Hope everyone is doing well! Pete and I recently interviewed Chris Van Dine who works for Phil Steele's College Football Preview. His coverage responsibilities are the ACC, SEC, and Conference USA; seemed to know his stuff and in particular with respect to our Hokies.
Topics included (i) process behind drafting the preview, (ii) what factors into Phil's rankings, (iii) how uncertain QB situations factor into rankings, and (iv) some slated / potential VT match-ups. We hope you find it interesting.
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Comments
I always enjoy the Phil Steele previews. Nice interview for a "behind the scenes" explanation.
According to his website, his preview magazine shipped last week. I'm not very patiently waiting for mine to arrive.
Update: Phil Steele's CFB Preview arrived! His preseason rank has us @ 25, too. He's got us playing Kentucky in the Music City Bowl.
He's bullish on Bud returning 7 starters, but thinks we may end up with less ppg than our 2015 squad (31.0 ppg).
FINALLY I've wanted to go to that bowl game for ages.
If it meant we had to stomp Alabama again I'd be good with it.
Nashville is an amazing town. My little sister just graduated from Lipscomb and we had a ton of fun exploring Nashville and seeing live music on Broadway.
Since she's got a job lined up there and will likely stay long-term, I'm hopeful that VT will end up there someday soon!
I would really like to see the Music City Bowl pony up some $$$ and jump a few bowls in the pecking order. Too many of the top ACC bowls are in FL.
On the other hand, Florida isn't too bad in December.
You misspelled, El Paso, Detroit, MD, NY.
I think you misspelled Pasadena, New Orleans, Miami Gardens, Arlington, Glendale, and Atlanta.
EDIT: Of course, I'm talking about places we DO want to go...
If your going to let teams without a winning record go to a bowl game, let them go to crappy destination. Hopefully we don't have another dip in w/l any time soon. I get what you are saying though - that tier system of bowls can really screw a team. Really wish the ACC would: 1. Only count ACC record for bowl selection order. 2. Get rid of the tier system. 3. Work out more deals to trade bowls with other conferences on a rotating basis. to keep destinations fresh and interesting.
As much as I'd love it, it doesn't really make sense for the Music City Bowl to do that though.
Just by the virtue of having the SEC tie-in, they make plenty of money and bring in more than enough fans. They don't need the upper-tier ACC teams to make money.
When you look at it from a business perspective, there's not much incentive. Look at the teams the last 5 years:
Tennessee-Nebraska
Texas A&M-Louisville
LSU-Notre Dame
Ole Miss-Georgia Tech
Vanderbilt-NC State
Of those 5 SEC teams, Vandy is probably the lowest profile name, but they're based in Nashville anyway so selling tickets probably wasn't an issue. In fact, looking at attendance figures the lowest attended game in the last ten years was A&M-L'ville with just over 50,000 fans. Not bad at all.