AD Whit Babcock Promises Uniform, Fundraising, Facilities Changes Coming in 2016

There have been some seismic shifts within Virginia Tech's athletic department in 2015, and to hear Athletic Director Whit Babcock tell it, there's more changes to come in the new year.

In just his second year on the job, Babcock already oversaw the most monumental change to the football program in Tech history — Frank Beamer's retirement — and he has some other big initiatives coming in his third year at the helm.

In an exclusive interview with The Key Play, Babcock revealed that further additions to the football staff, changes to each team's uniforms and alterations to the fundraising Hokie Club could all be unveiled in 2016.

Babcock managed to make what has to be the biggest decision of his career before the new year even dawned, picking Justin Fuente to succeed Beamer last month. Now, he's trying to do his best to get to know the new staff now that Fuente has filled out his roster of assistants.

Babcock said he started that process in earnest this morning, convening some of the rest of his leadership team to meet with the new staff for the first time. Much of the discussion centered around the program's "culture" and "what we're trying to build," but Babcock admits that expectations for the new season also came up.

"I don't know that I have any set number of wins," Babcock said. "We want to be competing and, ideally, winning our side of the division. Because if we win our side of the division, then we can have a chance to win the ACC, and when you win the ACC, more often than not, you're in the final four. So we didn't set any victory goals or squeeze them hard, but that's just what we expect at Virginia Tech."

In the 20-minute meeting, Babcock said he came away "impressed" with all of Fuente's new hires, even though he hasn't known them very long. But what remains up in the air is whether Fuente will look to add more support staff to the program beyond the two new recruiting positions Babcock added when he arrived in 2014.

"We talked some about that, he's gonna evaluate things and let us know," Babcock said. "And, shoot, within reason, if it's really gonna help us, yeah, we'll do all we can to find a way to do it."

"We won't add positions just to add them, but in the areas of recruiting and other things, potentially. But in general, Coach Fuente has been very impressed with what he's found here. That's a tribute to Coach Beamer. But every coach comes in and we give him a chance to evaluate it, and if he puts forth a good plan of why we need to do something differently or add someone here, I'm gonna do my best to deliver."

Babcock said financial considerations will, of course, drive part of that discussion, noting that the team ranks in the 30s among budgets of Power 5 teams, while ranking in the 20s of staff salaries overall.

"We have to out-culture and out-people people because we can't always outspend them, but spending responsibly, to be good in football and be good for our students, we'll try to do that too," Babcock said.

While he's quick to say that he doesn't like using Hokie Club funds to pay for salaries (preferring to spend them on "scholarships and student-athletes"), the success of the program's fundraising will undoubtedly play a role in any move Babcock makes going forward.

To that end, Babcock is encouraged by the Hokie Club's recent results, and is hoping to optimize its operations to build on its recent success.

"We've had two years in a row of continual upticks and stepping up in that," Babcock said. "One thing that our fanbase can look for in 2016 is some announcements about some tweaks and improvements we want to make to the Hokie Club starting in 2017, and that's one area we feel like we can take advantage of. We can keep the good of the Hokie Club, but modernize and do some new things there."

Few things fire up the fanbase — and get them to open their wallets — like new uniforms, and, in that arena, Babcock is prepared to deliver in 2016.

Babcock says the department worked closely with Nike's "Graphic Identity Group" last year to review Tech's logos and uniforms across each one of its teams, and have come up with some simple changes to the style. He adds that they've already ordered the new uniforms, placing the request in back in October, and they should be ready by June or July.

"In general, I think it will be more consistent, a cleaner look," Babcock said. "And we really worked with football to revamp all of our uniforms and all of our sports to make them look a lot more of the same....I just like a good, clean, sharp look and I know you'll see that coming up this fall."

He noted that the team will reveal a special uniform for the much-hyped Battle at Bristol in the coming months (his rating: "pretty cool"), and while he demurs on specifics for the rest of the new look for now, he did give a few hints.

"I think if you want a hint, I think you could say certainly, the oranges, the whites, the maroons, but something along the line of black or dark gray anthracite type stuff, that could be a possibility," Babcock said, noting that the team's all-black uniforms against North Carolina proved to be a big hit in the team's first foray into that color palette in some time. "Our standard, sharp, traditional VT logo will be on all helmets next season, same as this year."

But the uniforms won't be the only aspect of the team getting a facelift — Babcock notes work on the planned renovation of Merryman Center and the football team's offices in the Jamerson Athletic Center began just a few days ago.

"We raised, privately in gifts and pledges, around $2 million, and that will be spent on the entire second floor of Merryman and as it comes down the ramp to Jamerson and into the football offices and all those hallways," Babcock said. "We have great bones to the building, but we felt like we needed to freshen up a little bit, remodel a little bit, and that will help the look and brand of the place, but that will help recruiting as well."

Tech has seen a flurry of facility changes in recent years, but Babcock says that there are more on the way as well.

"In 2016, your readers and our fans can also expect to see our master facilities plan and where we're headed next," Babcock said. "We have great facilities here, but we don't want to rest on our laurels. I'm really excited by that. We'll do it responsibly, but something that keeps us at the forefront to train our young people in and recruit to."

Babcock is less certain about what fans can expect to see when it comes to 2016's TV schedule. He says he's "anxious" to hear from the ACC about its plans for VT next season, and expects to know more in his next meeting with league officials.

"I've not been told anything about a Friday game, I was told last year that we'd like rotate out of that and hopefully we will," Babcock said. "We put in our annual request to ideally play a Thursday night home, so other than that, right now we're just saying Saturdays and a Thursday night home game. We'll see what the ACC gives us."

And should the league come back with some flexibility in scheduling, Babcock knows just what he'll choose.

"Obviously TV and the ACC determine a lot of our kickoff times, maybe 10 or 11 out of 12, but when we have the ability to control them like we did this year for Furman, more often than not, we'll look at 3:30 p.m.," Babcock said.

But all that talk of football seems very far off indeed as Buzz Williams' basketball program makes noise in Blacksburg. Despite some dispiriting non-conference performances, the Hokies' win over fourth-ranked Virginia has the trajectory of the program looking much different than it did a week ago.

"It's always great to beat UVA, that makes us all smarter and better looking for a couple days," Babcock said. "But I really believe in what Buzz is doing. He's building a program and it's not a quick fix, and we may take a few lumps this year, but we may deliver a few as well. I was just really pleased to see the progress and improvement. And if we get better every year, it won't be long until we get to the NCAA tournament, and that's ultimately where we want to be. But it may be a two steps forward, one step back kind of thing."

With both the men's and women's basketball teams currently near the top of the ACC standings, Babcock wonders, like many fans, if he might ask John Swofford "Can we just stop now?" to keep the good feelings intact.

But, overall, with the wrestling team also earning some top national rankings, he feels more positive than ever about the direction of his department.

"We want to be the preeminent athletic department across the board in the ACC, and I don't believe that we need to shy away from aiming there," Babcock said. "We're not gonna be braggadocious about it, but that's where we're headed."

"Jim (Weaver) left a great foundation and I really like the way we're headed, but we really want to get every team ranked and every team in NCAA competition, and win ACC championships and national championships. But if we don't do it by graduating kids and playing by the rules, that would obviously not be the way to do it. I like it, I'm getting a feel for it, our coaches are really stepping up, and with our 22 sports, we love them all."