider we won TOP but how much wider could that gap have been with a few more 1st down conversions. Sellers I think would have extended several of our drives.
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Our WRs made a bunch of incredible catches. A number of drops were bad delivery from Drones. More (not Sellers) talent would have tackled Swain or maybe having a guy like Swain on our team would've resulted in us returning a punt for a TD.
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Overall, the team played a good game i thought. Bad errors at critical moments, which seems to be the theme of the Pry era. Another game that was very winnable and within grasp, but was handed away
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I'm numb to most of these losses at this point now, we just are who we are and I don't know how that changes. Honestly, we played better than I expected and I agree with those who are more optimistic about the rest of the year. I don't know how many games we win but I think we might make life hell for some of our opponents and at this point I'll take that, I guess.
But goddammit did it make me irrationally angry that we gave up a special teams touchdown. I love Shane, I'm proud of what he's building at SC, and I hope he does well. But the one thing I told my family coming into this game I didn't want to happen was something like that. I didn't want beamerball thrown back in our face and then it happened (and Shane capitalized on it, well played). And it happened because of yet another careless penalty where the gunner wasn't lined up correctly on a punt formation.
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My dad, who I love but never texts me, texted me "Beamerball" right after the punt return TD. I just replied "I miss having it on our sidelines". Not that I want Shane or Frank on our sidelines at this point, but I miss that late 90s feeling of excitement every time special teams took the field because you knew there was an above average chance you were going to see something positive and most likely game changing happen.
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In our defense, the safety we got was also a Beamer-ball example. Too many forget Beamer-Ball's focus was on getting points from all three units-offense, special teams, AND defense. Specifically-for special teams-don't JUST block kicks, but recover them for safety or TD and for returns teams, returns for TDs. For the defense, don't just intercept the ball , run it back for a pick 6; don't just cause a fumble AND recover it- make it a scoop and score! Too often we miss the SCORING part and with the offensive struggles, it costs us games to not FULLY capitalize when a turnover play happens../.
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Now that I've had some time to process....it felt like a loss as soon as that opening drive happened. Even when it was 7-5 and 10-8 it never really felt like we were in it. Taking the lead and scoring a touchdown were tasks that felt equally insurmountable.
On the bright side that was some of the stoutest DL play I've seen in a long time. They had a relatively hard time running the ball, we got some good hits in on Sellers (too bad the ball didn't bounce our way on that one strip sack) and the safety was awesome.
Unfortunately, everyone else on defense looked...rough. Still can't stop that damn Rutgers tight end play. LBs and safeties were ass, Reddish in particular had a terrible game at least to my eye test. Corners I thought were pretty okay? I was not sober and not fully paying attention for every single play so film review may refute some or all of this.
And the offense...I'm about to do what I used to hate Fuente for doing and blame some players here. True, some of those ineffectual inside runs looked like they were straight out of Stiney's playbook. And I hated the decision to throw deep on 3rd and 1 early on, even though it worked.
But everything else on that side of the ball came down to a failure to execute. Plays were there to be made, there were some particularly inspired play designs and we had people open all game long. Guys just weren't making those plays. Hawkins ran hard all game, but he missed a block on that one play in the second quarter that should've been a horsecollar foul on USCe. Forget about the bad no-call, he makes that block, it's a first down if not a TD. That one series in maybe the early 4th before the game got out of hand where Drones threw 3 catchable balls in a row and all 3 were dropped. The wide open outlet pass on 3rd down that was dropped, I think that happened sometime in the second half too. All the great sideline almost-catches. And then there's Drones himself, who is still the wildly inconsistent passer we've come to know and tolerate. Overthrowing. Throwing behind the receiver. Leading the receiver too much. The INTs were all squarely on him. The only good thing I can say about Drones' passing yesterday is at least he didn't throw any hospital balls. Is he really the best we've got? Really??
All in all, I feel like Montgomery and Siefkes had pretty okay first games. We might win more than 4. But we could easily still only win 4. Or less. Really, really would've liked to have this one. And that PRTD was just a horrible twist of the knife, our special teams have been anything but for years now. Just another edition of the same movie we've all seen way, way too many times before. Go Hokies I guess
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Are you kidding me? He reached out and pulled the guy down from behind with his hand in the shoulder pads. It was a textbook horsecollar and they didn't call it. Anyway I was mostly just using that as a reference point for what play I was talking about, whether it was or it wasn't is not my point
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IF it is the play im thinking of it wasn't a horsecollar. Looked like one of those plays where the tackler reached around the shoulder pad to the chest and pulled him down that way. Didnt show a closeup on the broadcast that i saw.
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bro, watch the play again. He wrapped the ballcarrier up around the neck in a headlock. It's a legal tackle. It looked awkward, but he didn't pull him down from behind by grabbing the back of the shoulderpads. I'm not arguing your other points or that Hawkins missed a block, just that it should be noted that it wasn't a horsecollar.
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If this is the tackle of Drones that I believe it was, it wasn't a horse collar, but I am almost positive he was tackled by the opening on the helmet, which is a personal foul just the same. I rewound and watched several times, feel pretty confident that is how he was brought down.
Drones was also supplexed after the whistle on the play Greene (sp?) was flagged for a personal foul and that wasn't called either. If that had been a running back, a little more normal to let that go, but they rarely let it go on extra curricular QB hits these days. They game was not horribly officiated in n my eyes, so not really complaining about the officiating overall, but those two did stand out to me.
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To me it felt like the offense wasn't ready, lot of trying to get plays communicated to everyone. OL looks better than last year, WRs need to spend some time on the JUGS machine but we have some that can make plays it seems. RB may take a couple games to flush out. Overall seems like a Blacksburg offense.
Defense seems to be a lot better with adjustments. DL looks scary. I feel like we played soft on WR a lot, plenty of green grass around catches. Other than the opening drive from SC, they came to play.
Love is the most consistent player on the team and has a fucking cannon for a leg. ST seems to be the most unimproved part of the team other than Pry's clock management.
After sleeping on it, I think it's going to be more of the same this year but the defense may win us a game or two. Glad we didn't look like we didn't belong on the field yesterday but at the same time we lost ourselves a winnable game. Pry needs to hire some clock manager for gamedays.
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Going back Pre-Game "Bare Minimum" thread--I think what I really wanted to see was "not the same." Essentially, all the things that have plagued the Pry era so far--improved or gone.
And despite sorta kinda hanging in there, I still saw far too much of the same. Poor clock management, mistakes leading to points for the other team, weak play from the back 7 on D, and Offensive miscues that killed drives.
The DL was a solid bright spot and the OL looked at least passable (although we'll see what French thought). But the passing game was an entire mess-Drones is consistently off-target and when he is, we can't catch. And the LB are just never making plays.
And there's a reason that you lose close games...when you can't get lined up for a Punt correctly in a 2 point game, you are a poorly coached team. That sequence was quintessential Pry Football.
Honestly, I came out of this game thinking we physically have a better chance to beat Vandy than I thought but I am simultaneously sure that we will find a way to lose....
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Didn't include this in my write up but yes. Still far too much of the same old Pry from years past. In a year when he's fighting for his job that isn't going to cut it. Also thought pass pro was awful but not sure how much of that was on the OL and how much was simply good calls by their DC
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Am I the only one who thought the end of half sequence was ok? Sure, they could've been more aggressive, but we've seen many instances of much worse results.
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Tired of them limiting themselves to FG chances at best. Did that part at least work out? Yes but we went to halftime with timeouts on the ledger and only took one real shot at the end zone.
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I didnt have a problem with it myself. It would've been pretty easy to shoot yourself in the foot and be down more points coming out of the half. The problem was the offense didnt turn it on and the start fo the second half either, or really the entire game.
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We ran over 2 minutes of the clock before crossing the 50 and ended with a really long FG, we didn't try to make it easier on Love. We didn't try to score against #13 in theor own backyard, we weren't trying to win the game and that's an issue. This isnt us keeping it close so Bud can shut them dow 2nd half, we can't play that football, we don't have the players, we needed to score and we didn't even try.
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The Defense did shut them down tho. They had 2 touchdowns with a preseason Heisman candidate. The end of the first half did not lose us the game. You might not have liked the strategy there but it was a strategy and miles better than what weve seen him do in the past. Would you have preferred drones throw 3 incompletions and gave the ball back to usc with 2 minutes to go?
Drones poor play lost this game. If he doesn't do 100% turnaround before Saturday it will be a long long season if he stays the starter.
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- we're better than in years past. We had two new coordinators and 30+ transfers. Years past we would have been down 0-17 before getting a first down and showing any signs of life.
- We couldn't take advantage of their mistakes. After first series, D settled in and was making plays. Could have easily been up 1-2 scores in 1H if we sustain drives and keep momentum.
- D played strong. Can't tell you how many times I saw DTs and LBs just flat out push guys back. Ferg is paying off.
- D scheme is much better. We made some mistakes. But you could certainly see the gameplan.
- O has the potential to be "improved". Talent isn't as good but scheme and cohesiveness seem better.
- stop running up the middle. OL doesn't execute it well. Especially slow developing and with the smallest back. Attacking the edges and PO plays worked much better.
- Drones is improving. Had much better touch. Threw catchable balls. Those highlight plays were because he had some touch on the ball. Think Monty is designing a good system around his strengths. Need to let him run more early. He always plays better after issuing a few hits (he doesn't like to slide). Take some pressure off him being too perfect on throws.
- WRs drops crushed Drones confidence. Throw lasers and low balls are when you forcing to be perfect. Esp noted at end of the game...you could see him lunge forward too much or throw off his back foot.
- ST can be a weapon. Think we were afraid of making stupid mistakes and playing "not to lose". Once the other pieces (O and D) gel a little better they'll take chances with ST personnel and scheme.
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Largely agree outside of Drones. For the most part as I watched the game I wanted to cognizant of how I felt throughout all phases of the game as a fan watching a college football game and not so much analyzing the play by play.
Drones: The first half felt like more of the first 3/4 games of last season. Play calling was way too many pass attempts. IMO, more RB and RPO run plays for Drones would be have been more effective and cater to his "Strengths". Would have rather us establish a run look offense first and pass less. Drones is not a passer.
Offense (again in a general observation): I felt the overall play calling was good. I felt the scheme throughout it was good. I felt the O is better than last year as a group. They have a workable foundation to improve upon but not with Drones.
O Line: The entire last season it was maddening watching how bad our line was. I didn't feel that way overall, one bit. I felt this unit was better and played okay and "okay" is a marked improvement vs last season.
Defense: Boy oh boy, did I enjoy watching this D play yesterday. This D resembled everything we heard about Siefkes style. This was the most aggressive D I've seen in a long time. Outside of a few plays and missed tackles, I am up on this unit.
Pry: Overall, the only item where I lost my shit was the illegal punt formation. I mean you've got to be fucking kidding me. Outside of that, I really didn't think he had other total buffoon clock management moments. Did he try to, maybe, but not utter WTF moments.
Coordinators: I left this game with a degree of confidence in both. These guys will bring the wins that we should win this season or at least they give me the illusion they will after yesterday's game.
Bottom line, we beat Vandy nect week, call me a believer. We lose, and oh boy this season is going to suck.
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IMO, more RB and RPO run plays for Drones would be have been more effective and cater to his "Strengths".
Disagree about RPO run plays with Drones. He just has a knack for making the wrong decision in any read option play. Case in point, the jet sweep read option with #9 where he took the ball and gained 1 yard up the middle, where #9 would've been out on the perimeter with two blockers ahead of him. That would've been a huge gain if he made the right decision, but he didn't.
Found it.
Defense: Boy oh boy, did I enjoy watching this D play yesterday. This D resembled everything we heard about Siefkes style. This was the most aggressive D I've seen in a long time. Outside of a few plays and missed tackles, I am up on this unit.
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Tables finely illustrating his awesome French-esque film review skills. Nice!!! No doubt Drones missed that one and others as you pointed out. At this point have him run a bunch then dial in a pass play he has the highest chance of making and pray for the best. Speaking of praying....
Hoping that we see the same D for Vandy. I hope and pray this guy is legit. If he proves to be, then we need to pony up the cash to retain him.
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Tables finely illustrating his awesome French-esque film review skills.
Hardly. It's all I can do to keep up with French when he's laying it right out there. I just happened to notice that one play at the time, and through some quirk of my over-50 brain, it was somehow retained in memory for a few days.
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Throw lasers and low balls are when you forcing to be perfect. Esp noted at end of the game...you could see him lunge forward too much or throw off his back foot.
That is indicative of a QB who still hasn't had the game slow down mentally for him and is absolutely rushing every throw. Playing behind dog shit OLs for years doesn't help that, but far too often yesterday he had a clean pocket and bailed or got out on the edge and didn't set his feet before throwing. He's not talented enough to throw on the move and he did it all the damn time leading to throws wildly all over the place barely giving the receivers a chance.
If that is who is going to be this year, we are going to struggle to win more than 3 or 4 games.
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I agree O line play was better than the past but dont agree that the pocket was stable much. The Left tackle got run by at least a half dozen times forcing Drones out or leading to rushed throws/Drones taking a hit as ball came out. SCAR picked up on it early and blitzed that side frequently. Will be interested to see how French grades that left side of the line.
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A couple times Drones scrambled to the wrong side as well, right into the teeth of the end coming around the tackle. He should have scrambled to the other side, which had ineffective pass rush on that play.
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I had chalked this one up as a loss all offseason, but I had some hope in the back of my mind that finally we would exceed expectations. That finally Pry would get things together and show us something.
And other than the first drive and up until the collapse at the very end, the defense played admirably. Hats off to Siefkes - he put us in a position to win the game. DL looked dominant and had Sellers rattled for most of the game. I think what hurt the most is seeing that we easily could have won this one.
But here we go again...the offense was absolutely pathetic. I don't even think it was necessarily the scheme (was way more conservative/vanilla than I had hoped, little misdirection).
But I'm going to say it - there are two common denominators over the last several years with this team after a lot of new players coming in and switching up the staff, and that's Drones and Pry. Very inconsistent and mistake-prone QB play from Drones that we've come to know, and still horrendous overall clock and game management from Pry. We have completely failed to put a good QB on the field in the Pry era. The sad thing is, I think Drones is the best we've got and Monty is probably handcuffed in what he can do offensively. Why we haven't brought in true competition for Drones falls squarely on Pry - I wouldn't be surprised if we have basically assured him the starting job and no competition with his NIL. Infuriating, but it's what we have.
And on to the Beamers. I'm not going to bash, but I'm also not going to say "rooting for Shane, hope SCar wins out!" That's a pretty decent team, but they aren't the thirteenth best in the nation. It just makes me angry that Shane has his little vendetta against VT/has to prove to the world he was too good for us. Yet complacency and the Beamers being unwilling to move on or adapt in Frank's final years is a huge chunk of why the program is so far behind and in the state it is now. I'm just sick we lost to him, and the narrative now will be that VT was only good because of the Beamers. We will never escape that shadow and that just makes me bitter at this point.
As Alum put it yesterday, the Beamers have moved on from us, but VT just can't seem to move on from them. We've got a golly shucks smooth talker HC who's just happy to be here hanging out on the sidelines, and who has just tried to hit us with all the Beamer-era ways of doing things and nostalgia that don't work anymore. Yesterday watching us was like seeing your favorite band from years ago, and all the original members are gone and the name is the only thing that remains. Feels hollow now.
Unless we can correct the mistakes and find a way to get something going offensively, it's hard to see anything different for next weekend or any team with a pulse. This is what we've come to know in the Pry era.
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Lots of message board and insider rumors and rumblings over bitterness from Frank's departure, Beamers upset with Whit, and Shane going after VT a lot directly in recruiting recently.
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Its been going on for years in how Shane recruits, especially in state. Never risen to the level of much press but there have been several stories about visits Shane has made to Virginia High Schools where word got out that he was using a straight bash Tech script rather than what SCAR offers. It didn't help that this was going on at the same time Fuente and crew decided to alienate Virginia High Schools feeding fuel to Shane's smoke.
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It may have just been a coach celebrating a win in his specialty (special teams), but Shane did go over to the reporter on the sideline after the punt return for the TD and say something to her about how fitting it was to score a touchdown that way.
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100% on Beamer. Look, we all loved coach and he built VT into a viable contender in the Vick years and through the early 2000s, but that's gone and becoming a memory.
His final years drove the nail through anything he had built. The empty national championship trophy case was a joke outside of Blacksburg.
Stop the #25 jersey tribute. No fans are going to jump ship if you do. It wasn't even mentioned during the broadcast, thankfully.
Beamer is and will always be a legendary figure in VT football history, but otherwise will be a footnote for never winning the big games.
I do not wish Shane or SCar success. It's infuriating that anyone would.
The Pry, aw shucks, we competed hard quotes are ringing hollow with each exacerbating loss. I really want him to succeed and get us over the hump.
Go Hokies!
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The biggest sign of where we are right now is that we hired a coach because he worked for Frank, and because he has ties to Frank and would continue the legacy...
And Frank was at the game wearing the sideline gear of our opponent and getting the game ball from our opponent.
I don't care that his son is the SC coach, it wouldn't be that hard to just wear a non-branded maroon jumper to represent both sides. VT is no longer the school of the Beamer family. They only want to see our failures.
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The biggest sign of where we are right now is that we hired a coach because he worked for Frank, and because he has ties to Frank and would continue the legacy...
I reject this notion. Pry got the job because:
He has a history of recruiting the areas we historically recruit
Had seen and worked inside of a 'big boy' recruiting operation
He could shmooze with media, donors, etc
These were all things that our program needed to address in early 2022.
Problem was, we hired a guy who recruits on relationships right as the NIL era was about to kick off.
But otherwise, I agree with everything you said.
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Exactly. We hired Pry who wants to party like it's 1999, and but that's low rizz sus frfr in 2025.
That and besides being a cultural fit on the surface, he just hasn't proven to be a very good coach at all. It's telling to me that the defense looks markedly improved finally as he has fully divested from it with his scheme and his hand picked guy in Marve to run it.
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he just hasn't proven to be a very good coach at all
100%
It was a rational hire that we (understandably) thought could/would address a lot of our program weaknesses. The thought process was sensible. But sometimes sensible hires don't work out.
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If choosing a coach, choosing a quarterback, or choosing a transit agency head were easy everybody would be winning and the trains would always run on time.
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This is very much my opinion. When it comes to coaching searches, you focus on process over results.
I think the failure of the Fuente Process was that no one in the room had non-VT P5 experience. That said, I'm a bit understanding of this issue... I don't think anyone knew how far behind VT was at the time. This problem was addressed with the Pry hire.
The problem with the Pry Process was that he hired first time coordinators. That gap should've been identified. Everyone saw that coming. I remember Ty on the Solid Verbal called this out.
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In addition to coordinators with experience you also need good ones. Montgomery hasn't run a good offense since 2016 (besides XFL where Skip Holtz was the real coordinator). I'm afraid we majorly f'd up hiring him and unfortunately game 1 appears to back that up
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this is definitely a concern of mine but I'm not ready to call for Monty's head yet. Give him a few games. I thought the play-calling was fine. There were opportunities out there that were just missed. Drones making poor reads, missing open receivers, receivers dropping easy balls, etc. Scheme-wise I think the offense was okay. Execution was a big problem but that's been a problem offensively since about 2018 so I'm not really that surprised to see it again in game 1 with new coaches. That needs to improve over the next few weeks. I won't be REALLY concerned until week 4-5 if there is no real improvement there. I'll give Monty at least 3 more weeks before I start passing judgement on his offense.
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My only real concern when it came to playcalling on the offensive side was the Red Zone plays that seemed to only have one option on each play. Down there you need as many quick reads as possible to keep the defense guessing.
Agree that the rest of the field, the plays called had guys open. So I guess the concern there is even if they are open, if Montgomery knows Drones can't execute it, he has to start thinking of plays Drones can...or next QB can.
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My one bright spot for Montgomery is that of all of his recent offenses, Drones is by far the best QB he's had.
If he can't call plays or tailor the offense to Drones strengths that is 100% on him and not the players. There are coordinators and several of them that could get a top 40 maybe even top 30 offense with the roster we have
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If he can't call plays or tailor the offense to Drones strengths that is 100% on him and not the players. There are coordinators and several of them that could get a top 40 maybe even top 30 offense with the roster we have
I don't buy this - I watched Drones. He's not that good of a QB and if your QB can't get the ball to the other players it wouldn't matter how good they are anyway (and, frankly, I don't know that our receiving corps is that stellar). If Drones is the best QB we have I don't think this roster is capable of a top 40 offense, regardless of coaching. Not even really close.
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Here's my gripe with Drones as a whole. They guy has the physical ability. He has a strong arm, big body, athletic, and can move in the pocket, can put a really nice touch on the ball.
He's a 0/10 on the rest of the game though. Nothing has slowed down for him, he rushes everything resulting in his footwork being all over the place, bailing the pocket early, making predetermined reads before the defense moves, rifling short passes for no reason. Drones is absolutely capable of being a good quarterback but after 3 years it should have clicked by now. I can very much see him being an absolute practice stud and a complete flop once things get going.
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I don't buy this - I watched Drones. He's not that good of a QB
Whether you think this relies almost entirely on the scheme fit of the QB. There are countless examples of QB's who looked awesome in one scheme and terrible in others, Grayson McCall at Coastal is a great example, awesome in Chadwell's system, terrible in the others.
Drones is perfectly suited to be a one-read style QB, along the lines of Jerod Evans. (If you saw Evans in a multi read pro-style system I guarantee you would say he was terrible.) Bottom line is it's on the coordinator to run the system that's best suited for the QB and talent that's available
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Evans = so true. All the more reason he should have come back to VT and work on his reads. He wasn't going to make it in the NFL as a one read QB. But, rumors out there may have made that a moot point anyway in regards to not being able to come back academically.
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No touchdowns is BAD. We controlled the game last week and the offense couldn't draw up anything when we needed it. If he can't do it then when can he?
I really don't think South Carolina's defense is world beating. They held us to 9 offensive points. That's FCS level output when they play power 5 teams. I'm not ready to fire him yet, but if there's a repeat performance against Vandy I will be
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SCar graduated a lot of defense but they still had one of the best defenses in the country last season. I have a feeling they're pretty damn good again.
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It's a possibility for sure. I don't see it at all, but it's definitely possible. I think this loss looking back will be a "wtf how did we lose that one".
Either way even if they are good, they aren't hold us to 9 points good. Even with the drops and mistakes and if they are a good defense we should've scored at least a touchdown on top of what we got.
It's a bad result, could be an outlier, but I'm taking note in case a trend develops and not throwing this data point out
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fair enough. These are valid points. If it was game 2, or even season 2, with Monty I'd be completely on board. But it was his first game for VT. There were some positives even though the offense failed to produce touchdowns. If that trend continues then, yeah, I'm right there with you. But it's been one game. Beamer once said that the greatest improvement you ever see in a team is from game one to game two. If this offense manages 30 against Vandy I think we cool the takes on Monty. If it's another slugfest in which we only score fieldgoals, then I'm not against raising alarms.
I will say, though, that I don't know how much of it is the actual coach. I'm of the (admittedly very silly) belief that Blacksburg is just not meant to have good offense. Nobody can seem to make offense work here. The only good offenses we've had were propped up on the shoulders of supremely talented players. And, frankly, at this moment we just don't have that type of talent so it seems completely unreasonable to me to expect our offense to be anything better than bottom 1/3.
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I mean let's not pretend that him being a GA in the 90s and all the photos we could drum up with him and Frank during that time wasn't a major selling point to the administration and boosters to why he was even considered in the first place.
All of what you say is true, but the connection to Frank is what got him on our radar. Otherwise, we probably aren't even interviewing him. He wasn't a major name in the coaching circles when Fuente was fired.
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Agreed on all fronts here. We need to find (other than a shit ton of NIL money) a guy that recruits the new world of college football, not the old world. I like Pry a lot, but he's too old school to win in the new world.
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I don't know if you're being serious with "They only want to see our failures" (as I don't have all the insider info that seems to indicate that Shane hates VT), but it is not even remotely surprising or controversial that Frank was on Shane's sideline. Like, I would have been shocked and a little disappointed in Frank if he wasn't. I can't imagine not actively cheering for my own son't success.
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It sounds like a bunch of message board BS. Of course Shane recruits Virginia, that was his calling card on the VT staff and probably part of the reason he got the SCAR job. Of course Shane negatively recruited against VT during Fuente, so did everybody else during that time. Shane's job is to win (if his eventual goal is to be VT HC then he needs to win at SCAR) so he does what it takes to win recruiting battles, and VT and SCAR have always competed for recruits.
There's a video after the game of Shane going up to Frank and saying "I'm glad that's over". He sounded like he HATED playing this game. The media narrative, playing against his alma mater/his dad's alma mater/his dad's old team/his old team/his old employer/the team & town he grew up with.
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This. I was talking about this with another Hokie friend the other day. If my daughter goes to another school, and that school plays Tech, yeah I'm rooting for Tech. But if she's coaching the other team, that's a hell of a different thing. I'm rooting for my daughter's success, and somewhat disappointed that it has to come against my alma mater.
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I've slept on it and realized I feel the same today as I did yesterday, and the day before.
The moral victories no longer suffice.
I'm glad the defense had a pulse and kept us in the game, but I'm tired of those small victories never translating to wins. We can get stops all day, and it's all for nothing if our offense doesn't reward it with points. The object of the game is to uh, ya know, score more points than the other team. Drones looked, as politely as I can put it, like diarrhea dog shit. I would almost prefer it if he didn't occasionally hit accurate passes - it only makes it more frustrating when he misses layups (and oh my god, does he miss those layups).
Save the empty platitudes and moral victories. Win the fucking games.
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Agree on all points. I was hopeful with some better QB coaching and mentoring, Drones could flourish in Monty's system. But Drones is what he is, he hit his ceiling in 2023 and there's no more development left for him. Monty's system requires a QB who can accurately throw it 30+ times a game, and Drones has lost every game he has been required to throw that much. He's slow seeing the field and going through reads, low football IQ, and streaky accuracy at best. And likely due to pandering and keeping him happy and entrenched as QB1 due to the NIL we have paid him, we don't have any better options on the roster. I just don't see how we are going to have much offensive success in this scheme given Drones' limitations, to put it nicely.
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Going to get back into doing advanced stats write ups for each week, but going to wait until at least three games have been played to start doing my own threads. (I think I did about 8 games last year with pretty decent consistency until I got married at the end of the fall.)
Looking at expected points per play (offense and defense only), we really hung with South Carolina in the second and third quarters, but got blasted in the first and fourth quarters. That shouldn't be surprising as those were the only quarters we allowed touchdowns.
Success rate and explosive rate will be an interesting metric to track as the year goes on, especially to see how they replace Tuten in the running game.
By rushing success rate, the Hokies finished at 43.2% which is higher than I initially expected. But looking at it by quarter, it seems it was mostly in the second and third quarters. VT couldn't get anything going in the first quarter on the ground, and had only limited success in the fourth quarter. Another major difference from last year was the fact that the Hokies had 0 explosive runs on offense (runs over 15 yards).
Passing the ball was a struggle, which is always going to be true when you complete less than 50% of your passes - but it did improve as the game went on. VT had a success rate of 31.4% and had explosive passing plays on 5 of 35 attempts (passes going for more than 20 yards), meaning that one of every three completions for Drones was an explosive pass. These came on both crossing routes picking up YAC and on deep shots to the outside portions of the field. It also does not include the play wiped off by a chop block.
Comparatively on defense, VT held the South Carolina running attack in check, allowing success on only 30.6% of plays. They did however have a much higher 47.4% success rate passing the ball on fewer attempts. They also had four explosive plays each in the running and passing game. For a team with boasting a preseason Heisman candidate, two 25-year old running backs, and a 6'5", 238 pound Olympic level athlete at receiver, I would say that is a pretty decent improvement over last season.
It will be interesting to see how this shakes out over the course of the year. One note, it looks like the College Football Database is moving behind a paywall to access the API this year, which might limit my ability to run comparisons against other teams later in the season. If the Hokies start winning, and these posts gain traction, I might just bite the bullet and subscribe.
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This is fantastic analysis. Kinda helps us take the emotion out. How much is the paywall. We may be able to crowd source for you to get this type of analysis (know I'd be willing to pay my share).
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I appreciate that, but it is absolutely not necessary. For the API access that I think I would need, its probably only $5 a month. The cost is more about whether I want to dedicate my Sunday mornings doing analysis than the subscription cost. It was just a lot easier to make that call when it was free. (There is a free tier as well, I just need to play around with it further and figure out the best way to do this stuff. Despite the fact that I am technically a research analyst, my skills are more public policy oriented than data science and so a lot of this is new for me.)
But, if I do continue this, are there things you would like to see more of? I kept it light today since it is week 1 and there are still a lot of unknowns, but I plan on diving in more around week 4.
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It is no surprise to me that with the 2 new Coordinators and OL that we had no real offense in Q1.
It did surprise me the drastic difference in the D after the first series.
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The irony after reading some of Pry's post game remarks is that when he was asked directly about the end of the first half clock management he asserted that they were absolutely trying to score a TD to end the half.
What makes that worse than him not trying is that he so mismanaged the clock, in a worse way, on the way to score a TD that it makes him look so incredibly incompetent... Still.
I love Pry, I wish he was our guy, but he will not be here long term. It's more than recruiting. It's more than a gross lack of QB development. It's more than a lack of player development (although the hire of Jarret Furgeson might have been the best hire of the offseason based on what I saw last night). It's the fact that he cannot handle JV level things within the context of any given game.
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There's a lot of positive things to take away from this game. But holy moly....
Will someone PLEASE explain to Pry that you need more points than the other team in order to win? I hate the whole "playing not to lose" mentality, even when we're leading. But playing that way when we're already losing is absolutely insane.
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We faired OK on one important offensive criterion, maintaining possession of the ball to rest the defense. Our time of possession was also greater than theirs.
We failed to achieve a 1st down on 3 of 11 possessions, 27%, which is acceptable.
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My apologies as this may seem far fetched but knowing that Drones is what he is, isn't it time we go the alternating QB route against Vandy? Maybe give Pop half of the series in the first half and then pick the QB at halftime... seriously, we know what we have with Drones but do we really know what we have with Pop? Just saying... it can't hurt.
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Home opener a year after losing to Vandy, I don't think you risk it. Drones is mid, but he's more of a known commodity than Pop or Rangel. Pop looked iffy against a competent Duke team, and Vandy is very competent. ODU or Wofford is where you might try that out, but Pry definitely can't afford to drop a game to ODU, we've seen other coaches do that.
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I think you actually make the case for starting Pop or Rangel against Vandy here.
Pry definitely can't afford to drop a game to ODU
He can afford to lose to Vandy (SEC, non-con, etc. etc.) and he likely will lose that game anyway (0 wins against noncon P4 teams in his entire HC career). If you can't afford to lose to ODU or Wofford, then you see what you've got in one or both of Pop/Rangel against Vandy. If they light the world on fire, then great, you found a QB and stick with them. If they stink up a storm worse than Drones did in Atlanta, then you know you need to stick with Drones. I think it's better to try things out in a game that you know you can lose rather than in a game you know you can't lose. If he plays Pop/Rangel for the first time against ODU and they are worse than Drones and we lose because of it, well, then you're in a world of hurt. Especially since you're probably losing to Vandy regardless of QB.
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It really depends on your view of the Vandy game. You've made it clear in this and other posts you think we're losing. So losing is already a sunk cost to you, it doesn't matter who starts at QB. Vegas doesn't see it that way, I doubt Pry does either. He thinks he can win, and he doesn't want to start the year 0-2. That would be a bad way to begin a year where you probably won't get fired, but you are on the hot seat and need to stack wins before November.
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Let's assume the Vandy game is winnable (frankly, I think it is). Flip it on its head and think about which of the next 3 games is least losable. Yes, it would suck to lose to Vandy and start 0-2. But if you can think of ordering the games in order of least painful losses to most painful losses it would be Vandy, Wofford, ODU. 0-2 sucks but we've been there before and dug out of the hole.
We absolutely can't lose to ODU. For that reason, taking a flier on your QB is high risk, low reward. Lose the game and you lose any semblance of faith you might have with the fanbase. Win that game and pat yourself on the back because you won a game you should have. ODU is a must win, IMO. Not worth risking it to find out what you've got under center.
Wofford is somewhere between ODU and Vandy. As a coach who has to think about SOS and talking points and motivations, etc. losing to an SEC team is less egregious than losing to an FCS team. For that reason, you can't afford to lose to Wofford either.
Do I want to lose to Vandy? No. But if we think about which of these three teams is going to be least painful to lose to, even if that means starting 0-2, it's Vandy and it's not even really close. If you really think it's risky to start Pop/Rangel because you're not sure what you've got with them then you start them in a game you can afford to lose (you could argue that Pry can't afford to lose any games but the Vandy game is the easiest to explain away - especially if he wins the next 2 and starts off the ACC schedule with a win over NC State, which is winnable)
If Pop/Rangel play vs Vandy and are better than Drones, you benefit from probably winning the game and you have your QB going forward. Finish OOC play with a 3-1 record and look forward to NCState. If Pop/Rangel play poorly against Vandy and you lose, welp, you're 0-2 against the MIGHTY SEC but you've shown the fans that you're willing to mix it up and see what you've got - go back to Drones and hope it's enough to get through the two games you absolutely cannot afford to lose and finish OOC play with a 2-2 record, which most people expected anyway.
Alternatively, you play Drones vs Vandy and lose, then start Pop/Rangel vs ODU and lose again then you're 0-3 and rudderless. At that point you just look silly. If you start Drones vs Vandy and lose, then switch and win against ODU and Wofford with Pop/Rangel you're 2-2 where people expected, have your QB for the season, but have to face questions for why it took two weeks of losses in winnable games to figure it out. Playing this from all sides, I think starting Pop/Rangel vs Vandy makes the most sense, if you're going to at all. Otherwise, you don't play either one of them until Drones is too hurt to play.
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I didn't watch and didn't care to. Camping in West Virginia with a bunch of lifelong friends, slamming a hundred Model Zero Especiales and riding my dirt bike and fly fishing was far better.
I did hear on the radio this morning that we had an illegal formation on a punt, Shane made us punt again and they ran it back 80 for a touchdown. That's what stands out to me after reading about the game. Why the hell are these penalties still an issue?
At this point I'm over VT football until something changes. Maybe I'll watch a game or two this season if I'm not on the boat but I've got better things to do on Saturdays then watch Pry's teams be lukewarm dog poo at best.
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I don't know why we do all this movement on punts. Just line up like you always do and kick the ball. Trying to be exotic and show different formations and lineups for a freaking punt just seems entirely unnecessary and begs for stupid penalties
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A private 500 acre tract of land half an hour west of Romney. I'm lucky enough to be very close to a generous family that encourages us to play on it whenever we want.
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Emotionally draining because I went in thinking we'd get routed. Then the defense looked shockingly competent compared to last year and we were in it. Then the gut punch of losing after realizing we had a good shot.
Giving it a day let me reflect and realize that this team could really make some noise going forward. Gotta have better QB play and WRs need to catch easy balls. If the defense keeps it up, I'm pretty optimistic about our potential to make a run. DLine was exciting. Holding that offense to 17 points? Last year's defense couldn't do that.
We'll see. On to Vandy!
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Don't know if this belongs her or elsewhere , but holy cow- most amazing stadium experience as far as logistics and game day experiencer.
We were waiting to meet someone outside the stadium so didn't go in til about 230(30 minutes til kickoff). Walked straight in through security-not even one minute to scan four tickets from phone.
Concessions inexpensive (e.g. $2 hot dogs)- even alcohol wasn't bad(shout out to strawberry frozen margaritas at $14 a piece and nicely strong. Lines not substantially long at all. In and out of bathrooms in 5 minutes or less. No problem navigating concourse crowds.
Flawless wifi and cell coverage.
Beautiful views- we were third deck front row 20 yd line on VT side.
We had friends with us that will also be with us at home games with season tickets- kept saying "don't get used to the experience of wifi/cel service/ and entering the stadium lol"
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Agree re capacity and pro and college; BUT getting fans through the metal detectors and getting tickets scanned without standing in line for 45 minutes like it is at every game at Lane should NOT be beyond the capabilities of a 21st century university with strong Engineering and IT departments...
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1. The Defense played with an edge, energy, and almost did enough to win the game.
2. WRs can make plays
3. RB has some depth - TBD on Stewart.
4. John Love is money - may help win some close games.
5. DL / front seven looks good and has some depth.
Cons:
1. Drone is not it. They clearly sank a bunch of NIL money into him, so sadly we are going to have to see it all year. No passion, no leadership, inaccurate, doesn't use his physical tools when he runs, bad instincts / vision. I'd be fine if he threw go-routes and ran QB draws all year - may be the best way to win.
2. OL pass protection. On some of those pressures, Drones bailed immediately and he refused to step up in the pocket all game. TBD. Run blocking decent.
3. Critical lapses at key spots by WRs/drops, Drones, Special Teams, penalties, etc.
4. No urgency late in the game. Walking around on offense down two scores with a chance to stay in the game.
5. Coaching (other than defense) still looks average at best.
Looking ahead - if they can get to NC State being 3-1 they'll have another chance to reset expectations with a manageable October schedule before a tough November.
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I could be remembering wrong, but I feel like last season, people were reluctant to really put much blame on Stu Holt, but can we all finally acknowledge that he is a terrible Special Teams Coordinator?
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He's had good kickers and punters but the gaffes have been repeated and inexcusable.
Pry's original hires have been a total shitshow.
-Rudolph- bolted ASAP
-Glenn - never really understood his role, also bolted quickly
-Marve - in well over his head
-Bowen- had some highs but lots of lows
-Holt - as above
That leaves Cheetah who has been fine, but nothing special. Mines who has been by far the best recruiter but haven't seen a ton of development from his HS recruits. And Quinn, who is so under the radar that I forgot he was on Staff.
That is why he has struggled, more than anything else.
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JC wasn't really Pry's hire, he's a holdover from the last regime. Semantics. He's successful as a member of Pry's original staff, he's not one of Pry's original hires.
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He's had good kickers and punters but the gaffes have been repeated and inexcusable.
It's not the kickers themselves that are the problem, it's the rest of the special teams folks...lining up wrong, dual #s, not staying in their lanes, fair catching when they shouldn't, NOT fair catching when they should, letting balls bounce in front of them, running a kickoff out of the end zone and getting tackled on the 10-15 yd line instead of taking the fair catch and getting the ball on the 25...
Now some of those are poor coaching decisions and others might be player related or a combo of both...but if I were coaching and I told them to fair ca5tch and they consistently ignored those instructions, I'd be finding a new kick returner...
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That's literally been Tucker Holloway's MO since he got on punt return and I shit my pants every time he does it. He does make some magic happen occasionally but he's going to get destroyed back there one time and its going to be bad.
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Comments
I was actually encouraged with the large exception of Drones. Im afraid he ain't the one to lead us to the promised land. That was yet another winnable game we lost more than I felt the other team won. If the team was ready on the first drive we mightve had a chance
Weirdly, he had a ton of great downfield throws in this game, a few drops and an unfortunate chop block kept them from all being completed, but honestly was very impressed by his accuracy on those throws and the receivers. However, I also feel like when we needed him to be accurate the most over the middle he missed too often.
I think this is worth a discussion. There were certainly some good throws downfield. But there were also some throws that shouldn't have been made when his WRs bailed him out by making SC Top 10 catches.
Drones is not nearly consistent enough to be a starting QB for a P4 team.
Agreed. One prime example, they played prevent D, soft coverage and he went 0 for 4 on the last drive. He should have easily made those passes and should have kept it and run on one of the incompletions. That was a drive that should have gotten us to the red zone. Total head scratcher.
he has largely been playing like randall, pre wake 04
On paper - Drones should be better than someone like Jerod Evans but he isn't. He is faster, similar size, stronger arm, etc. - but Jerod Evans was a legit fired-up competitor. Drones' issue is not his ability - he just looks like he doesn't care whether he wins or loses.
A 230+ pound quarterback going down two yards before the first down every time they run or being hesitant to take off is not them protecting themselves. It's just a lack of "it" factor. If he ran like Jerod Evans or Logan Thomas or wanted to win as bad as Tyrod - his game would completely change. That is coaching.
Agree with all of that except this part. If he genuinely does not care, no amount of coaching can change that, and the coaches should make way for the next man up.
I watched the game with my father in law, who is a Penn State guy from central PA and not familiar at all with Tech football, and he said this too watching Drones for the first time yesterday. That he just seems completely passionless and uncompetitive.
Lots of talk in the offseason about Drones becoming a "more vocal leader", whatever that means. I don't see it at all though. It's nagged at me for three seasons that something about him is just missing, and that's what it is - the guy just has zero fire.
How is the "it" factor coaching? It's an intangible that players either have or they don't.
Blame the coaches for lack of discipline, poor playcalling or poor clock management. Don't try to blame the coaches because it appears a player doesn't have enough of a competitive edge.
Agree that "it factor" is usually referring to an intangible quality of a player rather than coaching necessarily, but I do think this is something a coach can inspire in players by emphasizing playing with high effort every snap is so important that you're going to be benched if you're out there going through the motions even if you were named starter. Unfortunately to do this you also need capable back ups prepared to play, and I think in this case not having enough direct competition at QB this off season was likely more of an issue than other aspects of coaching.
Drones moves to 0-6 when attempting over 30 passes in a game. Very clear they need to figure out some kind of running game, which may have been Bowen's strength (if we're not giving all the credit to Tuten).
There were some bad throws and worse drops. Also some incredibly placed balls and even better catches.
Overall, with the way the defense played, I still come out feeling better than I did after the Vandy loss last season. Feels like there is a path to a good team if we can hold a superstar led offense to only 17 points.
Edit: took my dog on a walk and thought about this a little more. Feels like this was a reboot to the 2022 season, with a better roster and slightly better coaching... but a lot of the errors still feel the same. I'm still a little higher on this team because of Siefkes and Montgomery, but I'm worried we will be stuck in 6-6 hell until we can develop a true identity. If Bowen could find one with Drones and Tuten, I would hope Montgomery can find one this year. But it might take until October once again.
Bowen doesn't get the credit he deserves as OC. He schemed plays that got us yards despite a very weak O-Line.
Our O-Line didn't let the D in like a revolving door like last year.
No sacks from the right tackle is an improvement! But yeah, Bowen was creative but predictable, especially in the passing game. Montgomery seemed to have schemed up some simple plays that could have led to a steady if unspectacular offense. Time will tell if he's a long term improvement.
As down as I am about the loss. We got the result we expected just not how I expected. If VT can win against Vandy and takes care of business vs ODU and Wofford I'll feel pretty good about our chances vs State and ACC play.
Love and the defense look legit. Just need the offense to make the most of what they have.
The defense looked really good for 1.5 quarters. That was a positive. But it's not anything close to a Bud quality defense that can win games on its own and the offense doesn't know what it wants to be and doesn't have the players to figure it out.
We gave up two TD drives to the best QB we will see all year. There are deficiencies for sure, but this is the best defense we've seen since Pry arrived to Blacksburg. I agree, it's not vintage Bud, but it's miles ahead of what we've been forced to watch.
We gave up 17 points on defense to a preseason heisman front runner and one of those tds was in "sell out to stop thebrun and get the ball back" time due to the special teams gaf
This has been the case since loeffler was hired. At least with Stinespring we knew we just wanted to run and we had running backs and an offensive line to do it. And honestly we had above average to amazing quarterbacks to do this from 1999-2011.
I think Montgomery knows what his "ideal" offense is. Unfortunately the VT offense we need/can pull off is closer to Tebow with the Broncos
The scheme on offense and defense seems way better than last year. I'm hoping a lot of the stuff that killed us (dropped passes, awful throws, lazy tackling, rbs dancing in the backfield, etc) are week 1 things that get worked out by next week.
I feel better about this team than I have about any pry team thus far.
Agree with all of the above, but I STILL, 4 years in, do not have the confidence that Pry can effectively manage the clock. And that will cost us games (as it has in previous years).
I'd say it has already cost us a game this year.
I would agree with that.
I'm not sure why VT football is so frustrating in these games where we are expected to lose by double digits (we did cover the 13.5 point spread, FAM!!), but here we are.
Here's the elephant in the room for me - and it's twofold.
1. We still do not have a QB. Seriously, Drones has regressed year over year and appears to be the worst version of himself right now. He was making poor decisions, he was making poor throws (with the exception of simply throwing up contested deep balls), and he'd rather put his head down like a battering ram than side step someone for a first down. He simply isn't the QB we need to compete week in and week out. And it was clear that Montgomery doesn't trust him.
2. Pry... For as much as I love the guy, he simply cannot manage the clock, or the game. He has very little situational awareness. I know the end of the half situation can be debated (I disagree with his approach in a game like this), but with about 8 minutes to go in the 4th (or whatever it was), and down by 2 scores, you have to play with some urgency. His teams do not. Pry isn't a P4 football coach. And it couldn't be more obvious at this point.
With all that being said, I'm very impressed with how the team looked from a physicality standpoint. This is as big and as fast as we've looked since 2016. It was refreshing to see!
Additionally, the DL is really going to give most ACC teams some trouble. They looked really good today. I also thought Siefkes had a fantastic gameplan and made some great tweaks along the way. He was clearly one step ahead all day long. When USCe made plays (with the exception of the RPO's on that first drive), it was usually because they guys were simply better. That's all. I think this was a great hire.
All we can do is win next week. Mess that one up and it's going to be an ugly season.
13.5???? It was 7.5 yesterday. That shouldn't be a win
You might be right! Does that mean this was a double loss??
It dropped to 6.5 right before kick off then after their first drive went to 12.5.
Live odds don't count when you're referencing covering or not covering the game spread.
Regarding point 1 - I just went and checked the stats last year. There were games where the longest passes were 20, 25, 30, 31, and 34 yards. Of the 4 games we had passes longer than that, 3 of them were against Vanderbilt, Marshall, and ODU, with the 4th being against Stanford. In three of those, the longs of 55, 49, and 46 were by far the longest, with the next longest around 20 yards. Consider we had passes of 28, 36, and 37 yards just tonight, that is definitely more of a deep threat than we had last year, and against good receivers that played close with a lot of contact.
Also, at 221 yards passing, there was only one game we had more passing yards in last year, and that was against Vanderbilt. Against Miami last year, we had 189 (all Drones) and against Clemson, Drones had more than himself and Schlee combined (188, with Drones at 115 and Schlee at 73).
So Drones had more yards this game than in all but 1 game last year, with longer passes he had in most games. He IS better this year. He may not be a great P4 QB, but he is definitely better.
Edit: also, this is the first game of the season against probably one of the top 3teams we play, with an all new O-Line, new receivers, and new RBs. The offense probably wasn't going to do great this game.
It's one game. And we had element of surprise on our side vs SC. We won't get that luxury again this year now that other teams have film on us. If he keeps it up then sure. But let's not say he's definitely better than last year after one game. He had lots of yards. He also missed some really important throws. He also had receivers drop critical balls at bad moments. This wasn't all on him. Let's see what he looks like over the next 3 weeks before making claims of progress or regression.
Uh, did you ignore what I said about the stats? Explain more yards than all but one game and THREE long passes compared to just one in several games last year. Give me definitive points as to how he's worse. I'll give you a lower completion percentage but more yards. Plus, my recollection of some of the long "passes" last year was short passes with long gains after the receptions. These were 3 legit long passes. One of which, credit to the receiver, was made with a pass interference call against the DB.
Again, give me your criteria for how he has regressed. What stats are you comparing? My guess is it's the sniff test, which doesn't seem valid given all the stats I gave.
Again, I'm not saying he's "good" I'm just saying better than last year, at least in this game, again, against one of the top 3teams we will face, which he did worse, much worse, last year (at least in terms of yards, but when you throw for about double the yards, does completion percentage matter THAT much?).
yards are meaningless with two Ints and sub 50% completion, he isnt getting the ball where it needs to go, those are terrible stats.
Weren't there at least 3 passes that absolutely should have been caught by the receivers? Percentage completion, while probably MOSTLY on the QB is not 100% on him. And also, a bunch of his plays were running out of the pocket and getting rid of the ball rather than taking a loss. That counts against percentage completion, does it not, while also not giving an indication as to his accuracy.
Give him 3 extra completions for receivers dropping balls they should have caught and like 4 throwaways for being chased down by the defense (was it even higher?) and you're talking a MUCH different completion percentage. And, was his percentage completion higher last year because he took sacks or ran out of bounds for a loss rather than throwing the ball away?
oh, you're also counting the two completions to other team too, right?
Not all the incompletions or drops are equal though. Tayke Heath had a 3rd down drop that was chest high, straight to the hands but some of the other drops were made harder because the ball placement wasn't good.
There was the ball to a running back that would have had him running free down the sideline that he threw below the knees, which I remember him doing a lot last year (difference being Tuten had other worldly balance to make those catches).
I am not a film nerd, but I wouldn't be surprised if there were some mechanical/footwork issues on the drops, because to your point, he has some great throws were only his receiver can make a play. I don't expect perfection, but there is still room for improvement.
The Takye Heath is definitely one, I seem to recall one to one of the Greene's that was VERY catchable, and I thought I remembered one other as well. And yes, definitely a couple below the knees - even if someone could catch those, they aren't likely to pick up much yardage afterwards.
Slow down buddy. I didn't say he was worse. I'm simply saying it's too early to say he's better (or worse) after only one game...
You may not have, but the point I was referencing said that Drones had regressed and was the worst version of himself.
And re-read your message -thought you were supporting the OP's sentiment I wrote above. I think he's a little better in some regards, definitely need to see.
There's so much to break down here, but I won't get into it all.
For beginners, stats don't live in a vacuum. Those deep balls were a combination of good throws into tight coverage with SC Top 10 sort of catches. Those plays are not at all indicative of progress being made with Drones or with him being a serviceable QB. We can all reserve judgment until after a few games, but Drones looked as bad tonight as I ever remember him looking while in Blacksburg. There are many reasons we lost this game, not least of which is the reality that SC simply has more talent, but in the end Drones had opportunities and missed on many of them.
The most glaring opportunity? In the 4th quarter when we were 4th and somewhere around 3 or 4 yards and he ran out to the edge. All he had to do was shift a little, make someone miss, and instead he thought it was prudent to put his head down and operate like a battering ram. He had so many questionable decisions in a general sense that weren't directly related to accurate passing that it's abundantly clear he isn't our guy.
Could not possibly disagree more.
I think Drones was even worse than his stats show.
I saw someone who is processing very slowly, making poor reads (in the passing and option game), poor decisions on throws as well as in some of his runs.
He left SO much out on the field today, and it's completely inexcusable for him to be this bad 5 years into his collegiate career.
This is an interesting point. But I have some different conclusions.
The "improved" passing stats is likely more of a reflection of the Montgomery's scheme than bona fide improvements from Drones. That's not to say Drones will not be improved over last year, but Montgomery's passing scheme is really only a few components: (1) forcing the ball downfield when there is one-on-one matchup; (2) pass to an underneath receiver open that is schemed open; and (3) intermediate stops, outs and slants Drones did very well with forcing the ball downfield and letting his receiver make a play. He was just really inaccurate to many times with the rest of the passes. The really difficult part is that the short throws are like layups that simply require touch and placement but Drones threw the ball too hard, angled downward, and either behind the receiver or too low.
His receivers both helped him and hurt him. They did well in one-on-one matchups downfield but dropped to many short routes that were not thrown well but catchable. While the goal of the underneath routes are to catch and run, the primary job of a receiver is to catch the ball and the receivers didn't adjust well enough to make those catches (probably focusing on the YAC).
Drones's game on Sunday was definitely a bad game for Drones, but I am both discouraged and encouraged by Drones's performance. I'm discouraged by the inaccuracy and the 43% completion rate. I'm encouraged by his deep ball that put his receivers in position to make a play, something we have not seen in his game. If he can improve on the underneath routes, which are easy passes to make, the passing game will be better than the last two years.
It looked to me as if the WR's did a great job when forced to fight for a catch but looked to YAC before catching the ball on short passes where they were no pressed too much.
Defensive line looked really good for the majority of the game, which is a great sign for the future.
Drones is a problem. Missed way too many open guys today. The plays were there for us to win this game, the receivers were making the plays to keep us in it, and he just couldn't capitalize at all. He rushed every big throw he tried today, and was as accurate as a shotgun. If not for some phenomenal work done by the WRs, his numbers are brutal for this game
From my seat, I thought Drones looked bad.
He wasn't bad...
He was terrible
I think terrible is overstating it. If his receivers could catch balls that hit them in the hands or numbers his night looks a lot better.
That said, there were still too many inaccurate throws, especially when he was moving
No doubt, receivers didn't do him any favors. I'm talking about the eye test, what i physically watched. I seen a true freshman making his first start yesterday, not a fourth/fifth year QB that has started 3 seasons.
He still has happy feet in the pocket it's crazy to me that he still doesn't look comfortable. I get our OLs have probably traumatized him but damn.
Part of the reason we have him is because he's mobile. We seem to forget that early in his career here, he was almost expected to run the ball unless there was a wide open receiver. Weren't plays designed to mostly open one side of the field, lots of option plays?
Over the course of his career, we've been transitioning him to more of a passing QB where we just want him to be able to run on busted plays or designed QB runs.
Hate to say it, but if you can't even score a single touchdown due to execution errors and poor QB play, you're not going to win many games. With Vandy next week and a fairly challenging ACC slate, I don't see how we win more than 5-6. Defense has certainly improved but the offense is absolutely dreadful, and game/clock management from Pry is not improved.
Unfortunately think we are in for another long season, and will be paying another golden parachute to Pry at the end of the year. Such is the state of VT football now.
The punt return was the back breaker. The defense played well against a mobile QB. The offense made too many mistakes but I thought the play calls were generally not bad.
The long td pass was a direct result of the position we put ourselves in with thebpunt return and then stalled drive
Getting closer and closer to freeing up my Saturdays for better things to do.
Not watching the game and focusing time elsewhere helps. Just sayin'
I think I honestly feel worse after that. It's the same thing over and over. Flashes of talent and success bookended by silly mistakes and errors we have made over and over again. I'd rather we have been blown out but it feels like a metaphor for VT sports. It's showed we aren't willing to put in the money to really succeed but just enough to keep hope. In the current climate, I just don't think we will have any success beyond .500 seasons with the occasional 8 wins. I love everything about coach Pry except his ability to coach. And the school is going to be content with that until the very last moment. We are going to be able to bring in some decent transfers and a few good recruits that will either fizzle out here or if they improve, go elsewhere. It's the current state of college sports and we are still riding the high of 10-25 years ago thinking it's enough
We aren't going to be playing against many track Olympians or Seller's this year. So the defense was very encouraging. Dropped short passes but many great contested catches, by way of great throw. Drones has got to get it figured out. I was fine with the play-calling and Parker Clements wasn't out there so the OL was automatically better. I have some idea of what this team can be. But, we will go as far as KD's arm takes us. I also don't understand the 'Play Pop' crowd. He played an AWFUL uva defense last year, then looked pedestrian against Minnesota's backups. He wouldn't have been able to do much better in this game.
Hard disagree. Play Pop. There's no future with Drones after this season. He's shown us what he is, and that's a solid backup QB. Pop still has time. Let him play and develop.
Perhaps oddly, I was so impressed by the receivers, Hawkins, and the DL that I now have a much better feeling about the rest of the year. There were frustrating things about this game, but I thought we would lose so mostly came out of this feeling better rather than worse.
I'd agree. Other than Donavan Greens personal foul penalty, both Greens exceeded my expectations.
Same here. Just finished watching the 2nd half at 1230 am after getting back from a wedding and I gotta say this team is different than last year. I see peices that give me hope that I never saw last year.
Agree there. Caveat that the S. Carolina's weakest part of their game in 2024 was allowing sacks, but the D-line did well to get to the QB, prevent QB from escaping the pocket, get into passing lanes, and disrupt the run game.
I also thought the coordination was better. The O-line was not great but definitely a step up from incompetent.
QB play has to improve though. If it doesn't, the rest may not matter in terms of generating more wins. Drones needs to get comfortable in the offense and improve accuracy.
Defense out scored the offebse
This is the first time in a very long time we have a competent OC and DC at the same time. We should have went portal shopping for a new QB1.
Offense might look better when Drones isnt running for his life. every play, but that really means we will look good against bad teams and that's about it.
That's because our offense somehow doesn't know how to identify a hot route and Drones doesn't know how to find it if there was one... so so many opportunities today to just drop it to a guy and let them run and instead Drones runs like crazy off to the side of their best defensive player and throws some crazy pass. It is incompetency in play calling and execution.
We don't know that we have a competent OC
Drones is too inaccurate in both his passes and decision making to be an effective quarterback at this level.
Quarterback recruiting and development has truly been one of VT's biggest failures since the Tyrod Taylor era. Logan should never have been converted into a QB despite his strengths, Brewer was too fragile and threw too many picks but sure was a tough young man, Hooker was never properly developed but should have been a Heisman contender with an O-line and receivers to compliment him, and Drones is just not accurate enough. Others have had similar but usually worse liabilities. It's the toughest job on the team, I know, but I sure hope Coach Montgomery can stick around long enough to competently develop a QB1 with the requisite skills to complete over 60 percent of his passes while throwing less than 0.5 picks per game. I can dream...
How good do you think this team would be if it played Michael Brewer at quarterback?
8 wins at least with Brewer. Guy was the opposite of Pry and just found ways to win. Team wins 11 with Evans
Brewer was the king of 1 score losses, having 5 out of 6 his first season.
Healthy Michael brewer is probably top 5 qb post-MV5. Maybe top 3 even...
Brewer would win us games. Too many people just like Pry that are just happy to be here.
Brewer knew how to throw the ball with touch, he just didn't have the strength to throw deep iirc. He was smart, mobile and made the most of his skills and high football IQ. I could easily see Brewer getting us 8-9 wins with this team having a decent O-line, talented (but young) receivers and solid coaching to go with a defense that I believe will finish the season in the top half of the conference, maybe even top third.
This. With Montgomery scheming open receivers in the short-to-intermediate routes, Brewer would've had a field day. We would've won on Sunday with Brewer behind center.
I think you are correct.
I don't think anyone is surprised we lost that. Our defense played a hell of a game. Our offense was pretty disappointing, but that's not new. We had the element of surprise. Now the rest of our teams will have film on us. Let's see how they do.
Don't we have that Okie St QB that transfered in?
But yeah, our QBs suck, and you cannot win without someone competent throwing the ball
What pisses me off is how close we are to being good. But it's like Fuente in year 6. At some point when you find a way to lose EVERY SINGLE TIME in a close game it's time to move on and find someone more competent. Literally catch the ball, don't throw a stupid pick, tackle the return man when you have him wrapped up and we easily win this game. We were clearly the better team. Instead stupid mistakes make us look bad and we end the game without a single touchdown. Terrible work from the staff, they have to be fired as soon as possible
The coaches didn't miss the tackles; the coaches didn't throw the ball to the other team; the coaches didn't over/under throw wide open receivers; the coaches didn't drop passes...
No they don't.
They're the ones who recruited and train the ones who do. Their talent evaluation is lacking and their player development is horrible and has been for years. Even if the current coordinators are good, it might be too late to save Pry.
If Whit does get his way and the checkbooks do open, we need a complete blank slate, clean house of everyone and bring in a whole new regime that can utilize the assets given to them.
Not ready to climb up on the ledge yet. It's one game, and so far the DC looks to be legit. We'll see how it goes once we get into ACC play.
So another roll of the dice. Not that I am disagreeing with you, but a new coach is never a sure thing.
When you know what you have isn't working the dumbest thing to do is continue it just because of the possibility that trying something else might not work, either.
Your comment just makes it sound like a new coach is a sure thing to utilize the assets given to them, it's not.
I think that if we don't put up a good season, we will be looking for a new Head Coach next year. I also believe that we'll have to be very lucky for it to make a difference.
Yep. This feels inevitable at this point. I have no confidence in Pry whatsoever to build this team back into a winner. He's just a stone cold loser as far as coaching goes at this point, there's no getting past that. The same old ugly problems continue to rear their head.
No but if they're doing those things every single time even when they're clearly better than the other team, that is on the coaches. It's up to the coaches to get the team in a headspace to get up for the game
You can coach until you're blue in the face but if the player(s) don't have the talent/athleticism/football iq to execute, that's not on the coaches. Except for maybe playing someone else or recruiting better.
Some guys shine in practice but shit the bed when the lights are on on game day. Others can't seem to get it together in practice but are stars when the pressure is on. Coaches do need to figure out who belongs in each of those columns
Honestly it's a top 15 team that a not great team held in check for longer than I thought. Next two games I think will tell us a lot more about who this team is.
In the first game no team is ever as good as they look, and no team is ever as bad as they look. We made SC look like a questionable top-25 team, and were maybe closer to a top-25 team than most expect.
You think SC is a top 15 team? In 2025?
They are ranked 13th. Right now I think they are yea.
And Texas is ranked #1. Did Texas look like the best team in the country Saturday? I thought they looked more like us.
Texas lost. USCjr won, can you name 15 teams better than them based off this weeks games?
SP+ had S. Car. at 17 preseason, now up to 12. FWIW.
SP+ also has our strength of schedule remaining as the 9th hardest moving forward, probably due to three straight games against Louisville, Florida State, and Miami.
Surprised they are that high! Good news for the Hokies.
South Carolina is not a top 15 team, preseason rankings don't mean jack shit. I'd be surprised if that team finished with more than 7 wins this season, and we could've easily won by 2 scores if we cut out some ridiculous mistakes that most decent teams don't make
I said it last season and I'm saying it again, if "Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda" was the game of football VT would have a number of natty's by now. We are duty bound as CFB representatives of WaCaSa.
To an earlier point, our troubles have had one thing in common, amongst others (don't get me wrong, I know there are others), and that's not having a true QB1 since Tyrod. Couple this with WaCaSa, and we would be a 9+ win season team and ACCCG contender.
Outside of landing a QB1, there has to be a time when VT can get out of their own way to a larger degree than what we have seen season on end.
Can we make Pry and Montgomery run the stadium stairs for their end of half management?
At this point, Pry has shown that he has absolutely no idea how to handle the last 4 mins of a half enough times that the only fixes are to either give complete control of timeouts and tempo to Montgomery or to fire Pry. I was hoping that Montgomery being a former HC would be able to help in these situations and give advice but today's clock management screams that Pry was still 100% in charge. It's the same shit every time, he lets time run off the clock when facing a long field, doesn't know when to call timeouts, has the offense going at their normal tempo, and still has them checking with sideline to change play calls when they need to be snapping the ball. Pry is somehow the last person in the stadium to realize that we are near the end of the half every time. And when he finally does realize it, there are only 30 seconds left, on a running clock, with multiple timeouts remaining, and we are only at midfield. It's groundhog day every game and he's done nothing to fix it.
Not enough talk going on about this. It's the most egregious part of the day to me. I cannot fucking believe he still hasn't figured out clock management.
What's crazy is clock management is the easiest part of the game to understand. I've seen kids playing Madden that are miles better clock managers than Pry has shown
Hate to be the bearer of bad news but Montgomery wasn't the nest clock manager while he was at Tulsa either
Going in, a number of the analyses basically said, USC-e has the two best players and that will be the difference. I thought that was a gross oversimplification but in the end, that was probably accurate.
Keep our shit together and this team can probably win 8 or 9 games. Next week is a huge test.
The good:
The bad:
The other:
We would always be out numbered in Atlanta. Its a 3 hour drive from Columbia, SC. That's a day trip for their fans. Most VT fans would have long drives or flights and need a hotel.
It wasn't like this when we played bama here in 2009 or 2013.
Other than die hards, I think the fan base has largely checked out. 2009 and 2013 feel like an eternity ago.
Yea... that's kinda my point 😕
roth and burnop pretty much said the opposite. they pointed out lots of empty seats on the socar side
Lots of empty seats throughout the stadium. Capacity is ~75k, and only 55k tix sold (per a mid game announcement).
But we saw way more Gamecocks in the tailgating lots, on the way into the stadium, in the stadium, etc. we estimated it was 60/40 cocks.
Correct, I live in Atlanta and have been to all the games. I have never seen VT this outnumbered
Well Pry per usual wanted to thank our fans for the strong turnout first thing in his postgame presser. Pretty obvious that's just canned coach speak at this point.
Perhaps we need to admit that this WAS a strong turnout given performance the last few years.
What, are you not going to thank the fans who showed up?
Call it coach speak, but it's the right thing to say.
And using Bars #'s above; if the crowd was 55k and 60-40 in favor of Gamecocks, that comes out to 22,000 or so Hokie fans which is about on par with many of our past "travel crowds"(can't necessarily compare us playing South Carolina vs us playing Bama- Bama is almost always gonna be a more fun opponent to watch and therefore folks more willing to make the 8 hour trip(not to mention we were a better team back then too)....
Are missed tackles being out talented? On several plays out guys had their arms around the ball carrier and still missed it. Finish the tackle, that's fundamentals. Another one I saw was receivers dropping the ball when it was right in their hands. To me that's not talent, it's guys being soft. Not rising to the moment, not making plays. That's an attitude and coaching issue. Maybe guys are thinking too hard about assignments, maybe they're being over coached. Either way it's a problem, and most teams don't have that issue
Yes? This is exactly what it looks like when a 2-star tries to wrap up a 4-star. They get there, and the more athletic player wins.
I mean, I think that's talent adjacent as well. Yes, it's a confidence/mental issue first, but more talent players have had more successful reps throughout their career and have more confidence as a result. Yes, this is somewhat coachable, but I think that's a big of an over simplification.
I think most 6-6 teams have these issues. 9-3 teams? Much less so.
With you on catches, but hard disagree on tackling. Athleticism helps you reach the ballcarrier quicker. But the fundamentals of wrapping up the guy and getting him to the ground can be taught in practice. How many athletic defenders get where they need to be and either whiff with an arm tackle or try to make a SportsCenter Top 10 style hit and miss, flailing horribly? SO many of them, and it's been that way for years now across the sport.
You can be less talented and still be good at tackling.
You think wrapping up and tackling someone who is stronger, faster, and heavier is purely coachable technique?
Is that Individual not also taught how to break said tackles?
What is there to teach, stiff-arming and swatting people's arms away? Core strength? Come on. That's not teachable, that's instinctual/a matter of hard work. Get low, wrap him up, leverage his ass to the ground. If you can't, get strong enough to or move over for someone who is. Strength also =/= athleticism
Strength is not equal to athleticism but strength is absolutely a huge component to being athletic.
My point is you can improve on it. It's not some static component of someone's game that can't be worked on because "well, he's just not that talented."
I never said that tackling isn't a teachable skill.
But in 1v1 situation, where the tackler (a) doesn't know where the offensive player is going (by definition) and (b) is undersized and/or slower, then of course the offensive player is going to win the match up more often than not.
How many times did Tuten make a man miss? How many times did Tyrod or Vick weasel their way out of tackles? It's not always because the defender was under-coached, sometimes the other guy is just better.
And in THIS match up, that was often the case
But this went both ways. We were fortunate that some wide open SC receivers also dropped balls that hit them in the hands.
Is it attitude and coaching, or the fact it was the first game (of the season for some and of their careers for others)? If they are still dropping catchable balls in 3 weeks, then there is definitely more to it.
Agree but also note that Sellers did that all last year against SEC talent. He is just so difficult to get down.
Yeah, you watch on some of his runs and he is a great wiggler.
Besides the first drive the D looked improved and borderline stout at times.
The O -- looked like a carbon-copy of the Bowen scheme...was disappointed in lack of anything new. Drones isn't a good passer and isn't ever going to be.
Drones is great against inferior opposition and ass against anyone that has a pulse
Sellers averaged under 2.0 ypc which is not something to toss aside. Would be shocked if he has any other games that low. As said a bunch above, the defense played well enough to win this game probably. It seems like we actually have a D that can stop the run for the first time in a loooong time.
Also encouraged by the WRs ability to make contested catches and get open (we'll hopefully fix the dropsies). Feels just like last year with a good defensive front and skill players we can't quite take advantage of. And when the only major hold overs year to year are Drones and Pry, it's hard not to point fingers
It'll be our only loss of the season, and we didn't have Terion Stewart. USCe will do really good, and so will Virginia Tech. Defense and Special Teams will keep the Hokies in all games, and the running game/passing game will be balanced and play makers will step up. It was the first game of the season and players had to knock off rust. I'd like to see a lot of Pop Watson and Rangel because Drones is on his last year and will not improve but so much. Drones should be the backup. Build up depth, have a good year, and be even better next year =)
I think there's a better than fair chance Drones will not be starting by October
I think you are overestimating the quality of the non-drones QBs on our roster.
Maybe. After losing to Vandy, the coaches will be desperate to find something that works tho. Enter Pop or Rangel. I'm not saying it'll work but that's likely to happen imo
Why do you think we'll lose to Vandy?
After watching the Dline I think we have more of a chance than I did 24 hours ago. The teams than gave Vandy fits last year just used their lines to shut down anything up the middle.
Because so far this season our offense has produced 0 touchdowns and I'm not going to believe that the offense can be productive until they prove it
I just want a quarterback, ANY quarterback, who throws a catchable ball. I don't give a shit if he can scramble or anything like that, just be able to hit an open guy.
I feel like even doing that has been impossible for us since, I mean hell probably Tyrod
If Drones puts up another stinker of a performance next week against Vandy, you have to wonder if you make a switch at QB and give them ODU and Wofford to get reps before ACC play. I just don't think Drones is going to take this offense anywhere at this point. He plateaued in 2023 and hasn't developed since.
I feel like this is the opposite of what we said when Grant Wells was our qb and drones was on the bench 😭
We need QB development. We can't have QBs (or any player really) who's in the program for >2 years without showing any demonstrable improvement.
Well we play 4 or 5 teams better than them so if we get a performance even close to this one, it won't be enough to beat any of those teams
There are not 4 teams better than USC on our schedule. Miami and FSU, that's it
Wish we could've pulled it off, but I did see some encouraging things. The OL didn't look terrible, which feels like a big improvement over the last 3 years.
Secondly, it looked like the LBs were the most decisive in their movement since maybe the Tremaine Edmunds years.
The WRs were also making plays. Obviously a lot of things to clean up but the fight and physically we were playing with showed and I am looking forward to getting payback against Vanderbilt
Yet another game where we don't score a touchdown. Yet another game where end of half clock management is simply mond boggling.
I am just waiting for this program to excite me somehow and nothing about it is. I dont expect us to beat SEC teams but it sure would be nice just to get back to the days where we could punch above our weight
I feel better about the team this evening than I did when I woke up this morning. We were really competitive with a team that's much more talented than us. WRs looked good, RBs were effective even though the #1 wasn't playing, DL and general defense was good and Laws was excellent. D would be better with Delaney, but we expected he wouldn't be playing this year since his first start freshman year l, and I think that 3 year preparation for his absence showed.
I've never been a Drones fan, he's all potential and no substance. Would've really been interesting if we'd landed Malik Washington. Definitely missed Xavier Chaplin on the line.
I'm not mad, all that matters is conference play.
Do we know that South Carolina is much more talented. Outside their top 4 players I'm not sure we can say that at all
South Carolina has the 18th most talented roster (per 247) with four 5-stars and 35 4-stars on their roster. They are one of 18 teams that have a Bluechip Ratio > 50% (aka they have more 4 & 5 stars than 3-stars).
The same outlet lists Virginia Tech as the 40th most talented roster with zero 5-stars and 17 4-stars.
Source.
To be fair, I too didn't realize that South Carolina had a blue chip ratio north of 50%.
If we had those top 4 on our roster, how do you think it would impact our W/L record?
I would guess at least a 3 game bump.
Not even the top 4, if we just had Sellers you probably get at least that 3 game bump. Consider we won TOP but how much wider could that gap have been with a few more 1st down conversions. Sellers I think would have extended several of our drives.
Having sellers wouldn't fix our WR's dropping balls or special teams not tackling a guy who they have wrapped up
It would have made it easier for the WR's to catch about a half dozen of those passes.
Our WRs made a bunch of incredible catches. A number of drops were bad delivery from Drones. More (not Sellers) talent would have tackled Swain or maybe having a guy like Swain on our team would've resulted in us returning a punt for a TD.
We'd get a 3 game bump with our last year's RB behind a decent OL.
There were a couple of runs against USC, I said to myself, Tuten would have taken that to the house.
Yes and it's not close
Big winner for me today was Sling's day pass!
💯
Overall, the team played a good game i thought. Bad errors at critical moments, which seems to be the theme of the Pry era. Another game that was very winnable and within grasp, but was handed away
I'm numb to most of these losses at this point now, we just are who we are and I don't know how that changes. Honestly, we played better than I expected and I agree with those who are more optimistic about the rest of the year. I don't know how many games we win but I think we might make life hell for some of our opponents and at this point I'll take that, I guess.
But goddammit did it make me irrationally angry that we gave up a special teams touchdown. I love Shane, I'm proud of what he's building at SC, and I hope he does well. But the one thing I told my family coming into this game I didn't want to happen was something like that. I didn't want beamerball thrown back in our face and then it happened (and Shane capitalized on it, well played). And it happened because of yet another careless penalty where the gunner wasn't lined up correctly on a punt formation.
Yes, that was infuriating. And half the defense failing to sack Sellers on that 4th quarter run
That, combined with frank wearing SC gear...
VT feels like one of the players from Space Jam who got their powers stolen by the MonStars. And SC was one of them.
Frank was given a game ball too.
Frank was wearing gear from both teams. This is as expected.
Was he? When I saw him in the stadium is just SCar gear.
Yes, he was, I saw VT gear and the announcers commented on it as well.
His shirt/jacket was sCar which was probably the most prominent but maroon.
Frank was wearing a VT pin below the SC logo, which seemed to me like an appropriate way to represent both teams.
i get it. im a father and i get it.
your momma who you dedicated your life to vs your son
i just wish he went with a generic walmart 3/4 with pins of both, though
Eh, we've had kicks returned against us before. I'm annoyed at the kick coverage, but it wasnt like they blocked a kick for a TD or something.
My dad, who I love but never texts me, texted me "Beamerball" right after the punt return TD. I just replied "I miss having it on our sidelines". Not that I want Shane or Frank on our sidelines at this point, but I miss that late 90s feeling of excitement every time special teams took the field because you knew there was an above average chance you were going to see something positive and most likely game changing happen.
In our defense, the safety we got was also a Beamer-ball example. Too many forget Beamer-Ball's focus was on getting points from all three units-offense, special teams, AND defense. Specifically-for special teams-don't JUST block kicks, but recover them for safety or TD and for returns teams, returns for TDs. For the defense, don't just intercept the ball , run it back for a pick 6; don't just cause a fumble AND recover it- make it a scoop and score! Too often we miss the SCORING part and with the offensive struggles, it costs us games to not FULLY capitalize when a turnover play happens../.
Morning after thoughts:
Team looks much better than last year even in the loss.
I feel like if the offense can ever manage to get a touchdown, we'll be in a pretty good place going forward.
"Team looks much better" and
"If they can manage to get a touchdown" made me lol
First game I'd watched live in ages.
Now that I've had some time to process....it felt like a loss as soon as that opening drive happened. Even when it was 7-5 and 10-8 it never really felt like we were in it. Taking the lead and scoring a touchdown were tasks that felt equally insurmountable.
On the bright side that was some of the stoutest DL play I've seen in a long time. They had a relatively hard time running the ball, we got some good hits in on Sellers (too bad the ball didn't bounce our way on that one strip sack) and the safety was awesome.
Unfortunately, everyone else on defense looked...rough. Still can't stop that damn Rutgers tight end play. LBs and safeties were ass, Reddish in particular had a terrible game at least to my eye test. Corners I thought were pretty okay? I was not sober and not fully paying attention for every single play so film review may refute some or all of this.
And the offense...I'm about to do what I used to hate Fuente for doing and blame some players here. True, some of those ineffectual inside runs looked like they were straight out of Stiney's playbook. And I hated the decision to throw deep on 3rd and 1 early on, even though it worked.
But everything else on that side of the ball came down to a failure to execute. Plays were there to be made, there were some particularly inspired play designs and we had people open all game long. Guys just weren't making those plays. Hawkins ran hard all game, but he missed a block on that one play in the second quarter that should've been a horsecollar foul on USCe. Forget about the bad no-call, he makes that block, it's a first down if not a TD. That one series in maybe the early 4th before the game got out of hand where Drones threw 3 catchable balls in a row and all 3 were dropped. The wide open outlet pass on 3rd down that was dropped, I think that happened sometime in the second half too. All the great sideline almost-catches. And then there's Drones himself, who is still the wildly inconsistent passer we've come to know and tolerate. Overthrowing. Throwing behind the receiver. Leading the receiver too much. The INTs were all squarely on him. The only good thing I can say about Drones' passing yesterday is at least he didn't throw any hospital balls. Is he really the best we've got? Really??
All in all, I feel like Montgomery and Siefkes had pretty okay first games. We might win more than 4. But we could easily still only win 4. Or less. Really, really would've liked to have this one. And that PRTD was just a horrible twist of the knife, our special teams have been anything but for years now. Just another edition of the same movie we've all seen way, way too many times before. Go Hokies I guess
It wasn't a horsecollar
Are you kidding me? He reached out and pulled the guy down from behind with his hand in the shoulder pads. It was a textbook horsecollar and they didn't call it. Anyway I was mostly just using that as a reference point for what play I was talking about, whether it was or it wasn't is not my point
IF it is the play im thinking of it wasn't a horsecollar. Looked like one of those plays where the tackler reached around the shoulder pad to the chest and pulled him down that way. Didnt show a closeup on the broadcast that i saw.
bro, watch the play again. He wrapped the ballcarrier up around the neck in a headlock. It's a legal tackle. It looked awkward, but he didn't pull him down from behind by grabbing the back of the shoulderpads. I'm not arguing your other points or that Hawkins missed a block, just that it should be noted that it wasn't a horsecollar.
If this is the tackle of Drones that I believe it was, it wasn't a horse collar, but I am almost positive he was tackled by the opening on the helmet, which is a personal foul just the same. I rewound and watched several times, feel pretty confident that is how he was brought down.
Drones was also supplexed after the whistle on the play Greene (sp?) was flagged for a personal foul and that wasn't called either. If that had been a running back, a little more normal to let that go, but they rarely let it go on extra curricular QB hits these days. They game was not horribly officiated in n my eyes, so not really complaining about the officiating overall, but those two did stand out to me.
Well you've seen it more than me, but live it sure looked like his hand was in the neck hole.
To me it felt like the offense wasn't ready, lot of trying to get plays communicated to everyone. OL looks better than last year, WRs need to spend some time on the JUGS machine but we have some that can make plays it seems. RB may take a couple games to flush out. Overall seems like a Blacksburg offense.
Defense seems to be a lot better with adjustments. DL looks scary. I feel like we played soft on WR a lot, plenty of green grass around catches. Other than the opening drive from SC, they came to play.
Love is the most consistent player on the team and has a fucking cannon for a leg. ST seems to be the most unimproved part of the team other than Pry's clock management.
After sleeping on it, I think it's going to be more of the same this year but the defense may win us a game or two. Glad we didn't look like we didn't belong on the field yesterday but at the same time we lost ourselves a winnable game. Pry needs to hire some clock manager for gamedays.
Slept on it.
If this team isn't 3-1 after the preseason games (/s) are done. It's going to be a long season and Pry is toast.
Going back Pre-Game "Bare Minimum" thread--I think what I really wanted to see was "not the same." Essentially, all the things that have plagued the Pry era so far--improved or gone.
And despite sorta kinda hanging in there, I still saw far too much of the same. Poor clock management, mistakes leading to points for the other team, weak play from the back 7 on D, and Offensive miscues that killed drives.
The DL was a solid bright spot and the OL looked at least passable (although we'll see what French thought). But the passing game was an entire mess-Drones is consistently off-target and when he is, we can't catch. And the LB are just never making plays.
And there's a reason that you lose close games...when you can't get lined up for a Punt correctly in a 2 point game, you are a poorly coached team. That sequence was quintessential Pry Football.
Honestly, I came out of this game thinking we physically have a better chance to beat Vandy than I thought but I am simultaneously sure that we will find a way to lose....
Didn't include this in my write up but yes. Still far too much of the same old Pry from years past. In a year when he's fighting for his job that isn't going to cut it. Also thought pass pro was awful but not sure how much of that was on the OL and how much was simply good calls by their DC
In terms of Pass Pro, it also didn't help that the Refs let Stewart consistently line up in the Neutral Zone...
Yeah...didn't see the sense of urgency at all that one would expect from a coach who should feel like he's coaching for his job this year.
"We're not as bad as expected" isn't going to cut it.
Am I the only one who thought the end of half sequence was ok? Sure, they could've been more aggressive, but we've seen many instances of much worse results.
Tired of them limiting themselves to FG chances at best. Did that part at least work out? Yes but we went to halftime with timeouts on the ledger and only took one real shot at the end zone.
I didnt have a problem with it myself. It would've been pretty easy to shoot yourself in the foot and be down more points coming out of the half. The problem was the offense didnt turn it on and the start fo the second half either, or really the entire game.
We ran over 2 minutes of the clock before crossing the 50 and ended with a really long FG, we didn't try to make it easier on Love. We didn't try to score against #13 in theor own backyard, we weren't trying to win the game and that's an issue. This isnt us keeping it close so Bud can shut them dow 2nd half, we can't play that football, we don't have the players, we needed to score and we didn't even try.
The Defense did shut them down tho. They had 2 touchdowns with a preseason Heisman candidate. The end of the first half did not lose us the game. You might not have liked the strategy there but it was a strategy and miles better than what weve seen him do in the past. Would you have preferred drones throw 3 incompletions and gave the ball back to usc with 2 minutes to go?
Drones poor play lost this game. If he doesn't do 100% turnaround before Saturday it will be a long long season if he stays the starter.
Absolutely.
Put a QB in that is 3/4 accurate and can see the field and we win this game 35-17
Next day thoughts:
- we're better than in years past. We had two new coordinators and 30+ transfers. Years past we would have been down 0-17 before getting a first down and showing any signs of life.
- We couldn't take advantage of their mistakes. After first series, D settled in and was making plays. Could have easily been up 1-2 scores in 1H if we sustain drives and keep momentum.
- D played strong. Can't tell you how many times I saw DTs and LBs just flat out push guys back. Ferg is paying off.
- D scheme is much better. We made some mistakes. But you could certainly see the gameplan.
- O has the potential to be "improved". Talent isn't as good but scheme and cohesiveness seem better.
- stop running up the middle. OL doesn't execute it well. Especially slow developing and with the smallest back. Attacking the edges and PO plays worked much better.
- Drones is improving. Had much better touch. Threw catchable balls. Those highlight plays were because he had some touch on the ball. Think Monty is designing a good system around his strengths. Need to let him run more early. He always plays better after issuing a few hits (he doesn't like to slide). Take some pressure off him being too perfect on throws.
- WRs drops crushed Drones confidence. Throw lasers and low balls are when you forcing to be perfect. Esp noted at end of the game...you could see him lunge forward too much or throw off his back foot.
- ST can be a weapon. Think we were afraid of making stupid mistakes and playing "not to lose". Once the other pieces (O and D) gel a little better they'll take chances with ST personnel and scheme.
Largely agree outside of Drones. For the most part as I watched the game I wanted to cognizant of how I felt throughout all phases of the game as a fan watching a college football game and not so much analyzing the play by play.
Drones: The first half felt like more of the first 3/4 games of last season. Play calling was way too many pass attempts. IMO, more RB and RPO run plays for Drones would be have been more effective and cater to his "Strengths". Would have rather us establish a run look offense first and pass less. Drones is not a passer.
Offense (again in a general observation): I felt the overall play calling was good. I felt the scheme throughout it was good. I felt the O is better than last year as a group. They have a workable foundation to improve upon but not with Drones.
O Line: The entire last season it was maddening watching how bad our line was. I didn't feel that way overall, one bit. I felt this unit was better and played okay and "okay" is a marked improvement vs last season.
Defense: Boy oh boy, did I enjoy watching this D play yesterday. This D resembled everything we heard about Siefkes style. This was the most aggressive D I've seen in a long time. Outside of a few plays and missed tackles, I am up on this unit.
Pry: Overall, the only item where I lost my shit was the illegal punt formation. I mean you've got to be fucking kidding me. Outside of that, I really didn't think he had other total buffoon clock management moments. Did he try to, maybe, but not utter WTF moments.
Coordinators: I left this game with a degree of confidence in both. These guys will bring the wins that we should win this season or at least they give me the illusion they will after yesterday's game.
Bottom line, we beat Vandy nect week, call me a believer. We lose, and oh boy this season is going to suck.
Disagree about RPO run plays with Drones. He just has a knack for making the wrong decision in any read option play. Case in point, the jet sweep read option with #9 where he took the ball and gained 1 yard up the middle, where #9 would've been out on the perimeter with two blockers ahead of him. That would've been a huge gain if he made the right decision, but he didn't.
Found it.
Tables finely illustrating his awesome French-esque film review skills. Nice!!! No doubt Drones missed that one and others as you pointed out. At this point have him run a bunch then dial in a pass play he has the highest chance of making and pray for the best. Speaking of praying....
Hoping that we see the same D for Vandy. I hope and pray this guy is legit. If he proves to be, then we need to pony up the cash to retain him.
Hardly. It's all I can do to keep up with French when he's laying it right out there. I just happened to notice that one play at the time, and through some quirk of my over-50 brain, it was somehow retained in memory for a few days.
As Frank would say, "those over-50 brains will get after ya!"...I hear ya man. I'm right there with you.
That is indicative of a QB who still hasn't had the game slow down mentally for him and is absolutely rushing every throw. Playing behind dog shit OLs for years doesn't help that, but far too often yesterday he had a clean pocket and bailed or got out on the edge and didn't set his feet before throwing. He's not talented enough to throw on the move and he did it all the damn time leading to throws wildly all over the place barely giving the receivers a chance.
If that is who is going to be this year, we are going to struggle to win more than 3 or 4 games.
I agree O line play was better than the past but dont agree that the pocket was stable much. The Left tackle got run by at least a half dozen times forcing Drones out or leading to rushed throws/Drones taking a hit as ball came out. SCAR picked up on it early and blitzed that side frequently. Will be interested to see how French grades that left side of the line.
A couple times Drones scrambled to the wrong side as well, right into the teeth of the end coming around the tackle. He should have scrambled to the other side, which had ineffective pass rush on that play.
I had chalked this one up as a loss all offseason, but I had some hope in the back of my mind that finally we would exceed expectations. That finally Pry would get things together and show us something.
And other than the first drive and up until the collapse at the very end, the defense played admirably. Hats off to Siefkes - he put us in a position to win the game. DL looked dominant and had Sellers rattled for most of the game. I think what hurt the most is seeing that we easily could have won this one.
But here we go again...the offense was absolutely pathetic. I don't even think it was necessarily the scheme (was way more conservative/vanilla than I had hoped, little misdirection).
But I'm going to say it - there are two common denominators over the last several years with this team after a lot of new players coming in and switching up the staff, and that's Drones and Pry. Very inconsistent and mistake-prone QB play from Drones that we've come to know, and still horrendous overall clock and game management from Pry. We have completely failed to put a good QB on the field in the Pry era. The sad thing is, I think Drones is the best we've got and Monty is probably handcuffed in what he can do offensively. Why we haven't brought in true competition for Drones falls squarely on Pry - I wouldn't be surprised if we have basically assured him the starting job and no competition with his NIL. Infuriating, but it's what we have.
And on to the Beamers. I'm not going to bash, but I'm also not going to say "rooting for Shane, hope SCar wins out!" That's a pretty decent team, but they aren't the thirteenth best in the nation. It just makes me angry that Shane has his little vendetta against VT/has to prove to the world he was too good for us. Yet complacency and the Beamers being unwilling to move on or adapt in Frank's final years is a huge chunk of why the program is so far behind and in the state it is now. I'm just sick we lost to him, and the narrative now will be that VT was only good because of the Beamers. We will never escape that shadow and that just makes me bitter at this point.
As Alum put it yesterday, the Beamers have moved on from us, but VT just can't seem to move on from them. We've got a golly shucks smooth talker HC who's just happy to be here hanging out on the sidelines, and who has just tried to hit us with all the Beamer-era ways of doing things and nostalgia that don't work anymore. Yesterday watching us was like seeing your favorite band from years ago, and all the original members are gone and the name is the only thing that remains. Feels hollow now.
Unless we can correct the mistakes and find a way to get something going offensively, it's hard to see anything different for next weekend or any team with a pulse. This is what we've come to know in the Pry era.
I haven't seen any evidence of this anywhere. Did I miss something? (I don't follow a lot of offseason football news)
Lots of message board and insider rumors and rumblings over bitterness from Frank's departure, Beamers upset with Whit, and Shane going after VT a lot directly in recruiting recently.
Its been going on for years in how Shane recruits, especially in state. Never risen to the level of much press but there have been several stories about visits Shane has made to Virginia High Schools where word got out that he was using a straight bash Tech script rather than what SCAR offers. It didn't help that this was going on at the same time Fuente and crew decided to alienate Virginia High Schools feeding fuel to Shane's smoke.
It may have just been a coach celebrating a win in his specialty (special teams), but Shane did go over to the reporter on the sideline after the punt return for the TD and say something to her about how fitting it was to score a touchdown that way.
100% on Beamer. Look, we all loved coach and he built VT into a viable contender in the Vick years and through the early 2000s, but that's gone and becoming a memory.
His final years drove the nail through anything he had built. The empty national championship trophy case was a joke outside of Blacksburg.
Stop the #25 jersey tribute. No fans are going to jump ship if you do. It wasn't even mentioned during the broadcast, thankfully.
Beamer is and will always be a legendary figure in VT football history, but otherwise will be a footnote for never winning the big games.
I do not wish Shane or SCar success. It's infuriating that anyone would.
The Pry, aw shucks, we competed hard quotes are ringing hollow with each exacerbating loss. I really want him to succeed and get us over the hump.
Go Hokies!
Agree - the 25 jersey tribute thing should have stopped a while ago and definitely should end now. Sick of it.
The biggest sign of where we are right now is that we hired a coach because he worked for Frank, and because he has ties to Frank and would continue the legacy...
And Frank was at the game wearing the sideline gear of our opponent and getting the game ball from our opponent.
I don't care that his son is the SC coach, it wouldn't be that hard to just wear a non-branded maroon jumper to represent both sides. VT is no longer the school of the Beamer family. They only want to see our failures.
I reject this notion. Pry got the job because:
These were all things that our program needed to address in early 2022.
Problem was, we hired a guy who recruits on relationships right as the NIL era was about to kick off.
But otherwise, I agree with everything you said.
Exactly. We hired Pry who wants to party like it's 1999, and but that's low rizz sus frfr in 2025.
That and besides being a cultural fit on the surface, he just hasn't proven to be a very good coach at all. It's telling to me that the defense looks markedly improved finally as he has fully divested from it with his scheme and his hand picked guy in Marve to run it.
100%
It was a rational hire that we (understandably) thought could/would address a lot of our program weaknesses. The thought process was sensible. But sometimes sensible hires don't work out.
Which is what we were saying about Fuente, too.
Most coaching hires don't work out. Gotta work with the data you have on hand at the time and then see what happens.
If choosing a coach, choosing a quarterback, or choosing a transit agency head were easy everybody would be winning and the trains would always run on time.
This is very much my opinion. When it comes to coaching searches, you focus on process over results.
I think the failure of the Fuente Process was that no one in the room had non-VT P5 experience. That said, I'm a bit understanding of this issue... I don't think anyone knew how far behind VT was at the time. This problem was addressed with the Pry hire.
The problem with the Pry Process was that he hired first time coordinators. That gap should've been identified. Everyone saw that coming. I remember Ty on the Solid Verbal called this out.
In addition to coordinators with experience you also need good ones. Montgomery hasn't run a good offense since 2016 (besides XFL where Skip Holtz was the real coordinator). I'm afraid we majorly f'd up hiring him and unfortunately game 1 appears to back that up
this is definitely a concern of mine but I'm not ready to call for Monty's head yet. Give him a few games. I thought the play-calling was fine. There were opportunities out there that were just missed. Drones making poor reads, missing open receivers, receivers dropping easy balls, etc. Scheme-wise I think the offense was okay. Execution was a big problem but that's been a problem offensively since about 2018 so I'm not really that surprised to see it again in game 1 with new coaches. That needs to improve over the next few weeks. I won't be REALLY concerned until week 4-5 if there is no real improvement there. I'll give Monty at least 3 more weeks before I start passing judgement on his offense.
My only real concern when it came to playcalling on the offensive side was the Red Zone plays that seemed to only have one option on each play. Down there you need as many quick reads as possible to keep the defense guessing.
Agree that the rest of the field, the plays called had guys open. So I guess the concern there is even if they are open, if Montgomery knows Drones can't execute it, he has to start thinking of plays Drones can...or next QB can.
My one bright spot for Montgomery is that of all of his recent offenses, Drones is by far the best QB he's had.
If he can't call plays or tailor the offense to Drones strengths that is 100% on him and not the players. There are coordinators and several of them that could get a top 40 maybe even top 30 offense with the roster we have
I don't buy this - I watched Drones. He's not that good of a QB and if your QB can't get the ball to the other players it wouldn't matter how good they are anyway (and, frankly, I don't know that our receiving corps is that stellar). If Drones is the best QB we have I don't think this roster is capable of a top 40 offense, regardless of coaching. Not even really close.
Here's my gripe with Drones as a whole. They guy has the physical ability. He has a strong arm, big body, athletic, and can move in the pocket, can put a really nice touch on the ball.
He's a 0/10 on the rest of the game though. Nothing has slowed down for him, he rushes everything resulting in his footwork being all over the place, bailing the pocket early, making predetermined reads before the defense moves, rifling short passes for no reason. Drones is absolutely capable of being a good quarterback but after 3 years it should have clicked by now. I can very much see him being an absolute practice stud and a complete flop once things get going.
Whether you think this relies almost entirely on the scheme fit of the QB. There are countless examples of QB's who looked awesome in one scheme and terrible in others, Grayson McCall at Coastal is a great example, awesome in Chadwell's system, terrible in the others.
Drones is perfectly suited to be a one-read style QB, along the lines of Jerod Evans. (If you saw Evans in a multi read pro-style system I guarantee you would say he was terrible.) Bottom line is it's on the coordinator to run the system that's best suited for the QB and talent that's available
Evans = so true. All the more reason he should have come back to VT and work on his reads. He wasn't going to make it in the NFL as a one read QB. But, rumors out there may have made that a moot point anyway in regards to not being able to come back academically.
Plus, Cornelsen certainly wasn't going to help advance his football acumen
I dont think we know that about Evans we just know he killed it as a one read QB. I dont know if he was allowed to make other reads.
No touchdowns is BAD. We controlled the game last week and the offense couldn't draw up anything when we needed it. If he can't do it then when can he?
I really don't think South Carolina's defense is world beating. They held us to 9 offensive points. That's FCS level output when they play power 5 teams. I'm not ready to fire him yet, but if there's a repeat performance against Vandy I will be
SCar graduated a lot of defense but they still had one of the best defenses in the country last season. I have a feeling they're pretty damn good again.
It's a possibility for sure. I don't see it at all, but it's definitely possible. I think this loss looking back will be a "wtf how did we lose that one".
Either way even if they are good, they aren't hold us to 9 points good. Even with the drops and mistakes and if they are a good defense we should've scored at least a touchdown on top of what we got.
It's a bad result, could be an outlier, but I'm taking note in case a trend develops and not throwing this data point out
fair enough. These are valid points. If it was game 2, or even season 2, with Monty I'd be completely on board. But it was his first game for VT. There were some positives even though the offense failed to produce touchdowns. If that trend continues then, yeah, I'm right there with you. But it's been one game. Beamer once said that the greatest improvement you ever see in a team is from game one to game two. If this offense manages 30 against Vandy I think we cool the takes on Monty. If it's another slugfest in which we only score fieldgoals, then I'm not against raising alarms.
I will say, though, that I don't know how much of it is the actual coach. I'm of the (admittedly very silly) belief that Blacksburg is just not meant to have good offense. Nobody can seem to make offense work here. The only good offenses we've had were propped up on the shoulders of supremely talented players. And, frankly, at this moment we just don't have that type of talent so it seems completely unreasonable to me to expect our offense to be anything better than bottom 1/3.
I mean let's not pretend that him being a GA in the 90s and all the photos we could drum up with him and Frank during that time wasn't a major selling point to the administration and boosters to why he was even considered in the first place.
All of what you say is true, but the connection to Frank is what got him on our radar. Otherwise, we probably aren't even interviewing him. He wasn't a major name in the coaching circles when Fuente was fired.
Problem was, we hired a guy who recruits
on relationships right as the NIL era was
about to kick off.
This right here is one of the biggest reasons we are in our current position. The old style recruiting having a head on collision with the NIL era.
I don't fault Pry at all for this. It was an unfortunate timing of events that created a massive round whole, square peg scenario.
The other was hiring two inexperienced coordinators out of the gate.
Agreed on all fronts here. We need to find (other than a shit ton of NIL money) a guy that recruits the new world of college football, not the old world. I like Pry a lot, but he's too old school to win in the new world.
Problem is it's no longer "the guy", it's only the $.
I think the guy has a bit to do with it. Is it mostly money? Yeah probably, just like everything else now.
I don't know if you're being serious with "They only want to see our failures" (as I don't have all the insider info that seems to indicate that Shane hates VT), but it is not even remotely surprising or controversial that Frank was on Shane's sideline. Like, I would have been shocked and a little disappointed in Frank if he wasn't. I can't imagine not actively cheering for my own son't success.
Shane is an alumni and coached here should he not want USC to win?
It sounds like a bunch of message board BS. Of course Shane recruits Virginia, that was his calling card on the VT staff and probably part of the reason he got the SCAR job. Of course Shane negatively recruited against VT during Fuente, so did everybody else during that time. Shane's job is to win (if his eventual goal is to be VT HC then he needs to win at SCAR) so he does what it takes to win recruiting battles, and VT and SCAR have always competed for recruits.
There's a video after the game of Shane going up to Frank and saying "I'm glad that's over". He sounded like he HATED playing this game. The media narrative, playing against his alma mater/his dad's alma mater/his dad's old team/his old team/his old employer/the team & town he grew up with.
This. I was talking about this with another Hokie friend the other day. If my daughter goes to another school, and that school plays Tech, yeah I'm rooting for Tech. But if she's coaching the other team, that's a hell of a different thing. I'm rooting for my daughter's success, and somewhat disappointed that it has to come against my alma mater.
It seems we're going to have to just get used to that these days.
I've slept on it and realized I feel the same today as I did yesterday, and the day before.
The moral victories no longer suffice.
I'm glad the defense had a pulse and kept us in the game, but I'm tired of those small victories never translating to wins. We can get stops all day, and it's all for nothing if our offense doesn't reward it with points. The object of the game is to uh, ya know, score more points than the other team. Drones looked, as politely as I can put it, like diarrhea dog shit. I would almost prefer it if he didn't occasionally hit accurate passes - it only makes it more frustrating when he misses layups (and oh my god, does he miss those layups).
Save the empty platitudes and moral victories. Win the fucking games.
Agree on all points. I was hopeful with some better QB coaching and mentoring, Drones could flourish in Monty's system. But Drones is what he is, he hit his ceiling in 2023 and there's no more development left for him. Monty's system requires a QB who can accurately throw it 30+ times a game, and Drones has lost every game he has been required to throw that much. He's slow seeing the field and going through reads, low football IQ, and streaky accuracy at best. And likely due to pandering and keeping him happy and entrenched as QB1 due to the NIL we have paid him, we don't have any better options on the roster. I just don't see how we are going to have much offensive success in this scheme given Drones' limitations, to put it nicely.
I think you could also say this about Pry as well...
Going to get back into doing advanced stats write ups for each week, but going to wait until at least three games have been played to start doing my own threads. (I think I did about 8 games last year with pretty decent consistency until I got married at the end of the fall.)
Looking at expected points per play (offense and defense only), we really hung with South Carolina in the second and third quarters, but got blasted in the first and fourth quarters. That shouldn't be surprising as those were the only quarters we allowed touchdowns.
Success rate and explosive rate will be an interesting metric to track as the year goes on, especially to see how they replace Tuten in the running game.
By rushing success rate, the Hokies finished at 43.2% which is higher than I initially expected. But looking at it by quarter, it seems it was mostly in the second and third quarters. VT couldn't get anything going in the first quarter on the ground, and had only limited success in the fourth quarter. Another major difference from last year was the fact that the Hokies had 0 explosive runs on offense (runs over 15 yards).
Passing the ball was a struggle, which is always going to be true when you complete less than 50% of your passes - but it did improve as the game went on. VT had a success rate of 31.4% and had explosive passing plays on 5 of 35 attempts (passes going for more than 20 yards), meaning that one of every three completions for Drones was an explosive pass. These came on both crossing routes picking up YAC and on deep shots to the outside portions of the field. It also does not include the play wiped off by a chop block.
Comparatively on defense, VT held the South Carolina running attack in check, allowing success on only 30.6% of plays. They did however have a much higher 47.4% success rate passing the ball on fewer attempts. They also had four explosive plays each in the running and passing game. For a team with boasting a preseason Heisman candidate, two 25-year old running backs, and a 6'5", 238 pound Olympic level athlete at receiver, I would say that is a pretty decent improvement over last season.
It will be interesting to see how this shakes out over the course of the year. One note, it looks like the College Football Database is moving behind a paywall to access the API this year, which might limit my ability to run comparisons against other teams later in the season. If the Hokies start winning, and these posts gain traction, I might just bite the bullet and subscribe.
This is fantastic analysis. Kinda helps us take the emotion out. How much is the paywall. We may be able to crowd source for you to get this type of analysis (know I'd be willing to pay my share).
I appreciate that, but it is absolutely not necessary. For the API access that I think I would need, its probably only $5 a month. The cost is more about whether I want to dedicate my Sunday mornings doing analysis than the subscription cost. It was just a lot easier to make that call when it was free. (There is a free tier as well, I just need to play around with it further and figure out the best way to do this stuff. Despite the fact that I am technically a research analyst, my skills are more public policy oriented than data science and so a lot of this is new for me.)
But, if I do continue this, are there things you would like to see more of? I kept it light today since it is week 1 and there are still a lot of unknowns, but I plan on diving in more around week 4.
It is no surprise to me that with the 2 new Coordinators and OL that we had no real offense in Q1.
It did surprise me the drastic difference in the D after the first series.
I dont feel bad about it. Don't feel good either.
The irony after reading some of Pry's post game remarks is that when he was asked directly about the end of the first half clock management he asserted that they were absolutely trying to score a TD to end the half.
What makes that worse than him not trying is that he so mismanaged the clock, in a worse way, on the way to score a TD that it makes him look so incredibly incompetent... Still.
I love Pry, I wish he was our guy, but he will not be here long term. It's more than recruiting. It's more than a gross lack of QB development. It's more than a lack of player development (although the hire of Jarret Furgeson might have been the best hire of the offseason based on what I saw last night). It's the fact that he cannot handle JV level things within the context of any given game.
There's a lot of positive things to take away from this game. But holy moly....
Will someone PLEASE explain to Pry that you need more points than the other team in order to win? I hate the whole "playing not to lose" mentality, even when we're leading. But playing that way when we're already losing is absolutely insane.
We faired OK on one important offensive criterion, maintaining possession of the ball to rest the defense. Our time of possession was also greater than theirs.
We failed to achieve a 1st down on 3 of 11 possessions, 27%, which is acceptable.
My apologies as this may seem far fetched but knowing that Drones is what he is, isn't it time we go the alternating QB route against Vandy? Maybe give Pop half of the series in the first half and then pick the QB at halftime... seriously, we know what we have with Drones but do we really know what we have with Pop? Just saying... it can't hurt.
Home opener a year after losing to Vandy, I don't think you risk it. Drones is mid, but he's more of a known commodity than Pop or Rangel. Pop looked iffy against a competent Duke team, and Vandy is very competent. ODU or Wofford is where you might try that out, but Pry definitely can't afford to drop a game to ODU, we've seen other coaches do that.
I think you actually make the case for starting Pop or Rangel against Vandy here.
He can afford to lose to Vandy (SEC, non-con, etc. etc.) and he likely will lose that game anyway (0 wins against noncon P4 teams in his entire HC career). If you can't afford to lose to ODU or Wofford, then you see what you've got in one or both of Pop/Rangel against Vandy. If they light the world on fire, then great, you found a QB and stick with them. If they stink up a storm worse than Drones did in Atlanta, then you know you need to stick with Drones. I think it's better to try things out in a game that you know you can lose rather than in a game you know you can't lose. If he plays Pop/Rangel for the first time against ODU and they are worse than Drones and we lose because of it, well, then you're in a world of hurt. Especially since you're probably losing to Vandy regardless of QB.
It really depends on your view of the Vandy game. You've made it clear in this and other posts you think we're losing. So losing is already a sunk cost to you, it doesn't matter who starts at QB. Vegas doesn't see it that way, I doubt Pry does either. He thinks he can win, and he doesn't want to start the year 0-2. That would be a bad way to begin a year where you probably won't get fired, but you are on the hot seat and need to stack wins before November.
Let's assume the Vandy game is winnable (frankly, I think it is). Flip it on its head and think about which of the next 3 games is least losable. Yes, it would suck to lose to Vandy and start 0-2. But if you can think of ordering the games in order of least painful losses to most painful losses it would be Vandy, Wofford, ODU. 0-2 sucks but we've been there before and dug out of the hole.
We absolutely can't lose to ODU. For that reason, taking a flier on your QB is high risk, low reward. Lose the game and you lose any semblance of faith you might have with the fanbase. Win that game and pat yourself on the back because you won a game you should have. ODU is a must win, IMO. Not worth risking it to find out what you've got under center.
Wofford is somewhere between ODU and Vandy. As a coach who has to think about SOS and talking points and motivations, etc. losing to an SEC team is less egregious than losing to an FCS team. For that reason, you can't afford to lose to Wofford either.
Do I want to lose to Vandy? No. But if we think about which of these three teams is going to be least painful to lose to, even if that means starting 0-2, it's Vandy and it's not even really close. If you really think it's risky to start Pop/Rangel because you're not sure what you've got with them then you start them in a game you can afford to lose (you could argue that Pry can't afford to lose any games but the Vandy game is the easiest to explain away - especially if he wins the next 2 and starts off the ACC schedule with a win over NC State, which is winnable)
If Pop/Rangel play vs Vandy and are better than Drones, you benefit from probably winning the game and you have your QB going forward. Finish OOC play with a 3-1 record and look forward to NCState. If Pop/Rangel play poorly against Vandy and you lose, welp, you're 0-2 against the MIGHTY SEC but you've shown the fans that you're willing to mix it up and see what you've got - go back to Drones and hope it's enough to get through the two games you absolutely cannot afford to lose and finish OOC play with a 2-2 record, which most people expected anyway.
Alternatively, you play Drones vs Vandy and lose, then start Pop/Rangel vs ODU and lose again then you're 0-3 and rudderless. At that point you just look silly. If you start Drones vs Vandy and lose, then switch and win against ODU and Wofford with Pop/Rangel you're 2-2 where people expected, have your QB for the season, but have to face questions for why it took two weeks of losses in winnable games to figure it out. Playing this from all sides, I think starting Pop/Rangel vs Vandy makes the most sense, if you're going to at all. Otherwise, you don't play either one of them until Drones is too hurt to play.
After we are up 24-3 at halftime, Drones only gets one series in the third quarter and then we are playing Pop/Rangel for the rest of the game.
We can only hope it turns out that way
I didn't watch and didn't care to. Camping in West Virginia with a bunch of lifelong friends, slamming a hundred Model Zero Especiales and riding my dirt bike and fly fishing was far better.
I did hear on the radio this morning that we had an illegal formation on a punt, Shane made us punt again and they ran it back 80 for a touchdown. That's what stands out to me after reading about the game. Why the hell are these penalties still an issue?
At this point I'm over VT football until something changes. Maybe I'll watch a game or two this season if I'm not on the boat but I've got better things to do on Saturdays then watch Pry's teams be lukewarm dog poo at best.
I don't know why we do all this movement on punts. Just line up like you always do and kick the ball. Trying to be exotic and show different formations and lineups for a freaking punt just seems entirely unnecessary and begs for stupid penalties
You didn't see Frank pulling that shit and he's the godfather of special teams.
That sounds amazing. What part of WV?
A private 500 acre tract of land half an hour west of Romney. I'm lucky enough to be very close to a generous family that encourages us to play on it whenever we want.
Nice! I've camped near Romney. Absolutely beautiful.
Emotionally draining because I went in thinking we'd get routed. Then the defense looked shockingly competent compared to last year and we were in it. Then the gut punch of losing after realizing we had a good shot.
Giving it a day let me reflect and realize that this team could really make some noise going forward. Gotta have better QB play and WRs need to catch easy balls. If the defense keeps it up, I'm pretty optimistic about our potential to make a run. DLine was exciting. Holding that offense to 17 points? Last year's defense couldn't do that.
We'll see. On to Vandy!
Don't know if this belongs her or elsewhere , but holy cow- most amazing stadium experience as far as logistics and game day experiencer.
We were waiting to meet someone outside the stadium so didn't go in til about 230(30 minutes til kickoff). Walked straight in through security-not even one minute to scan four tickets from phone.
Concessions inexpensive (e.g. $2 hot dogs)- even alcohol wasn't bad(shout out to strawberry frozen margaritas at $14 a piece and nicely strong. Lines not substantially long at all. In and out of bathrooms in 5 minutes or less. No problem navigating concourse crowds.
Flawless wifi and cell coverage.
Beautiful views- we were third deck front row 20 yd line on VT side.
We had friends with us that will also be with us at home games with season tickets- kept saying "don't get used to the experience of wifi/cel service/ and entering the stadium lol"
Agreed, by far the best stadium experience I've had at any level of sports.
Well they were 20k fans under capacity, but I am sure a lot of this is the difference between a modern pro stadium and a historic college stadium.
Agree re capacity and pro and college; BUT getting fans through the metal detectors and getting tickets scanned without standing in line for 45 minutes like it is at every game at Lane should NOT be beyond the capabilities of a 21st century university with strong Engineering and IT departments...
Nothing a few pockets full of beers can't fix...
Pros:
1. The Defense played with an edge, energy, and almost did enough to win the game.
2. WRs can make plays
3. RB has some depth - TBD on Stewart.
4. John Love is money - may help win some close games.
5. DL / front seven looks good and has some depth.
Cons:
1. Drone is not it. They clearly sank a bunch of NIL money into him, so sadly we are going to have to see it all year. No passion, no leadership, inaccurate, doesn't use his physical tools when he runs, bad instincts / vision. I'd be fine if he threw go-routes and ran QB draws all year - may be the best way to win.
2. OL pass protection. On some of those pressures, Drones bailed immediately and he refused to step up in the pocket all game. TBD. Run blocking decent.
3. Critical lapses at key spots by WRs/drops, Drones, Special Teams, penalties, etc.
4. No urgency late in the game. Walking around on offense down two scores with a chance to stay in the game.
5. Coaching (other than defense) still looks average at best.
Looking ahead - if they can get to NC State being 3-1 they'll have another chance to reset expectations with a manageable October schedule before a tough November.
I could be remembering wrong, but I feel like last season, people were reluctant to really put much blame on Stu Holt, but can we all finally acknowledge that he is a terrible Special Teams Coordinator?
I don't know if people were slow to blame him as much as there were just an overabundance of easier targets last year.
He's had good kickers and punters but the gaffes have been repeated and inexcusable.
Pry's original hires have been a total shitshow.
-Rudolph- bolted ASAP
-Glenn - never really understood his role, also bolted quickly
-Marve - in well over his head
-Bowen- had some highs but lots of lows
-Holt - as above
That leaves Cheetah who has been fine, but nothing special. Mines who has been by far the best recruiter but haven't seen a ton of development from his HS recruits. And Quinn, who is so under the radar that I forgot he was on Staff.
That is why he has struggled, more than anything else.
You forgot JC Price, who has done fairly well and are seeing some of his recruit make plays, and Pearson Prioleau who hasn't done very well.
JC wasn't really Pry's hire, he's a holdover from the last regime. Semantics. He's successful as a member of Pry's original staff, he's not one of Pry's original hires.
I love semantics which means VT parted ways with Heach Coach JC Price and Pry hired him back as DL coach
Touche
It's not the kickers themselves that are the problem, it's the rest of the special teams folks...lining up wrong, dual #s, not staying in their lanes, fair catching when they shouldn't, NOT fair catching when they should, letting balls bounce in front of them, running a kickoff out of the end zone and getting tackled on the 10-15 yd line instead of taking the fair catch and getting the ball on the 25...
Now some of those are poor coaching decisions and others might be player related or a combo of both...but if I were coaching and I told them to fair ca5tch and they consistently ignored those instructions, I'd be finding a new kick returner...
That's literally been Tucker Holloway's MO since he got on punt return and I shit my pants every time he does it. He does make some magic happen occasionally but he's going to get destroyed back there one time and its going to be bad.
Holloway has gotten destroyed several times. Its the main reason he has hardly been seen since coming here. Always out injured.
Greg Stroman used to do the exact same thing in his first few years doing PR. He finally got it figured out like his senior year lol
That was the point I was (maybe unclearly) trying to make.
When you have Love hitting 50+ yarders routinely and a generally good Yards/punt average it gives the appearance of "good special teams."
But the basic mistakes have been incredibly costly and have continued to linger throughout Stu's tenure.
Overall, attention to detail has not been a calling card of the Pry era.
Yep - this is why we struggle in close games IMO. When getting a win is about performance on the margins, details matter.
I was calling for Holt's head back in 2022. He had one good year in 2023.