Recent Comments
Stroman was maddening last year, not just on special teams but on his coverage as well (see OSU and ECU games). But so far this season, I've been very impressed by his play overall. I agree with French in that he was in perfect position on both of those TDs.
The outcome is not what we wanted, but this is still beyond awesome.
What happened to Alexander? The coaches had mentioned he might be in for Stro based on matchups and like French said, it was just physics that won out. Perhaps the bigger Alexander could have made the stop?
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9 years 10 months
# | Ask TKP: What's your one positive and negative takeaway from Battle at Bristol? Pro: Evans looked good. On a huge stage against a good defense, he didn't seem to make many bad decisions. He didn't try to force passes, he did reasonably well avoiding pressure, and is pretty tough. He took some hits put kept pushing through them.
Con: Its hard to say beyond the fumbles and penalties. The defense played as well as could be expected, I'd say and the offense looked other than the above mentioned. Stroman got beat when he was in great position and the linebackers missed tackles, but that will happen. Dobbs makes guys miss, that's sort of his whole deal. I think without the fumbles, the offense would have looked really good. I think it will look really good by the end of the season.
A lot of last night's negativity seems to have dissipated in the light of day, but I think its still worth pointing out, this was the second game of the Fuente era. This game was never going to be perfect. I know its easy to buy into our own hype, but this was never a great matchup for us. I know how frustrating it was after the 1st quarter, but it could have been a lot worse. We were competitive with a good team into the 4th quarter despite some very bad mistakes. I'm willing to accept that this early into Fuente's tenure at Virginia Tech.
Wyatt Teller first flag actually switched momentum in Vols' favor. Teller definitely has to play better and the fumbles have to stop if we are to win the coastal division.
The muffed punt was 90% bad luck, 5% Stro not effectively clearing the landing zone and 5% ESPN in the most expensive game ever held not having a decent fucking camera angle on it to overturn what was almost certainly a questionable on-field call.
So apparently Wyatt and Fuente got in argument (about going out of town a couple weekends ago) and some not-so-nice words were being said by Wyatt so that's pretty much the reason why he isn't playing/is 2nd string.
Yes those two penalties killed a couple of our drives but his (out of control) play is not the reason why he isn't starting.
Uh how about using a different DB to cover him??
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9 years 10 months
# | Ask TKP: What's your one positive and negative takeaway from Battle at Bristol? Positive: Ekanem looks back to 2014 form.
Negative: They basically took last year's undisciplined penalties and lack of attention to detail and grafted a lack of ball security onto the team.
I agree AND would have scored more if we had implemented more passes.
I didn't totally dislike the uniforms, but I think between the gradient of black and gray we should have tinted the whole thing a little maroon. I know the significance of the black and gray original colors, but I don't immediately recognize them as us.
French, will you have any review on Trevon Hill's play from the game last night? To me it looked like he has a good initial burst, good speed off the edge and some good moves to boot. On the negative side, he did not do a good job containing the weak side on the zone read (look at Dobbs rushing for TD late in the game... Hill tackles the RB on an aggressive 'crash' and Dobbs runs untouched for a TD).
Would love to hear your thoughts.
Edit: Also, great analysis on Stroman! So many on the boards were down on him last night. But it certainly looked to me like he was covering well on those two TD's, the bigger man/better athlete won the ball... nothing you can do about that.
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9 years 10 months
# | Ask TKP: What's your one positive and negative takeaway from Battle at Bristol? I said it before I will say it again...
Negative: We lost a game, to a ranked team, on a big stage.
Positive: Last time we won on a big stage we had a disappointing season (see OSU) maybe this will have a reverse effect and we win the rest of our games out including upsets over UNC, Miami, and Notre Dame (all ranked teams).
The defense is encouraging, We still leave a field goal or 2 on the field every game, and several fumbles if we can clean those 2 things up things will be great. Slye can kick 60 yarders in practice we just need it to translate on the field and one of these days he will make a crazy long one. Guys are getting experience, it is Fuentes first season, eventually luck will go our way. We lost by 21 last night, they scored 3 touchdowns off of our fumbles we can play with that UT team and are capable of beating them.
Win the rest of the non-conference games, win the ACC Coastal, Go to the ACCCG, Go to a good bowl game! It's early in the season, no need for bashing players and coaches like people did last night, it's punishment enough making mistakes like that in front of a crowd that big and everyone watching on tv. GO HOKIES!!!
That will be in the review
French what was your 1 positive and 1 negative take on the game last night?
I had a similar negative experience to a lot of the comments here. Had fun tailgating for 12 hours but things went off the rails when we started heading to the track. Things started getting pretty tense at Gate 13 (and 14, 15, and 16). Just when things were about to go south in the worst possible way a dozen nervous cops showed up out of nowhere and they began letting people in without screening them.
Really didn't care for the blatant UT homerism on display during the game or the lack of response to an aggressive Tennessee fan attempting to start a fight next to us. I was in such a bad mood I ended up leaving early and walking back the mile and a half to the tailgate lot they stuck a lot of VT people in. Still took till 3am to make it the 10 miles home.
If they ever do this again I may go back. But it would be to enjoy the atmosphere in Bristol before game day and tailgate. I'll pack up after the first quarter starts and head to bar.
Honestly, Dobbs and Hurd are just better athletes. The coaches probably knew going in we needed more than one body on them.
PORKCHOP SANDWICHES!
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9 years 10 months
# | Ask TKP: What's your one positive and negative takeaway from Battle at Bristol? Just like Joey Slyes leg
You can still develop other players while having a starting set 5. Oline is all about creating continuity.
You can give player spills throughout the game. the center of all people is the one player you never want to change out because of the relationship between the center and the QB and he directs the line.
When I was with the team and Stiney was there we had a set starting 5.
PICK 6 BIG SHOOTS
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9 years 10 months
# | A Few of Thoughts on the Battle at Bristol that Won't Make the Film Review I have actually been impressed by his judgement of calling fair catches or trying for returns so far this year compared to last year.
Glad I was there but will not go back.
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9 years 10 months
# | Ask TKP: What's your one positive and negative takeaway from Battle at Bristol? I can't help but think we are on the cusp of having the most complete Hokie team we've had in a long time.
We've got a heck of an uppercut, but the aim needs some work
PICK 6 BIG SHOOTS
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9 years 10 months
# | A Few of Thoughts on the Battle at Bristol that Won't Make the Film Review The thing that bothered me the most about our defense last night was the first guy to the ball carrier not finishing the tackle. Over and over it seemed like we had Dobbs and then our guys would grab at him and miss. I understand he's a big guy and very athletic, but it's not like we have a bunch of scrubs.
It was a little distateful, but I had a laugh at the one that said "when VT wins, Michael Vick gets Smokey"