Articulating my excitement over the hiring of Justin Fuente

There are lots of posts on the forum about things people are excited about regarding the new head coach of the Virginia Tech Hokies. I'm not really sure that this post will offer anything new (and if it's deemed not to contribute to the conversation here, please, Joe or VTGuitarman, kick it to the curb) but my thoughts have been swirling since the announcement that my preferred choice was going to get the nod, and I want to lay out exactly why I'm excited for the future. Really, I'm doing this as much for myself as for the TKP community. I've been a bit of a mess over this whole thing. But anyway, here, in bullet form, is my own thought process on why I think we might be on the cusp of the greatest era of Virginia Tech football in history.

1. We finally have a coach who will place an equal (or greater) burden of responsibility for winning games on the offense. More than that, and unlike with Scot Loeffler, we have assurances that Fuente's offense works, and that he himself is an effective head coach.
2. Fuente was capable of fielding one of the most explosive offenses in college football with a roster full of 2- and 3-star recruits. While the defenses of the ACC are (presumably) superior to the defenses of the American conference, the inherent elevation in recruiting between a P5 and a G5 program should, in my mind, indicate that Fuente could be expected to have the same level of success at VT as at Memphis without a dramatic jump in recruiting rankings having to occur first.
3. However, given the resources and facilities of the Virginia Tech football program, if Fuente is capable of replicating his success at Memphis, the program might stand to witness a dramatic jump in recruiting rankings through a simple bandwagon effect. High profile recruits will flock to an explosive offense at VT just as they did to Clemson.
4. Foster is being retained. Beyond the simple feel-good aspect of that, the retention of Bud and all his position coaches (save the one who coached one position that was used about 30% of the time) means that the Lunch Pail defense remains intact. The effect of this will be that, while Fuente will install an offense that none of our Coastal opponents have ever seen before, our defense will retain a thorough familiarity of how to game plan for our conference foes. We will know what they're bringing at us, but they won't know what we're bringing at them. Until opposing DCs get up to speed on Fuente's variation of the spread, that puts us at an advantage.
5. While 2015 was undeniably a down year for the product Bud put on the field, I have always believed Foster's aggressive defense was best suited to playing with a lead. He now has a head coach and an offense that can provide him that lead regularly. I believe we are about to see the defense play with its ears pinned back more than we ever have.
6. The cupboards are stocked. Our greatest skill position of need was WR, and three of our four verbals at the position have reiterated their commitment. We have an unquestioned feature back, the offensive line showed big improvement and returns the core of the unit (not accounting for potential NFL draft attrition) and assuming Joshua Jackson does live up to his word now that Loeffler is definitely out, Fuente will have two young guns from which to hand pick his QB of the future (and mold from scratch). Meanwhile, on defense, there is more work to do, but DT looks solid, I don't believe the Ekanibal had a "leave early" type of season, and the young defensive backfield showed insane promise. As has been the trend of late, it seems to come down to the linebackers, but I have to admit, Motu showed flashed down the stretch. Get Settle and Sobchak in front of him and that might be the front-four anchor he needs to make the plays he needs to make. The overall point is, this shouldn't be a rebuild. The rebuild (so far as restocking the roster) has happened over the last three years.

In conclusion, we have a young, hungry head coach, whom we know can coach up an offense full of not the sexiest recruits, a Broyles Award winning defensive coordinator, talent at just about every position, and the element of surprise.

Is it Labor Day yet?