I woke up Sunday morning and stared at the ceiling, trying to recall the strangest dream. Virginia Tech lost to Old Dominion. In football. Weird, right?
Believe it or not, I slept pretty well up until I inadvertently woke up sometime around 5 AM. It was that moment in the night where you suddenly become alert and your mind begins racing through a litany of mental hang-ups and daily tasks to complete. I used to be able to shrug these types of moments off and fall back asleep. But as I've gotten older, I've had a harder and harder time shutting off the thought faucet, allowing the drip-drip-drip to progress into a full on monologue. So while I didn't sit down in front of my computer until early Sunday afternoon, I've essentially been hate writing this column in my head since the early morning hours.
Saturday's performance by the Hokies was abysmal. From the coaching staff to the players, it was one of the most embarrassing games I've ever watched from a Virginia Tech side. When Tech lost to JMU in 2010, you could at least point to the sloppy conditions and the five days of preparation coming off a gut wrenching loss to Boise State. There are no excuses for the loss to ODU.
The "road" game was in name only; half the stadium appeared to be clad in orange and maroon, meaning the home team had roughly 10,000 supporters. Wallace Wade is a more hostile environment than that. I'm not buying that the unexpected bye week affected the team's rhythm. Nor do I support the notion that this team was caught looking ahead to Duke and/or Notre Dame. Too many guys were playing in front of their friends and families to look past Saturday.
You only lose games like this if everything goes wrong. Catastrophically wrong. Losses like Tech's don't occur because of one error or one area of poor play. There has to be a comprehensive breakdown, from the players on the field to the coaches on the sideline. The staff was quick to take the blame in the post game press conference, and understandably so. At the end of the day, they're responsible for preparing the team and putting them in positions to succeed. With that being said, the players are ultimately the ones responsible executing on the field.
As the since-dismissed Trevon Hill reminded everyone on Twitter Sunday afternoon, ODU's 632 yards of total offense were the most surrendered by a Bud Foster defense.
Trevon Hill's new profile picture is interesting to say the least in light of this news. pic.twitter.com/iIGtJfNkb7— Bryan Fischer (@BryanDFischer) September 23, 2018
The four unsportsmanlike penalties were infuriating, especially against a team you're clearly more talented than. And the near constant lack of execution was so startling, I began to openly wonder if the team had gone on an all-night bender at the local strip joint — where they discovered that their Sex Ed teacher works at said establishment — to cheer up their injured and depressed friend. (You've got to admit, the Varsity Blues parallels are interesting). So while I appreciate the seppuku performed by Justin Fuente and Bud Foster after the loss, it was a team effort.
Losses like these make you question everything you thought you knew about a team. Looking back at past performances, it's hard to rationalize a loss like this. The same Hokies team that dominated Florida State on Labor Day night in front of a national audience was humiliated by Old Dominion on a TV network many people don't even get. We've since learned that the Seminoles of 2018 are not their colleagues from 1999. But as fans, people tend to rationalize performances in their team's favor. In other words: Sure, Florida State is bad this season, but it was the Hokies' Week One beat down that sent them on their middling path. After Saturday's dud in Norfolk, one has to wonder how bad Florida State really is.
Lest we forget, it was only a few weeks ago, in the waning days of preseason camp, that many feared the trip to ODU. Tech fans were unsure what to expect from an inexperienced defense and an offense that struggled down the stretch in 2017. Two wins against sub-par teams seems to have caused many to forget about the myriad challenges facing the Hokies. Justin Fuente seems to think that his players bought in to their (surprisingly high) #13 ranking, noting:
"I told them, 'I liked you guys a lot better when everybody told you that you were terrible. Everybody told you that you didn't have a chance to win the first game, and all you did was work your tails off. And then now, we get to feeling all good about ourselves and we get brought back down to earth.' We got what we deserved."
To review from a slightly different perspective: If we anticipated that the 2018 season would be filled with some ups and downs and remained cognizant of Tech shortcomings even after the Florida State win, then why was this loss particularly frustrating? The simple answer is because a program like Virginia Tech shouldn't be losing to one like Old Dominion. But I think there's more to it than that. I can only speak for myself, but the waning moments of the fourth quarter were filled with feelings of embarrassment, dejection and enmity. Let's keep in mind, the season is not lost — Tech is still 1-0 in the ACC, and the conference, sans Clemson, isn't exactly lighting the college football world on fire.
Maybe this particular bout of frustration stems from the fact that Tech has now managed to lose to both JMU and ODU during a stretch of 14 consecutive wins over the Hoos. Or maybe, deep down, it feels like the Karma Police arrested us for our relentless mockery of UVa's loss to a #16 seed in the NCAA tournament.
To be honest, I really don't have an answer. I'm sure it's a combination of factors, including youth, arrogance and an unexpected loss of momentum. Looking at it a bit deeper, the current frustration is the prime consequence of fandom. The Hokies won a game in Tallahassee many believed they were destined to lose. The new faces were playing at a remarkably high level. There was suddenly an abundance of size, speed, athleticism and talent. The Coastal looked winnable. Whether we were aware of it or not — no matter how many times we reminded ourselves of this team's flaws — deep down, there was a growing sense of hope.
After a long offseason filled with tempered expectations and little talk of a realistic division title challenge, the Hokies looked legit. To quote Shawshank, "Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane."
One of the best pieces of parenting advice I have received is to "aim low." It's human nature to build up expectations for outings, birthday parties and vacations. Over time, you learn that nothing ever goes as planned: kids blow out of their diapers at the worst possible times; the old man dressed as Santa Claus is terrifying; and there's a 15% chance that they'll actually enjoy the lovies, bottles and glider that you spent a small fortune on. Much like sports, kids are fickle and wildly unpredictable. But if you temper your expectations, always mindful of Murphy's Law, then you'll regularly find yourself pleasantly surprised and rarely disappointed.
Maybe #AimLow should be the new motivational hashtag for the Tech fanbase. It could be an interesting coping mechanism.
Let's not confuse this for a slight. There's a lot of football left to play, and this team can still challenge for the Coastal. This was always going to be a trying season for Hokies fans, one filled with a lot of bumps in the road. Now that Tech managed to lose to a team it should have easily dispatched, are should the rest of the season be phoned in? Of course not. Take it as a learning experience, much like the coaches and players will. You might be pleasantly surprised with how things work out.
Comments
Time to go 1-0 this week.
LET'S GO...
HOKIES!
HOKIES!
Hopefully this painful wake-up call will get them fired up and we give it good and hard to the dookies this weekend. Let's Go, HOKIES!
Honestly, this one does not sting as much as JMU did. I knew this team was going to trip up at some point, the youth on defense was going to show, it was just a matter of when. At least this time I wasn't soaking wet while watching it happen.
I don't know. We knew the defense was young and inexperiened but we also expected the offense to carry more weight and take a step forward. But the offense really hasn't done anything outside of the first drive of the FSU game.
re:
The offense put up 35 points. You can justifiable argue that they left points on the field; that better play calling by the offense could have pulled out the game; that blocks were missed; that player X should have made a different read; but I disagree that the offense hasn't done anything. That many points should have been enough.
The loss was on the defense. In retrospect, the ECU cancellation that gave the team to time to work on "player development" might have been better spent on preparing for the ODU game, but I would like everyone to remember this site was full of folks picking the Hokies to win by at least 4 touchdowns and expecting the subs to be in early in the second half. I think all of us were looking past ODU and we paid for it. The team needs to put this embarrassment behind the and get ready for Duke.
Go HOKIES!
+1. The worst Bud Foster defense should be able to hold ODU to under 35 points. It's not like ODU is a Tulsa, or some other high powered non-P5 offense.
Total yards and even total points for this game was deceptive. Watching the game, we either scored or we went 3-and-out (or thew INT). The inability to sustain drives, flip the field, was a problem. Our execution, even on scoring drives was atrocious. JJ's throws in particular were awful. On the opening drive in the 2nd half, we completed one pass, it was a converted 3rd down, but should have been an easy completion. Instead, it bounced off the turf as Savoy was pulling it in. Honestly, the refs probably shouldn't have called it a catch and the punt team should have come out. Instead, we scored. We also scored on a 4th down.
The defense, esp the secondary was horrible. But the QB, WR, and OL play was equally bad.
Offense put up 600 yards against ODU and 586 against W&M. Not stellar opposition, sure, but that's definitely not nothing.
Of course it is not nothing, but just like everything in life reality is somewhere in the middle. VT offense just wasn't good enough. Whether you want to say that makes it a "bad" performance is up to your own subjectivity. Personally, I thought it was a bad performance. We got lots of points from huge plays and not many from long sustained drives. Offense struggled to convert on first and got taken off the field when it was clear that our defense was a liability and was going to get shredded every possession.
Offense simply hasn't been good enough to call it anything more than mediocre so far this year.
You must not live in the 757. Were going to have to listen to this crap for years.
Yep, probably decades.
Are you kidding? I have cousins in New Jersey giving me crapp on Facebook about this game.
well there's your problem right there.
No I do not. But the other reason JMU stings more is that we haven't played them since 2010. We will get our chance at revenge against ODU over the next couple of years.
i live in the 904 and i still hear about JMU. im sure this one wont go anyway any time soon here either.... all my FSU buds made sure to let me know about it like they were undercover wearing ODU uniforms in the game or something.
I mean that's an easy rebuttal, Tech spanked their ass.
I'm onboard with #AimLow. Seems way more accurate and fitting that #HardSmartTough, since nothing in that game exemplified that mantra.
I also think this team severely lacks sufficient leadership, and no one stepped up to rally the troops when the going got tough. Can't have your QB1 sitting to himself sulking after a bad series (has been a recurring theme now), can't have your defense sitting there heads down and clueless after giving up another score. Gut check time for this team. Saturday wasn't just bad, or a disappointment; it was flat out unacceptable for VT football.
He does talk to Brady a lot I heard
Alright, even I can find this absolutely friggin hilarious. Thx for the laughs jpoole. Feeling better already.
That's the sneaky worst part of this is I feel like I can't mock the UMBC win anymore. This ODU loss happened too close to it and, if not equally embarrassing, is pretty close.
just go talk with a LOLUVa fan for 5 minutes and you'll be itching to drop the UMBC loss on them again.
False. You can't mock it right now. Give it until basketball season. There have been bigger upsets in college football, but only once has a #16 seed beaten a #1 (and the #1 overall at that). Every NCAA tourney for the rest of time will mention UMBC over uva. This loss for us is awful and embarrassing, but nowhere near as historic.
We lost to a team that had the biggest point spread in CFB, this is fairly demeaning. A team that had a 1.8% chance of winning drug our ass for 60 minutes, this still hurts.
Hurts like hell and I don't think I'll ever get over it. Thinking of the UMBC upset will always make me smile, because that one is all-time historic. Likely the biggest upset in college basketball history, other than maybe Chaminade.
I'm just trying to add perspective. This loss sucks hard (I've never had a worse time attending a game) and will be part of ESPN graphics for a long time, but it will never be as famous or as as big of a deal as #16 over #1.
There is no explaining away this loss. This is a game that you don't lose. Period, you don't lose this game. Even if you sleepwalk through the motions, our talent and depth dwarfs what they got. This is a game that only teams with that are seriously broken to the core lose, and we lost by 14.
Nationally, we our prestige won't recover from this for at least another season. Even if we won out, "but this team lost to 0-3 ODU"... Right now Andy Bitter is using the fact we were preseason ranked to say why preseason rankings need to be abolished. He's taking issue with anyone willing to throw us a vote in the polls, and he's going down the list of teams that deserve it over us. And he's our beat writer. This loss ruined our reputation for a while and likely permanently damaged our ability to recruit the 757 region going forward.
No amount of 'we knew this would be a trying year' will make this feel better. We had a week and a half to prepare for this one and we blew it.
Did UF losing to Georgia Southern ruin them? UNLV Tom Howard? Michigan to App state? Tech to Temple?
Considering where those programs were before those losses to where they are now, yep. Only one I'd day didn't was Tech vs Temple and that was only because MV7 was redshirting. But if you had included JMU, given how the team collapsed after 2010, I'd say that one had long term impact.
Losing to JMU wasn't what caused us to take a nose dive over 2 years after the fact. After the JMU loss, we still made two straight BCS bowl games.
Yes, I truly believe that losing to a bad team in our best recruiting hotbed will have lasting effects. Will we EVER get over it? Probably, but it won't be soon......
We don't have the blue blood status of Michigan or Florida to power through embarrassing losses. And Michigan actually did start sucking not lonv after the loss. Florida too.
I'm not sure Michigan has ever fully rebounded from App St. Sure they've been recruiting well and flashed here and there, but that game and season ended up seeing long-time coach Lloyd Carr stepping down and that program taking a significant dive from truly elite to backseat in the Big 10 to Ohio State and even MSU most years.
Did we quit when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?
Always leg for animal house!
Well, he's not wrong. It was obvious after FSU had to rally to beat Samford in the 4th quarter that our ranking was bullshit. We were given way too much benefit of the doubt for beating a team with a lot of hype and no credentials. But once the pollsters put us there after week one, they couldn't drop us significantly after it became apparent FSU wasn't the signature win everyone thought it was, lest they admit the level of bullshit involved in preseason and early season polls.
This didn't permanently damage our 757 recruiting. Sure it sucks, and yes nationally we aren't relevant anymore, but one game doesn't do that to a program.
We've lost to 2 programs in VA (who we recruit against to a certain extent) that we should NEVER lose to. Yes it does damage it. A LOT
ODU and JMU are not recruiting the same scholarship kids as Tech.
That's missing the forest for the trees.
We already have had a rough time of it in the 757, and now we went and played a game out there for recruiting purposes and allowed a 0-3 program with losses to FIU, Charlotte, and a blowout 42 point loss to Liberty dictate play in every phase of the game en route to a 12 point win. Every coach in the 757 was paying attention to that game, because we wanted them to, and we absolutely blew it. This isn't going to hurt our chance against JMU and ODU for recruits, but you know who it does? The likes of UNC, who even when their team is in shambles finds a way to blast them by 30 last year. The likes of Penn St, Alabama, Clemson, etc who don't allow themselves to lose that game. Sure Penn St went to OT against App, but they found a way to gut out a win. We couldn't do that, and even worse, the coaches lost control of the team through the countless personal foul and unsportsmanlike conduct penalties over the course of the 2nd half. That's where its going to hurt us, and that's where we are going to have the hardest time regaining any kind of foothold. We already had it tough there, and we just made it worse.
First that wasn't the assertion he made, he said we recruit against JMU and ODU. Second exactly look how bad UNC is and yet still recruits. Losing a game isn't going to down a program either in recruiting or any other fashion.
The point is that the 757 recruits who choose UNC, Penn state, Clemson etc who were at the game witnessed the worst hokie loss in almost a decade. The ODU trip was supposed to showcase how Virginia Tech was 'back', and attempt to keep the 757 kids who leave OOS.
Instead, we gave them another reason to choose another school. UNC still pick up 757 kids when they're bad. We struggle with that as well. And now we've made it that much worse.
Agreed. We spent a Saturday putting bows on all the recruiting gifts we plan on passing out to the region.
No one being recruited by those schools was there unless they are fans of ODU
ODU officials announced Saturday's home game with Virginia Tech sold out, and that it did so without putting any single-game tickets on sale. All tickets went to ODU season-ticket holders and students, in addition to the nearly 2,000 sold by Virginia Tech.
I said "to a certain extent". I agree with the responses above (and below). It hurts our recruiting in the region against in-state and out-of-state schools
ODU may not recruit against us now. But why are you so sure that their program will not snowball into something much bigger? That happens all the time. UCF is example #1. Florida, FSU, and Miami didn't have to worry about UCF until they did.
What we did Saturday was gift wrap ODU a potentially program-building win. If ODU gets even a little bigger, we are going to have to worry, and not just about an occasional recruit being grabbed.
Good, I hope they built a great, successful program.
I don't want to play easy games, I want the teams we beat to win every game that isn't against us. I want entertaining football where our players are challenged and rise to the occasion.
I'm glad we beat W&M two weeks ago, but that isn't a satisfying game. I want last second victories and goal line stands and finger tip catches. I want "Tyrod did it Mikey" and "Miami wants to talk about it".
I don't want to stumble into the playoff because we are surrounded by mediocrity, but because we worked harder and played smarter and repsonded tougher.
You must have a bigger liquor cabinet than I do.
VT had given me over 30 years of last second victories (and defeats) and I could really use fewer of them, haha!
UCF is the largest university in the country in one of the most desirable states to live in, its an outlier. Honestly Liberty worries me more with their endless supply of money and nationwide reach.
Enrollment size doesn't matter. I think the largest university in VA is George Mason. What matters is program potential. ODU is the only FBS program in the tidewater. It is a sleeping giant that we are helping to wake up. VT had no business playing this game in the first place.
Ditto on Liberty.
This. We're not going to lose recruits to ODU, but this just makes it that much easier for Penn St and everyone else to pluck through the 757 at will.
Agreed. Most ODU grads and supposed fans in Hampton Roads are still fair-weather fans. I have yet to meet a diehard ODU football fan. The win gives them ammo to talk crap but beyond that, they dont have much. It's still a rough loss to take on our end but it's the easier recruiting for schools like Penn St and Clemson that are the big issues.
Their football program hasn't existed long enough for any "diehard" fans to exist yet.
Agreed somewhat since it started back in 2009 but a fan base and monetary benefit of it does have an effect on things like that. My point was still just agreeing that ODU isnt the threat in recruiting.
I love bitter, but anyone who takes the "preseason polls should be abolished" stance because sometimes teams are overrated loses a lot of credibility.
Just a breather of reminding that
Teams that got the Death Penalty from the NCAA
Penn State #9 on primetime this week vs
#4 Ohio State (The Urban Myer death Penalty of BS)
Miami see last year
SMU - See last few years
SMU is the only "death penalty" of the bunch. Everyone else got a relative slap on the wrist.
Penn state wasnt the easiest sell. They lost To UVA
Penn St came out of that thing with more money and more funding than they did going into it. Donations went up and their community rallied around those that enabled pedophilia. They used it to increase their recruiting footprint, revamped their recruiting gameplan, poured money into their facilities, and now they're stronger than ever.
Which, hey I guess harboring and covering up a coach as he performed acts that resulted in 45 convictions of sexual abuse made it all worth it, as long as the football program remained strong.
Nothing to do with the current conversation, but Dammit Alum!! You HAD to go and put whatever the hell that new god awful mascot is as your avi!!
You know it!
I was laughing at this earlier when I saw it on twitter. Now there is not chance of me being able to take you serious when it is your avatar hahahaha. That thing is hilarious.
Ahh see your mistake was taking anything I had to say previously seriously
Opioid addiction is no laughing matter. Unless you are the Flyers mascot.
He must've been a long-time fan, we just didn't know it. ;^)
Sure but this is a national trend. As I've said multiple times, it's not about recruiting the state anymore.
From 2016
I never thought I'd be more hopeful for the Redskins season than the Hokies....
As a lifelong disillusioned Skins fan, I totally get this.
Where were the leaders to rally the troops? I highly doubt that Josh Jackson plays with any leadership in practice. His body language and lack of interest is so frustrating to see on the sidelines. The lack of speed and decision making also tells me he needs more time to develop. Why has he been our QB1 for this long?
I didn't get to watch the whole game yet but seeing Larussa just take 3 steps and successfully throw up jump balls is disturbing.
He wasn't supposed to be. Jerod Evans was supposed to be QB1 last year, and it was supposed to be up for grabs this year.
Man I miss Evans. Talk about a QB that played with swagger.
With the amount of talent we had on defense, last season would've been fun if Evans was taking the snaps. The play calling from Corny seemed to make a lot more sense with a qb who is a run threat.
I blame my fiance... She washed my lucky game day shirt without me knowing....
We're still Hokies. It sucks, but we're still in the ACC race. It'll hurt for a good while, it sucks for recruiting, but this too shall pass. All of us (except for FifthFuller) pretty much wrote this season up to be a rebuilding year. We didnt expect to lose this one, but how very Virginia Tech of us to... So screw it, lets restock up the bourbon we all consumed in heavy amounts this weekend and BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF DUKE.
Please dont tell her I'm blaming her....
Go damn Hokies.
Call it off. /s, possibly
Damn..Sorry that it won't work out between y'all
Honestly I dont blame her... the last time that shirt got washed was after GT 2016.... (dont freak out, it only gets worn if I'm around the house watching a game. It's not an everyday kind of shirt)
But still.... that's THE GAMEDAY lucky shirt....
It is actually my fault: I brought my Virginia Tech flag inside during storm prep so it would not get ripped off the front of the house and failed to return it to its place of honor prior to the game. I sincerely apologize to Hokies everywhere for this egregious error.
You just didn't take the game seriously enough.
There was a lot of that going on.
I was actually in downtown Blacksburg with Danny Coale Is My Spirit Animal and mentioned something about it and that if we lost, we know who to blame.
I, too, had a hand in this. Every time we have a family gathering in the fall, Tech loses. JMU, Cincy 2012, and now ODU. Sorry guys.
Wait JMU and ODU were your fault? Never get near a family member burning football season again.
Saturday was the kind of game that will make people check out of the program for awhile....and could you honestly blame them if they did? However, as 2010 showed us, it really is silly to write off the entire season based on one loss (no matter how historic) so let's see how these guys respond. Personally, this Duke game will tell me more about the current state of Virginia Tech Football than the loss this past weekend.
Weird, I don't remember the last time during the season, that we've had two weeks in a row without football. Can't wait til our guys finally take the field again.
Looks like somebody discovered alcohol...
This game just piles on the offseason woes...shoulda coulda woulda won't win games. We need some leaders to step up.
As stale and stagnant as the offense looked, aside from a few big plays, they put up 35 points. 35 should be enough to beat ODU every day of the week.
I think ODU spent the whole off season with this game circled on their calendar, planning and prepping for it, while VT was looking ahead to Duke
edit: I read "offseason woes" as "offensive woes"....my my reply to you doesn't make a whole lot of sense, lol
But at some point, even after we snap out of "looking ahead", we had 4 quarters to adjust and we didn't. We were almost never out of the game.
If this were an ACC team, I'd buy that, but I'm having a REALLY hard time understanding how we could get out of a jam on talent differential alone....
I texted a friend this: 'While our defense played absolutely abysmal, it further proves that if our offense needs to step up in a shootout, we are not capable, i.e. Oklahoma State.'
Plenty of blame all around, but we didn't step up enough on offense when it was going to be the only way we won that game given the trends on defense.
Now, on to Duke.
I've said this before, but I will say it again:
Respectfully, the VT Offense only put 35 points on ODU whereas Liberty hanged 52 points on ODU in week one. Fellow Hokie, this was a complete failure by the entire team. VT should always be able to score more points than Liberty when they play a common opponent. Good lord we suck...
No doubt, the defense was dreadful, especially in the fourth quarter. Nobody is denying that. However, the offense scored 14 points in the first half on ODU, and one of those touchdowns was an improbable 87 yard touchdown by our power back. So we had ONE legitimate scoring drive against ODU in 30 minutes of football, that is so completely unacceptable it's difficult to understand how that could have possibly happened.
And in the second half, we scored another long TD because the CB on Hazelton fell down as the pass was thrown, meaning over the course of the game against ODU, we only had 3 legitimate drives against a team that gave up 52 to Liberty.
Agreed. What if our offense hadn't stalled out continually and came out and put the game away in the first half? Doubt starts to creep into ODU's minds, they take more risks, and just maybe we pull away with a win even with the D struggling. D was abysmal, no doubt. But the offense is not capable of leading this team to victory when it matters most. This is equally as disappointing as what we saw from the D.
Really the only time this offense has carried the D when they were struggling was the ACCCG vs Clemson, and 80-90 percent of that was Jerod Evans just saying FTS and going beast mode. This offense is still a work in progress and frankly not to the level of efficiency it should/needs to be. Playcalling is also still atrocious at times.
I'm hoping that Willis becomes Jerod 2.0 and shows some fiery leadership in getting this team going against Duke.
So people are comparing this to 2010 and JMU, but let's be real here: that team had a leader the team rallied around in Tyrod.
I'm not in the anti-JJ crowd, but he just doesn't appear to have the leadership qualities this team needs right now on offense (especially after his first INT where he sat and stared at his feet looking dejected).
In fact, the only person I saw look even remotely close to a leader in that game on Saturday was Reggie Floyd after Houshon Gaines' personal foul.
Somebody needs to step up.
I am pretty sure his injury was a tough one and we will need someone else to step up. That said, I agree that he did not look like a leader out there.
With the JMU season parallels - at least on other sports boards I frequent - even the diehard CFB fans remember us losing to JMU. They don't recall we won the ACC that year. Losses like this, JMU, Wake, linger and hurt the program for years. There is zero excuse for losing a game like this, even if you thought the team 'might slip up' at some point. Regardless of circumstance, we should win this game 100 times out of 100.
The Wake game is brought up here more than anywhere else and I kind of wish it would stop. We lost to a conference team. It was ugly, but we lost. Remember Wake was won the Atlantic division and gone to bowls.
The JMU had a more lasting impact.
There's a reason for that
Wake beat
Gardner Webb
Army
VT
One of those isnt like the other.
If VT had won Wake would have been 2-10
0-8 in ACC games
This is my first comment on any forum, in any thread since what I'll now refer to as Black Saturday, and I'm still speechless. What I saw on that field did not resemble anything like a P-5 program in the ascension phase of a rebuild, and did not even look like a bottom-of-the-barrel ACC team... and that's a pretty low floor these days. There is no way this does not have a lasting impact on the program, how severe that impact is depends on how the team responds and performs the rest of the year. Prepare, play, and win the "easier" games (no game should be considered "easy", now) and win 1 more quality game, and the impact may certainly be curbed to nothing more that an internet meme, UVA-shit talk fodder, and a lost recruit or three. If, however, we cannot rebound and lose 3-5 more games, lose to UVA and/or miss bowl season, then this program is in a lot of trouble, and I don't mean trouble like Beamer's last couple of seasons. Image means a lot in college football, and the damage that was done to VTs image will take a lot of work to recover from, of that there is no doubt. The question is, how long will it take?
Are we talking end of Bill Dooley's dismissal NCAA infractions & Beamer's 1st 6 seasons program damaging kind of trouble or the entire 1970s program damaging kind of trouble??
Our relative position in the college football world isn't even comparable to what it was in those times. So, my take is focused on what the loss has the potential to do to the program now given it's current position as a respectable P-5 program, not where things might have sat in those days gone by, bc we had never achieved the level of success that we have since.
Am I the only person who doesn't think this will hurt our recruiting that much? I mean yeah the loss is very embarrassing and it happened in the 757 but for one thing I don't think that many recruits were there. The stadium isn't that big.
Second point: are kids really going to bail on the premier football school in the state because of this one loss? You never know what can happen. As disheartened and confused as I am by this loss, we literally still have a chance to win the coastal THIS YEAR.
If this hurts recruiting, I'd say it hurts because we lost to a sub par team, not because it happened to be ODU and in the 757.
I'm upset. I'm disappointed. But I'm no chicken little and I'll be in Durham Saturday to watch the righting of the ship.
#1-0
Unfortunately I believe the top 10 in state recruits will continue to go out of state.
Agreed on both: Virginia Tech isn't "elite" -here's to hoping that someday we can say that. But if we break in to the top 10 recruiting classes, that would be short of a miracle.
Some kids wanna travel, some kids like the bigger-branded schools, some just get a better recruiter than Tech's. The goal is to find the right personnel overall and keep winning. The bigger schools (save for some SEC states' schools and maybe Miami) can easily go through a list of kids "they couldn't keep from in-state" but they compile a pretty good roster. I think CFJ is making strides and those kids will decide based on a million factors.
But what-do-I-know; I'm just a Firewall Engineer...
I think the announcers said it was the best recruiting day the school had ever had. over 100 request for tickets from recruits. It helps ODU in recruiting against JMU or Memphis or Wake Forest
Of the top 10 recruits in VA 3 are commited to penn State
2 are staying in-state and going to VT
Win or lose this should still be a positive for recruiting. And we should sign up for another round of home and home. Alternate with JMU home and home. You want to sell a program over Penn State or Auburn, the other Va recruit stealer....sell players something they cant get. Playing a game back in town. Penn State isnt playing in VA
This team and coaching staff better wake up fast because Duke is playing outstanding football right now. We lost, or rather we got beat by ODU, but let's move on. We may have found a QB who plays with fire in his heart. It's one loss, a bad one, but still a non-conference loss. Learn from it. Go Hokies!!
Was I the only one watching that last touchdown, and felt like we had it perfectly defended, but the QB dropped a ball right into a double covered WR and he caught the ball with 2 guys draped on him?
I'm chalking this up to ODU just having a day. They earned that W.
It was an amazingly well placed ball - inch in either direction and he doesn't make that catch.
Honestly, living in the 757 and having cousins that went to ODU, I have been to and watched a bunch of ODU games this year. I watched all of the Charlotte game. That was not even remotely close to the same team that played Charlotte.
#7, #9, Cox and Larussa had epic days. They were unstoppable in the 4th quarter. I dont see how Larussa plays like that in practice and Stevie Williams was still getting the start. They looked anemic against Charlotte.
Honestly, I see ODU winning 1 or 2 more games. Either that or they played horrible their first 3 games, I dont know, that 4th quarter they looked like the #13 team not us. They looked like William and Mary would smoke them the week before.
That RB looked like Jerome Bettis, shedding tackles left and right.
They just played a perfect game.
The Charlotte game was first thought to be on saturday, then canceled, then given a days noticed to be the next day. Its hard to use that as a comparison.
Amazing what changing up a struggling QB can do
ODU was horrible against Liberty and then they played a little better each of the next two weeks. This week they had some players in the zone, and they played the game of their lives.
VT came in ready to have some fun and put on a show. Like Fuente said, our team found themselves in an unexpected competitive game and we reacted badly.
There was a 1.8% chance of this happening. That means it happens about once every 55 games. IT HAPPENS.
We MUST stay reasonable! Orange jerseys should be burned. All fall weddings should be canceled. Lucky jersey washing fiancé's should be dumped.
I can't wait to watch Virginia Tech football this Saturday.
In order for ODU to even have "a day" we have to be terrible. It's not like we played UNC where they have the talent there to compete if they put it all together. This was a 0-3 ODU that was ranked behind 50+ FCS teams in the statistical rankings.
this loss hurt us x10. it hurts in recruiting. as mentioned early, we had every coach, recruit, and anyone with any say so watching us play this game because we wanted them too. 2ndly 3 days before a big DRIVE FOR 25 push you just lost a TON of donors. im still going to donate the same as I was before but if you don't think a ton of fans will decide there is a better place for their money to go after that loss your kidding yourself. people want to see the reward for their investment. that was just not a good look for us at all. not on a national scale, an acc scale, a VA scale, a 757 scale, or any other scale. it may only take a week for fans, players, and coaches to recover going 1-0 next week will erase a lot for those folks but this set the Program back for atleast 2 seasons. we would have to really be elite playoff team next year to make this memory not last.
Couldn't agree more. I'm still going to give my normal monthly donation, but the extra I was considering tomorrow will now be spent elsewhere. Maybe it's wrong, maybe it's not, and everyone will respond in their own way and let's all respect each other's decisions, but I can't bring myself reward that performance with cold hard cash... maybe later, but it's too soon.
Because this loss proves what, exactly?
I'll be donating tomorrow, because this team needs all the help it can get.
Let your conscience be your guide.
I don't disagree, but I'm still at the point where I have to make decisions about where my money is spent. Again, I will continue to donate my usual amount, but until I see that donations are part of an overall improving program, I'll have to keep them at that level.
And regardless of what the loss may or may not mean for the season, it's certainly not an indicator of an ascending program.
I think the point is that the money is needed to do the things that ascend a program. I understand your point, but you're not thinking about it the right way IMO. It's not rewarding a terrible performance but investing into the program to make sure it doesn't happen again. That's why I'm upping my contributions at least.
I do invest in it. But this isn't a case of "we need more money to get over the [insert team] hump". This game was far below our standards. Just a different lens, I suppose. But I can't give more than what I'm currently giving after that performance, until I see what this coaching staff does to respond. If this program needs more money to ensure we never lose to fucking ODU again then we're way worse off than any of us thought.
Fair enough. This is a true test, to see how they rally the team.
i dont think VT is going to Bus in a whole bunch of recruits. generally you go on campus for the weekend or day of but on campus of the school. Recruiting weekend for VT is ND game,Miami game. Every weeknd of a home game. Recruits that Tech is recruiting were making other visits. This week they will be at Penn State to see that atmosphere. Tech's win or Loss vs Duke/ODU wont be the 1st thing on many of thier minds.
Donors donate because they like Tech and the future of Tech.
You want more fans to donate, connect with them.
Never play Austin Pea. Play in state at ODU or JMU. VT fans can attend a game in thier own backyard and feel a connection. they may not buy season tickets or come to every game due to the distance but once every 2 years they get a home game and reminded to support Tech maybe just contributing a few dollars every year. or buying a new jersy for the game.
Listening (unable to watch...fortunately) to the VT-ODU game reminded me of 2010-11 VT-Stanford bowl game second half, x2. One of the things that I've always enjoyed about College football is that it is a game of momentum. And a true test of a great team is one that can actually turn the momentum around when it goes against them. Like pretty much everyone here, I am bewildered that ODU was able to pass on us at will. It was like a being on the receiving end of a long punishing drive (that lasted the whole game...) with Darren Evans just punishing the front 4 over and over again. It shouted, "You know we're going there again, just try and stop us!" And we couldn't. The inability to succeed when you KNOW where it's going will work on any player's mind and spirit. You can just amplify that with young players. That we couldn't effectively adjust with the best D coordinator in the business is what confused me. I know we tried various adjustments to counter them throughout, but what really stood out to me is that I am not sure we knew (or even still know) what ODU clearly identified as a weakness. Without that, adjustments are like throwing darts, blindfolded. In my heart, I hope we have another Senior-called players' meeting to redefine the season, as we did in 2010. And I'll keep on hoping.
Honestly, based on what I saw from this team, I think the bowl streak ends this season. This is just not a good team, and there don't seem to be any real leaders on the team to rally around. Right now I'd expect losses to ND, GT (they will abuse the LB's and safeties), Miami, Duke, and one of Pitt, BC (yes I know they lost last week but do you trust this defense to stop them?), or UVA. Combine that with the loss of the game with ECU (who would gladly refuse to reschedule given the bad blood over the cancellation), and you're looking at a 5-6 season.
I imagine that they will have a dead serious week of practice and they will approach this Duke game with an extraordinary intensity. This loss while super shitty could be the basis from which a newer much more focused competitive culture emerges.
If we beat ODU handily they would have been looking past Duke to the big ND game at home under the lights. Eventually this young team would have been bit hard. Might as well have been a non ACC matchup.
That was supposed to happen after JMfU in '10....and Ecu in '08....& Temple in '98.....& anOsu in '14.....
It's almost like we had different players playing in all those games, so some of the same lessons had to be relearned over time...
The purpose of the 1st time was so that it would NEVER happen or be repeated EVER again. Ever.
I would hope there would be enough accountability within the program and enough pride in what they do and what they represent that we don't have to resort to getting embarrassed on the field of play to teach that kind of lesson.
I'd hope that too, but sometimes there isn't.
We've been here before and a lot of the same things were being said about us when we lost to JMU. Everyone thought it was the beginning of the end and then we went undefeated in the ACC and won the ACC championship. However, that team had seniors like Tyrod Taylor, Davon Morgan, and Andre Smith that refused to let them fail and turn on each other. This team can react one of 2 ways. A.) Come closer as a team and right the ship, which will take leadership from players I'm not sure they have right now or B.) They'll fall apart from the inside. Finger pointing and internal blaming can tear a team apart fast and then we are looking at a LONG season.
I hope we go with Option A. However if Option B happens, I want QP in there as soon as possible and becoming the face/leader of the program. There's too much future talent on this team to let one loss drag us down for multiple seasons. If it gets ugly, you might as well start getting him the experience he needs and start showing whose team it is.
I disagree. Recruiting bottomed out in 2010 after that loss. The whiff we had in recruiting that year set us so far back down the line that we're still trying to play catchup to regain the talent level we had that season. It directly led to the backslide of the program that really hit in earnest in 2012 and continued through the eventual retirement of Beamer himself. That loss might not have impacted the final result of the 2010 season, but its not correct to say it didn't have a major impact on the long term health of the program.
Not saying I disagree, but do we know that the loss caused recruiting issues? It certainly could not have helped, but was Beamer's age more of the issue in recruiting in those latter years?
Small aside, but I wonder how this impacts Qunicy Patterson, since he was on the sideline. A front row seat to that implosion could be a good teaching moment for his leadership development, or not...
I think you're overstating your case here a bit. The loss to JMU and the hit recruiting took in the years that followed were both symptoms of the same disease (complacency) rather than a direct cause and effect. The 2010 squad was carried on the shoulders of an NFL caliber QB, and as soon as he was gone, glaring deficiencies in recruiting became apparent. We had already started losing recruiting battles before we lost to JMU, and we continued losing them until Beamer retried. Sure, other programs might have used that loss against us, just like they might try to use ODU against us, but any player being recruited by a P5 program has at some point in their football career been beaten by a team they had no business losing to. It happens. Any single loss, no matter how historic, does not derail a program.
The backslide that occurred subsequent to the 2010 season occurred because Beamer was old, tired, was battling cancer, and had an incompetent offensive staff that no elite recruits would want to play for. Blaming it on the JMU loss is revisionist history.
I think it's a combo of all the above. Also, they WILL use the ODfU loss in their pitch against us. Not might.
Lets take a look at the numbers on that then
2010 - 28th
2011 - 35th
2012 - 21st
2013 - 21st
2014 -28th
2015 - 29th
Those are our recruiting rankings for that 6 year spread. So while the recruits might not have developed and produced the way we wanted to, it's not like all the sudden we took a nose dive or "bottomed out" in recruiting. This team has an opportunity to change the perception though. If they can turn it around this year and take care of the teams we should and beat Notre Dame and Miami at home, then the recruiting should be fine. Do I think that's going to happen.... probably not. BUT there's just too much young talent on this team to let this lose our focus on the big picture. Let these guys grow up some. It's not their fault we let our expectations sky rocket after the FSU win and now we're having to come back down off our high and realizing what we thought before the season was probably right. There will be growing pains this year. We knew our younger DB's would struggle with bigger and more experienced WR's. ODU played the game of their lives. The former walk on QB threw a perfect fade while getting rocked and the receiver made a one handed catch in the endzone. Gotta give them some credit here but we just can't go chicken little on this situation. That's for UVA fans, not us.
Exactly. ZERO TOP 15 or 20 classes.
Rigghhhtttttt but the argument was that it took a huge drop off after that JMU game.... and it didn't. We've consistently been in the same range. I'm not arguing our overall recruiting is exactly where I want it to be. That's a different conversation for a different thread.
I would consider 28th to 35th a sizeable drop off (interesting enough that it came on the heels of the season they shit the trousers to JMfU). I would attribute the spike from 35th to 21st to the success of the '11 season (where the team did NOT lose to an FCS opponent). I absolutely point to the loss as one of the main factors in us not cracking the top 15 or 20 in the subsequent seasons.
When was the last time we had a top 15 recruiting class? I'll save you some time looking that up.... Never. So to say that losing to JMU that season is why we didn't have any top 15 recruiting classes following it is just wrong. We've only had one top 20 class and that was 2008. Also if you think that one game had such a long term impact on our recruiting, then that 2011 class should have been a big drop off too if you were right. It's not like a year passed and people just forgot about the JMU loss. The numbers show that game had no long term impact on recruiting, so I don't know why you keep pushing that narrative. If you want to be pissed about Tech recruiting in general, I get it. We've been consistently 20-30 with no major swings.
Spot on. Do you know how you get top 20 recruiting classes? Perform and not lose to ODU...
How many top-15 classes did we have before the JMU loss exactly? There was no significant drop-off. We went from #20-30 classes to #20-30 classes, with a single minor blip to #35.
Texas has lost to Kansas and Maryland
They have the #9 overall recruit rank for last 4 years of players
and
#3 in 2018
https://istexasbackyet.com/
As much as a shit filled diaper Texas has been recently they're still a "blue blood" program. They also hail from the Mecca of high school football recruits so it comes easier.
I'd say its just the opposite and exactly what a good recruit coaching does
If your a top Texas HS player you could go to Texas or Texas A&M. or you could go to LSU or Houston
Or go north to Oklahomma or Okie State
We'll skip Arkansas, but continue to Miss State or Ole Miss
Or Alabama or Auburn
Or if youre in Alabama you could go to Bama or Auburn, or UGa or TN, or LSU or FL
Thats good recruiting is getting a 757 plyer to play at Auburn
I really feel like the fanbase is overreacting here. Yes, it is a bad loss. Yes, it will generate bad headlines. And yes, people will make fun of us for losing this game.
But this isn't some death knell for the program. Get a hold on yourselves. We lost a game. Recruits aren't going to ignore a program for a bad loss (pretty much everybody has bad losses and ugly wins). I mean, ODU got embarrassed by Liberty and somehow managed to rally enough to beat us. The least we can do is pass the favor on to the rest of the ACC.
Winning at ODU was not going to open the floodgates of 5* recruits to come to Blacksburg and losing to ODU isn't going to suddenly turn away the 5* recruits we weren't getting anyway.
Sometimes having more talent on a team doesn't win you games. We demonstrated that against FSU and ODU showed us that turnabout is fair play. Character is demonstrated not when things go well, but when they go poorly. This loss is an opportunity for some major growing up by a young team. Fuente came into a program in decent shape and managed to keep things moving along. This is his opportunity to show that he can be a great coach.
We've had a weekend to roll around in despair. We need to get it all out of our system. See you guys in Durham. Go Hokies!
It wasn't about securing 5* talent, but about showing 4* and high 3* talent we're a destination to help you continue your growth toward a future where you can have success on the field and potentially into the NFL. We now have to spend recruiting time and money on the trail convincing the coaches we wanted to be at that game that we're not the program they saw that night. Things that should have been understood are now going to zap up time and resources away from the next level recruitment we need to perform to get to where we want to be. That will undoubtedly hurt us.
I could be well in left field on this one, but I have a funny feeling that Fuente and Foster will right the ship and whip the hell out of Duke next week.
But, I could be terribly wrong lol
They had damn well better.
I'm voting for the former -I'll be there, with the missus and here's to hoping they don't disappoint.
You gotta figure, in regards to the passing def, the only way is up/better
I got bashed on another thread for saying we will be lucky to get 6 wins this season (6 bowl eligible wins, so 7 wins total). But after this performance on Saturday, the apparent lack of leadership with players AND coaches, and the dismissal of yet another strong defensive player (from a squad that just gave up 600 yards and 49 points to ODU), where do you all foresee the 5 wins coming from?
I really don't want to hear about JMU. I was there, I remember it vividly. That was the literal "perfect storm" loss. That 2010 Tech team had some major talent AND leadership. That is why they went on to win the ACC. What has this team of players and coaches shown you to be even remotely similar to that team? The only similarity I see is they both lost to teams that they shouldn't have.
Trust me, I want to believe that this team will respond like the 2010 team did. I want to win out just as much as every single person on this board. However, the confidence in this team has been completely destroyed after that loss and more so, HOW we lost.
I hope they prove me wrong on Saturday. I really hope they do. I will be rooting them on just as hard as before. Whatever happens Saturday night will be a good indication on whether or not my worst fears start coming true or if the hope creeps back into the picture.
Why won't all the wins count towards bowl eligibility they only played one FCS team this year.
I didn't know about this rule: "Each year, a FBS institution may count one victory against a Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) opponent that has averaged 90 percent of the permissible maximum number of grants-in-aid per year in football during a rolling two-year period".
Regardless, my point is I am concerned about where our wins come from the rest of the season based on our performance on Saturday.
First time commenting, long time reader. This article matches more of what I was hoping to see at one point after the weekend. Being Hokies I think we are all decently used to this and everyone has said as much but the way we always come back is what we are known for. This one hurt and maybe a little more at this moment for those of us here in the 757 who cant get away from the ever constant commentary of the ODU population. I know after I walked into dojo Sunday morning to a place filled with almost all ODU grads, bows and pleasantries were immediately followed with "how 'bout them Hokies?". The thing I enjoy about this site is the diverse amount of takes on what's happening but if we are true to the Hokie way of doing things, we take scrapes and bruises and get back up to fight another day and typically in strong fashion. After this weekend, I look forward to a French article to pick me up and a fresh take on things come Saturday. Go Hokies!
Leg this man's first comment, he first taught me how to fence.
Leg for you sir and for your first comment!
I appreciate it! You guys keep doing your thing and I will continue to enjoy reading and being fully dipped!
All the rest of the teams we play this year are light years ahead of ODU.... God help us all. ODU put up over 600 yards on offense, imagine what a talented offense would put up? 1000 yards?
I upvoted you to remove the downvote because I feel it wasn't within the guidelines. However, I think your worry is hyperbolic. Foster has been statistically elite for 20+ years as a DC, he will find ways to mitigate the weaknesses we showed Saturday. Will they be removed entirely with an instant fix? No, this team will have to mitigate these weaknesses for the rest of the season. However, to think that we will give up 600 yards every game is not realistic.
I am not a fan of #AimLow, sounds to me like settling. I would hope all Hokies are always aiming high, but not looking too far ahead that we trip over what's in front of us. I always prefer the "Under Promise, Over Deliver" mantra for building up expectations or more personally "Plan for the worst, hope for the best". Almost everyone dropped the worst case scenarios for this season and went right on to the big-eyed possibilities. Now we are here dazed and confused and picking up the pieces hoping there are enough good parts left to make it to the finish line. I hope this is a flat tire and we have a full size spare, but I will be planning making it through this season going 5 under with the hazard lights on.
I agree. I hate the "we perform better as an underdog" or "it's better when we start ranked lower" etc. Those are loser mentalities. To win and be top dog, you've got to be able to deliver as a favorite, stomp a throat, and find ways to win in snoozer games. Giving a pass on 'hiccup games' is not the sign of a winning program or the mentality I'd hope for in a program. I get we're not going to go undefeated every year, but Fuente now has more losses as 21+ point favorites than he does signature wins. That's concerning.
Eh, given our history both WVU and FSU count as signature wins, and he's "only" lost as a 21-point favorite twice. And overall he's 3-4 against the spread when we're favored by 21 or more, with 3 straight wins (again, against the spread) before this game.
Concerning, yes, but not enough to completely lose faith in the program yet.
There is no excuse for this loss, as has been stated by others. The only possible silver lining, and it shouldn't have taken this to get here, is that hopefully this team's young core of players will know that this shit can happen when you rest on your laurels and don't practice with intensity. Sometimes you have to learn that the decal on the helmet and the jersey you are wearing doesn't win the game, the players collectively have to win the game. The responsibility rests with every player who steps foot on the field.
Maybe it's just me, but going off of social media, i've seen more apathy from fans after this loss. The feeling is more "meh, it's a loss" and not as much people bringing out the pitchforks. Also, with Trevon Hill being kicked off, my expectations has gone down from a week ago. This game sort of felt like that BC game where Vince Hall and Rouse got into it over on the sideline and then Brendan Hill was caught dancing during the loss. We had just lost two games in a row (BC and GT) and had a bye coming up...After the bye, the team pulled together and went on to have a great year. Someone is going to have to step up and it doesn't necessarily have to be a senior...Yosh, CHung, Ricky, even Floyd...need to get these guys together and get everyone on the same page...
More than anything, I'm really disappointed Brendan Hill didn't teach his son Trevon better.
/s
Young teams beat FSU and lose to ODU. We will be fine. Stop caring about what people on the internet think.
Virginia Tech shouldn't lose to ODU, period. Doesn't matter how 'young' the squad is.
Yes, I know this. The point is that young teams, like young children, do stupid, bewildering things, but in the end this team will be fine.
Can we just go one year without having a meme loss. The beamer 0-0 picture still haunts me. So does the ECU 2014 loss after one of our school's greatest wins. So does Maryland's LB turned 4th string QB torching us on the ground in 2013.
Why are our losses always so meme worthy. Plz stop.
That wasn't the year Maryland had a LB playing QB, that was an actual QB playing for them. He wasn't a very good QB, but he was a QB.
I don't know what to say really.
Three minutes
to the biggest battle of our professional lives
all comes down to today.
Either
we heal
as a team
or we are going to crumble.
Inch by inch
play by play
till we're finished.
We are in hell right now, gentlemen
believe me
and
we can stay here
and get the shit kicked out of us
or
we can fight our way
back into the light.
We can climb out of hell.
One inch, at a time.
Now I can't do it for you.
I'm too old.
I look around and I see these young faces
and I think
I mean
I made every wrong choice a middle age man could make.
I uh....
I pissed away all my money
believe it or not.
I chased off
anyone who has ever loved me.
And lately,
I can't even stand the face I see in the mirror.
You know when you get old in life
things get taken from you.
That's, that's part of life.
But,
you only learn that when you start losing stuff.
You find out that life is just a game of inches.
So is football.
Because in either game
life or football
the margin for error is so small.
I mean
one half step too late or to early
you don't quite make it.
One half second too slow or too fast
and you don't quite catch it.
The inches we need are everywhere around us.
They are in ever break of the game
every minute, every second.
On this team, we fight for that inch
On this team, we tear ourselves, and everyone around us
to pieces for that inch.
We CLAW with our finger nails for that inch.
Cause we know
when we add up all those inches
that's going to make the fucking difference
between WINNING and LOSING
between LIVING and DYING.
I'll tell you this
in any fight
it is the guy who is willing to die
who is going to win that inch.
And I know
if I am going to have any life anymore
it is because, I am still willing to fight, and die for that inch
because that is what LIVING is.
The six inches in front of your face.
Now I can't make you do it.
You gotta look at the guy next to you.
Look into his eyes.
Now I think you are going to see a guy who will go that inch with you.
You are going to see a guy
who will sacrifice himself for this team
because he knows when it comes down to it,
you are gonna do the same thing for him.
That's a team, gentlemen
and either we heal now, as a team,
or we will die as individuals.
That's football guys.
That's all it is.
Now, whattaya gonna do?
So, most importantly, don't give up yards on stupid penalties.
Shit happens. Winning takes care of everything.
After a nightmarish offseason, we came with high hopes but very guarded expectations. We all got very hopeful after better than expected performances in the first 2 games. And then we got a very necessary reality check. Thankfully it was in a non conference game. Can Coach Fu and Bud right the ship now? I don't know, because I still don't know what exactly it was that stood out to ODU, that they justifiably took repeated advantage of throughout the game. And we can rest assured that our conference opponents will be watching the tape to figure it out. But after watching VT for 30 years, I can say one thing: we have always been the more dangerous team when we didn't have respect...when we had a chip on our shoulder. Well, we've achieved the Rodney Dangerfield part. But time will tell about the chip on our shoulder. 2010 was almost magical as I knew we were better than our first 2 games, and Tyrod and Co spent the next 10 games proving me right ... up until the second half of the Stanford game... I don't have a feel for this year's team. They came out better than I expected and showed me more than I'd hoped they would, and they've bottomed out lower than I could've imagined. I really don't know how things are going to unfold...gonna be a ride (not sure about the fun part yet). High hopes, but guarded expectations.
I think you called it right about how people are feeling right now. Just when we started to feel a lot better about our chances this season, we get the rug pulled out from under us. We should have known based on this offseason (and the numbers of So and Fr on our 2-deep) that we would struggle at times this year, but the demolition of FSU and a solid performance against W&M had people changing their outlook. I'll admit to dropping my guard re: expectiations after the first two games. I think at this point we just have to wipe any expectations and see how they play the next few games. Duke and ND are really going to tell us where we're going, much more than ODU.
And are you CS? Long time, no see, bud. This is MM. We need to sit down sometime over a beer or five, lots to catch up on.
The worst thing for me was the almost astonishing lack of tackling ability. This is a young defense so lapses in judgement or breakdowns in coverage are expected, but why did they not tackle?
I'm gonna assume that they cracked under the pressure of adversity and that is how their youth ties in. But that was the most bewildering thing to me. DBs also seemed to forget how to defend a pass. They rarely even put a hand in the WR face it seemed.
I want to go back in to the time I thought this was as bad as it would get.
I think the FSU game and inflated ranking got our hopes up. I won't rehash everything said over the last 36 hours but I have a feeling the rest of the season will come down to the Duke game. We don't need to win but it needs to be competitive and the team needs to show some heart. If they don't, it's as good as finished.
"Don't need to win"? Are you kidding me? We need to get focused, be intense, and play with an attitude that shows we are serious.... Coaches, player, everyone. Run the score up when able, TAKE NO PRISONER. We need to wear all maroon uniforms the rest of the season, the color combo that has proven we are out for business. There is no way to erase this loss, just show character and prove it was a screw-up, nothing more.
We can blame the players for not taking this game seriously, but it clearly started at the top. The fact that Fuente brought QP (the 4th quarterback, that did not go to FSU) so he could get some garbage time tells me they all took this game too lightly.
The honeymoon's over for this staff, especially after the offseason. I expected this to be the bottom year given the youth and turnover of the Beamer's recruits to "Fuente's guys." But next year I think seats may start to get warm if we don't start to see a significant improvement on offense and the overall program. I'm sure Whit will be patient (and I agree with that) but the shine is kinda off of Fuente until he starts consistently outperforming expectations. This is a huge step back.
You contradicted yourself in the post. Was this a huge step back or were you expecting a "bottom year'?
Sorry - I expected this to be an underwhelming year (6-6, 7-5), with next year being the first year with Fuente's recruits & system in place (hoping to quickly return to 9-10 wins going forward).
I did not expect this type of loss under this regime - its the first really bad loss on Fuente's resume at Tech. So this was a bigger step back than I expected.
One of the older ODU fans in front of me at the game kept asking me when VT was gonna put in their starters lol. ODU fans definitely were hearing that VT's third/fourth stringers would be getting playtime. Honestly thought it was pretty funny.
This game reminded me of the 2008 ECU game so much, in that their QB was able to exploit young DB's that were smaller than the big bodied WR's. Deja vu all over again.
I am so glad my income doesn't depend on the performance of 18-22 year old kids. I'm trying to not let my happiness depend on them.
I don't understand the big WRs vs. small CBs take everyone has for this game. Farley is 6'2" and Watts is 6'1". The ODU receivers burning us all day were all 6'3" and under. It's not like it was 6'3"/6'4" vs. 5'10" (Levonta Taylor comes to mind). I don't think giving our CBs an inch or two would have made any difference because their technique was so poor in man and their positioning/decision making was awful in zone.
It also didn't help that they picked on our CB philosophy at playing the WR rather than playing the ball. Those lob passes which allowed the receiver to adjust late rendered the corners helpless because they never turned to spot the ball. We were always a step late on those plays, and without over the top help, it was like taking candy from a baby. It just made it look like a size discrepancy based on how badly it made our coverage appear.
Is Watts actually 6' 1" ? Because he really looked small out there.
I think #aimlow is perfect. Tech finally broke me Saturday night. Don't get me wrong, I am still going to bleed Orange and Maroon, but my hopes of ever actually being something more than a regional power who gets a big upset every now and then are quashed at this point
Was actually hanging out with some old friends who are UVA fans on Saturday. Hadn't seen them since the holidays and naturally took the opportunity to make some jabs about the UMBC game. Sure felt like karma as we were watching the ODU game unfold. But whatever, don't intend to stop giving them grief about it, losing to the first 16 seed was still way worse.
Don't quite know how to feel overall. When these types of losses happened under Beamer the thing that always stood out was the lack of effort and energy. I sorta believed until this weekend that that was in the past. Fuente preaches it and win or lose the past two seasons, the effort and energy was there. Not Saturday. Lots of missed tackles and seeming lack of speed/intensity. Stinks to see it happening again. I think its a rare thing indeed to find a coach that can instill that kind of discipline every single week. Gotta be a big part of why Alabama and the Patriots are where they are.
Still believe in this staff, still love the Hokies, 2010 turned out alright. Lets do it again.
Ugh. I can't think of anything worse than #AimLow. That's like giving up.
While I dont mind the sentiment, yeah, that is a really bad slogan lol.
Eh, i'll actually trade this loss for beating Duke, ND, and Miami and being competitive against Clemson. (Huge ask I know)
I also think how we respond will have a much bigger impact on recruiting than the actual game itself.
Jhalf is the smartest person I know -at least in the last few minutes of me reading anything.
Make profit.
Why would it be a trade off like that though lol?
Losing like this probably means we are more likely to lose all three of those games.
It shouldn't be a trade off, and probably won't be.
I'm just assuming this is what the football gods asked us for.
Remember that time a supposedly good Ohio State team lost to an unranked Virginia Tech?
Is this supposed to somehow insinuate that the 2 upsets are of equal magnitude?
To Ohio State it was...
Simply not true at all. Maybe a handful of fans that don't have a firm grasp on reality, but it was not at all the same thing, even to most educated OSU fans.
The one thing we can agree on is that being a Hokie sports fan is not an easy task. Therefore, I choose to not let the bad times control my outlook. Being a lifelong Redskins fan, I've had a lot of practice with huge expectations and little success, but here I am, still a fan. In the grand scheme of things, its business and I am just a Hokie Club member and alumni with little to no impact on the athletics. I'll enjoy the good, weather the bad, and always be a Hokie.
Oh, and no matter how bad it gets....
Efff uva!!
The two are so incomparable as to be hilarious.
Did anyone else hear of ODU fans burning couches and rioting in the streets after the game?
When did WV annex Norfolk?
There are some dumpsters in Blacksburg that got some rough treatment after the OSU game in Columbus. I try not to throw those stones anymore for fear we see the same behavior again in the future.
One of my neighbors in Foxridge burned a couch after the OSU win.
You can take the kid out of West Virginia...
I was just about to ask "where is their family from, exactly?"
Alright bear with me on this. I don't know how it would go but say we run the table and we are Clemson's and Notre Dame's only loss on the year and Miami is a Top 10 team when we beat them. Are we in the playoffs? That would essentially be 3 top 10 wins (maybe 2 top 5) and an acc championship.....
If we run the table and win the ACC with one loss? I say yes unless all the other conferences have undefeated champions.
Now, do I think that likely? Probably not. But then again, I didn't thunk ODU had a win in them on Saturday, so what do I know
edit: I take it back, with the loss coming when we were such favorites, it would also depend on who the losses were for the other conference champions, and how impressive the wins against the ranked opponents were. Not to mention we will have played 1 less game than most teams.
It took 2 days after the most embarrassing, humbling loss in program history (or at least one of the top 3) to start talking about running the table, winning the ACC and making the playoffs. Man, I just hope we can beat Duke on Saturday.
After watching 2010 happen, anything is possible.
Is it going to happen in 2018? Probably not, but we won't know until we lose again or until we end up 11-1.
Yea but that's more fun than talking about how much we suck and think we'll never be good again
Leg for "seppuku". Except I don't know how to leg a post, haha.
Hit the up arrow my man
I do that for comments, but don't see the arrows for the OP.
It doesn't exist for staff posts.
Do not listen to the LeBatard show! Their useless pole questions was "Will Virginia Tech always be Virginia Tech? Always ranked in the Top-20, but never wins anything memorable". Came back 96% "yes".
Also was Dan's funniest thing of the sports weekend.
Hurts because its true...and that's our national perception.
(Disclaimer-I really like the LeBatard show)
While stuff like this should be used for internal motivation, we all know it'll just be added to the 'woe is us, we'll never win' stockpile
I get it. Just adds to the pain of the loss.
chew on this: ODU is a 5 point dog to ECU this coming weekend. I'm curious to see how this games turns out. Even if ODU wins, it doesn't prove they are a good team. If ECU wins, it makes me wonder if we would have come crashing down to earth a week earlier, but we'd still have the ODU game to try and refocus and get our crap together before the Duke game.
I would fully expect ECU to beat ODU. ODU just won their superbowl. Our players were half-sleepwalking but that QB hardly missed a throw last week. Plus we all know what happens when you play ECU right after a program's all-time victory...
I'll be surprised if ODU gets up for that game and doesn't come crashing back down to earth.
Where have I seen this play out before?
F-k, I can still hear the jeering chants ringing in my ears & brain of "O-VER-RATED! CLAP, CLAP, CLAP-CLAP-CLAP!" and "HO-KIE CHO-KIES! CLAP, CLAP, CLAP-CLAP-CLAP!", no matter HOW many fuck damn times I blare Tech Triumph & VPI Victor March. Fuck Dammit. Is any/everyone still drunk/hungover??
Thing is, the team earned every single one of those chants and I hope to hell their ears are still ringing with them as well. They better have them in the back of their minds all season because it's obvious that they need some motivation.
Even though we were, you know, supposed to have moved on long past it at this point (you know, the whole "setback comeback" thing)?
You move past the shock, you move past the "if only I would have..." and the hypotheticals, things that are now history. I, for one, would want to be reminded of how bad it felt to hear those chants to help ensure I didn't have to hear them again.