Update (12/3/15): Virginia Tech officially announced Torrian Gray and Charley Wiles will join Justin Fuente's staff.
Both Thayer Evans of Sports Illustrated and Evan G. Watkins of 247Sports reported Virginia Tech defensive secondary coach and passing game coordinator Torrian Gray will be part of Justin Fuente's new coaching staff at Tech.
Virginia Tech secondary coach Torrian Gray is being retained by new Hokies coach Justin Fuente per source.— Thayer Evans (@ThayerEvansSI) December 2, 2015
The Hokies' DBU tradition will continue under its current dean. Gray has a knack for identifying and developing defensive backs, recruiting at a high level and placing his DBs in the NFL.
Watkins also reported defensive line coach and running game coordinator Charley Wiles is expected to be part of Fuente's staff, which agrees with a report by Jason Stamm of Rivals.com from earlier in the week.
Retaining Gray and Wiles — two longtime Bud Foster assistants — is a logical decision by Fuente.
"One of the beautiful draws about this opportunity was I believed that hopefully it potentially came with the best defensive coordinator in all of America," Fuente said at his introductory press conference. "I'm awfully happy that he's agreed to stay on with us and help us continue what Coach Beamer started."
"That's going to be Justin's decision," Foster said on Monday about his defensive staff. "Obviously, I have a recommendation. I have strong feelings about my guys. We've put together a great staff here, but ultimately, it's his decision. Hopefully, I'm sure we'll talk but at the same time, we'll see where that goes."
Foster asked Fuente to consider retaining Wiles and Gray. Fuente, who doesn't seem intent on meddling with key cogs of Foster's extremely successful defensive system, obliged. Simple. Smart.
Comments
We have hit a home run. There is literally no way this couldn't have gone better from the moment Beamer announced his retirement.
I guess we could have beaten UNC...
but yes. I agree. This has been a major home run for Whit and the athletic department
Doesn't matter; beat LOLUVA.
THIS^^^ so much is what REALLY matters.
That "Why not both?" gif would work pretty good right about here.
Statistics show, when being forced to choose, beating LOLUVA takes precedence. But hanks for playing!
So reading into this did Bud not request of Fuente that Brown stay on?
From the Teel story.
Not necessarily. It's entirely possible Bud recommended his entire staff, but Fuente wanted to pick and choose.
I think that Fuente is going to move one coaching position from D to O, so Bud had to lose one. Brown has the smallest role to coach, and was the logical position to eliminate.
Fuente has final say.
I think this was going to happen eventually, even if Frank Beamer was here for another year or two. We've slowly seen Brown's position become obsolete and we've been speculating for a while that Brown was either going to be dismissed or switch his role to another position.
In other words, I really don't see a strong argument that Bud could have made to Fuente in order to keep him.
I completely agree that his is the easiest position to cut. I understand if the position is dissolved, but I don't think it would make much sense to bring in an outside LB coach to the position in Bud's defense. I would think that since we're staying with Bud, if the position is to be filled Brown would be the logical fit since he already knows the defense. I hate seeing Brown go, and I get it, but if we bring someone outside to fill the role, I'm going to be a little pissed.
I'm sure that Fuente wanted to bring Galen Scott with him, Brown is the logical choice to drop to make room
Without an official announcement, it has further legs considering that Holmon Wiggins retweeted a post from GobblerCountry saying Gray was staying.
Love it. And best of all short-term, we now have 6 coaches who can go out and recruit for the next 2 weeks while a bunch of other schools (Miami, UVA, Georgia, USCe, MD, etc) are twiddling their thumbs and hoping to wrap things up in a week or two.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6iSLloTusw
WOOOOOOOOOO
I believe you need to add Brewer to your list of undefeated QBs
Check it
So, should we expect that Galen Scott might come over from Memphis to complete the defensive staff? He was with Fuente at Illinois State but actually got to Memphis two years before Fuente did. He's DC now, but has only been DC for a year (and it didn't go well) and may be willing to take the demotion to be in a more stable situation.
Or he might stay on at Memphis is Odom is hired.
I think we have one less defensive staff member than under Frank.
that would be pretty bad for practice.
I think that is the likely answer. Likely as LB/AHC with a pay raise
I don't want to get profane, but this is frickin' sweet
"I don't want to get profane"
"Oh gee, what a nice guy!"
oh
With all the attrition seen with our DBs, this year Torrian has really gotten good play out of the young dudes. There are great things still to come from VT Football
This is huge.
Time to recruit Kendall Fuller, I think he has the talent to start right away in 2016.
That would make me happy.
Period. End.
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Would it make sense for Shane to move to the defensive side of the ball and become the outside linebackers coach? It'd allow Fuente to fully stock the offensive coaches as he sees fit,
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+1 for Pete & Pete.
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Because you can't forget about Petunia...
Now that's nostalgic with the Pete and Pete
...seriously...it's like I'm the only one with an eighth grader's mentality around here...
One of the best GIFs of all time.
It perfects my reaction to the thread title.
This is out-freakin'-standing! The three people that I wanted to stay the most, no matter who we got as coach - Foster, Gray, and Wiles - are all staying, plus we got an HC that seems like he's going to do great things for us. As was said above, this could not have gone any better at all.
Hold up, I thought Wiles was retiring...
Every Morning
Every Night.
I feel like I have gotten 4 hours of sleep the past 5 days.
What is taking them so long to name Stiney OC?
Cause Dickey is coming from Memphis. If he comes, he's getting the moniker Dickey-do
Plus Dickey-do has improved every run game of every team he's ever coached.
Dickey-Does!
I have the taste of bile in my mouth.
It never left but
DBU IS BACK!!
Serious question. why do so many Hokies on thekeyplay want Shane to stick around at VT? I want nothing to do with him. It's the nature of the beast in his business to be fired if you don't produce. He'll be fine and get a job somewhere else. I'm honestly baffled at the support for this guy to stick around and wonder if he'd have the support if his last name wasn't Beamer. No one needs to list every recruit he's ever pulled from a Richmond becuase I'm mostly talking about his coaching of RBs. The Hokes haven't had a great running game since DW left. Don't blame it on the O line either because it's not like Billy Hite ever had an amazing line. I hope he's successful in his future but let's just trust Fuente with the offensive coaches. Not trying to set a record for down votes but just curious for all the support when we just got a great offensive coach.
No one's saying Shane is an incredible RB coach. However, for a staff that's light on VA guys, having a proven recruiter on staff who knows the state, especially the big population areas, would be an asset. I know people are quick to point out the recent slip, but keep in mind that's also when we started losing and more was being said about Beamer's age and impending retirement. Shane's record recruiting for/against the SEC week in and week out as well as his success the first few years at VT has shown me that he could be very successful with Fuente closing the deal.
All that said, I don't really have strong feelings one way or the other about Shane. I'm sure he'll land on his feet, but I wouldn't be upset if he stuck around.
I gotta disagree about Shane helping "closing the deal" with recruits in Richmond. He was in charge of Richmond, which is 2nd to Hampton roads area for population. Last 4-5 years Richmond kids have been leaving the state in high numbers. Again I dont need someone to list the handful of richmond kids he's pulled because its such a large city it's expected that Virginia Tech gets one every once in awhile. I think Shane got comfortable becuase his pop was running the show and VT was such a consistent school in football. I think I speak for most Hokies when I say Im pumped to possibly have an offense that is on Par with our traditionaly strong defense.
Our 804 recruiting dropped off a cliff with the change from Cavanaugh to S. Beamer.
I believe the best thing for him and the best thing for us is that he moves on to another opportunity. Aside from a position at LOLUVA, I wish him the best I can possibly wish him.
But for his career to come full circle, to become the head coach at VT, I think he needs to find another opportunity and prove himself capable of taking on the challenges that our program would lay at his feet.
Much love. Move on. We'll meet again.
I heard he might be in charge of free kicks that occur in the 1st half. In other words, time to move on.
This just in.....UVA announces that it has requested for Mike London to rescind his resignation letter after realizing he is the only person that actually wants to coach the Boo Hoos. When London was reached for comment he said the idea of facing "Smash and Flash" in Blacksburg next year was not a thought he liked to entertain. So therefore he was gonna use his settlement check from UVA to buy season tickets to watch some real football put on by Fu & Fo Entertainment in Blacksburg.
Word is Craig Littlepage sent London a handwritten letter in the mail that said "YOU"!
Smash and Flash
Fu & Fo Entertainment
Well done...
Fuente, from Memphis, leading the Hokies in Tennessee to beat Tennessee for the first game of 2016.
I like the sound of that ^_^
FTFY
Doesn't really matter; they're both preseason games
I move that we retire this joke with the coach for whom it's intended
I think its interesting that there hasn't been confirmation of Wiles yet. I wonder if Fuente is hoping to poach another DL coach from somewhere else?
Curses, beaten by a few seconds...enjoy the following GIF instead:
EDIT: Not fast enough.
There's a really nasty echo in this thread...
Would have had you beaten had I not taken the time to check two other threads where comments might have been relevant. Curse my respect for the community guidelines! From now on, NOTHING BUT SPAM!
Haha, yeah, I checked other threads but I also tried to embed a tweet that VT Football and Hokiesports both removed. Then I found the original one.
And Emma gifs
I've never said I'm not a shameless attention seeker.
Yes there is. I was feeling pretty good about myself embedding an official VT tweet as I didn't see it posted yet. Then, BOOM, two previous comments with the exact same thing! My bad.
looks like wiles will also be retained per Bitter in his chat
Have we gotten any contract details on the assistant? Did Torrian get the raise we've often suggested he deserved?
No financial details released yet for anyone, AFAIK. Doubt we'll hear anything until the staff is actually finalized and we have numbers for everyone. That will be, at earliest, after Memphis' bowl game.