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Week 1: Virginia Tech Hokies vs Alabama Crimson Tide @ Atlanta, GA (8/31/2103)

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So, even though we got crushed, there were positives:

1. Our defense played one hell of a game. They were absolutely nasty, I was impressed with the D-line, linebackers (especially the play of Jack Tyler), and our secondary with all those young guys.

2. Our offensive line played really well, it looks like Grimes has done a hell of a job with them. I don't think we gave up a sack, they kept the pressure off LT for the most part.They also opened up some nice holes for Edmunds.

3. Trey Edmunds really impressed me, he looked really explosive, and i like the way he hits an open hole, I think he's our next great RB.

Negatives:

1. Our receivers played horribly, way too many dropped passes. LT didn't play great, but he threw a lot of catchable balls that were dropped. I don't think Knowles should be a starting WR.

2. Specials teams coverage was absolutely pathetic. 2 td's given up is unacceptable.

Overall I think if the receivers and LT can somehow get into sync, and we tighten up our special teams coverage, we'll be ok. We should be able to win every other game on our schedules except maybe UNC/Miami.
 

hokiehi21

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I've never been so optimistic about a team that just lost by 25. VT's gonna be good. A little worried about the WR's but no defense/secondary we play will be nearly as good as Bama's. Did any TE make a catch today?
 

HoHumHokie

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I've never been so optimistic about a team that just lost by 25. VT's gonna be good. A little worried about the WR's but no defense/secondary we play will be nearly as good as Bama's. Did any TE make a catch today?

I'm a lot worried about the WR's. DJ and Knowles were horrible. I think Stanford should have been in more. When will Meyer be healthy?...sounds like LT really had something going with Meyer during summer workouts. I don't think we threw to a TE. I think JC and Mangus should be returning kickoffs down the road...Knowles looked bad there too.
 

wildturkey

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Thoughts on the game:

Defense far exceeded my expectations. Given the opponent, they played a damn fine game.

Special teams continues to be "special". Just poor effort. Guys were quitting on their lane assignments assuming the ball carrier was going down on first contact. Absolutely no excuse for that shit. It's a cliche but its true, you play till you hear the whistle. Also, I'm uncomfortable with key players returning kicks. Jarrett and baby Fuller have no business fielding punts with all the injuries/attrition we have. Let someone else do it. I'll gladly give up a slim chance for a big return to have a healthy 2ndary.

Offense was by and large a mess with the receivers being fucking pathetic. It wasn't a total disaster because I thought the O-line was just ok given the circumstances. Edmunds looked solid as well. He could move the pile when he actually had a hole so that's a plus. LT was sub par. His WRs let him down a lot but I also thought he missed a few throws. And I thought he misread the option a few times too. He keeps it a little too much for my liking. I'd bitch about the playcalling with its lack of short and intermediate routes but I doubt any of our WRs could even run a proper route or catch it. I know Bama has damn good defense but we should have at least had a marginal offense tonight if the WRs showed up. I would have benched Coles (for his piss poor effort) and Knowles (did he drench his hands in butter?). We're getting our asses kicked anyway. Might as well make a point that it won't be tolerated.

But to end on a positive note, we have 3 winnable games up next. I say that with some hesitation since we struggled every game last year but the point is we have a prime opportunity to work out some major kinks with offense and special teams. The key from here on out is the coaches and leaders need to push everyone and prepare for every game like we're playing against Alabama. If we put that kind of effort in, then maybe we can get another ACC championship and a shot at a quality opponent in a BCS game.
 

HammerDown

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Hopefully you guys learned something and can benefit from it going forward to be 3-1.
 

Ragingcroc

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Everyone has said what I wanted to say, so I'll just leave you with these. Pretty classic facial expressions by Frank Beamer
frank-beamer-facepalm-570x320.jpg


beamerface.gif
 

NickVT10

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The WRs just played bad. Knowles looked like he had no business being out there today. He had 5 drops I believe? Special teams were also a disaster.

I think the OL played pretty well. There were holes for Edmunds who often got 3-4 yards which is about what we could ask for in this game. That combo go us to third and manageable a lot but we couldn't catch the 3rd down passes. LT was pretty accurate for the most part and made good throws. Speilman pointed out how Coles gave up on the route on that pick 6 and that it wasn't LT's fault entirely.

There is a lot of hope for this team this year. The defense looked very good including the 2nd string DTs. The secondary looked very good. We may be able to run the ball a little bit more.

If we can get some receivers who will snag the ball out of the air we will be ok.
 

NickVT10

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And maybe the best part, we have maroon pants this year
 

Ragingcroc

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Alabama was held to under 100 yards rushing for the first time since 2011 vs. LSU. Impressive.
 

NickVT10

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I think we will have an improved running game and a more effective offense than we saw. We did go against probably the best defense in the country other than us tonight.
 

wildturkey

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I saw enough out of Edmunds to think the coaches should forget time shares. Give him 70% of the load. Use JC and Caleb more as pass catchers.
 

Forty_Sixand2

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I saw enough out of Edmunds to think the coaches should forget time shares. Give him 70% of the load. Use JC and Caleb more as pass catchers.

I'm not ready to go there just yet. Take away the home run and he had 55 yards on 19 carries. He looked good but also had a few zero yard plays. JC can still ball.
 

VT_Antzo

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You can't just discount the run he had and say he had 55 yards on 19 carries....if he didn't have that run who is to say he wouldn't have run the ball the next seven plays and averaged 5 yards a carry...he broke a nice long run and "running for 132 yards against an Alabama defense that had only allowed 12 individual rushers to reach the 100-yard mark since the start of 2005, the fewest nationally." Is a nice debut in my opinion (and probably yours as well).

Now to continue the Rocky theme, who would have thought our first loss to Bama was really when Drago took out Apollo...time for the montage.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SUzcDUERLo]Rocky 4 training montage - Hearts On Fire (HD) - YouTube[/ame]

 
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hokiegrad

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I'm not ready to go there just yet. Take away the home run and he had 55 yards on 19 carries. He looked good but also had a few zero yard plays. JC can still ball.

I don't think he had less than two yards on a carry in the first half. Those zero yard plays were in the 2nd, when Alabama was able to get more penetration, whether that's because they knew they didn't have to worry about our passing game or because our OL was getting tired (or both). I was quite happy with Edmunds's performance.

That said, I'm not ready to go there yet either. As you said, JC can still ball. It's not just new coaches that you have to be patient with. That goes for new players as well. I expect better things from JC this year, not only because of the improved OL (it sure looked better in game 1, at least from a run blocking perspective), but also because JC is a year older and more experienced, more physically prepared, etc. Looking forward to seeing what he can do. Tandem RBs is the way to go unless you don't have a choice. Keep each other fresh, keep the defense adjusting.
 

Ragingcroc

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I see a lot of promise in this team, but I am still surprised we lost the way we did. I didn't think a blowout was out of the question, but not being able to catch a ball and giving up 21 points to Alabama's D and ST, wow.
 

Ragingcroc

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I'm not ready to go there just yet. Take away the home run and he had 55 yards on 19 carries. He looked good but also had a few zero yard plays. JC can still ball.
He had around 4 yards per carry minus the big run before Alabama just started run blitzing us the entire second half.
 

amszete

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Beamer needs to give up coaching / overseeing special teams. His crap has cost us big now in some games.

Our WRs were horrible. Why continually put someone in that can't catch a ball or can't get it done? Put in stanford or someone that can at least try and do better. It is very obvious our lack of WR recruiting over the past years has come back to haunt us. Maybe move Caleb back to WR and keep Edmunds, JC and Mangus at RB with Edmunds as the work horse.

Speaking of Edmunds, he had a HUGE day. Not just with the 70+ yard TD run but he was CONTINUALLY getting 3-6 yards a carry against one of the best college defenses against America. So question -- why not just RUN THE BALL until they force us to do otherwise? I saw alot of Stinespring / MOC bullshit where they are trying to do too much when we need to stick to our roots as a program which is a RUN FIRST PROGRAM. I think we really shit the bed offensively trying to dance and do some things when we didn't really need to.
 

vtpoop

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I'm not ready to go there just yet. Take away the home run and he had 55 yards on 19 carries. He looked good but also had a few zero yard plays. JC can still ball.

That's true, but think about this - when was the last time Bama gave up 100 yards to a running back in one half, much less a freshman back in his first career game? When you consider we had trouble running the ball against even Austin Peay last year, that is one heck of an improvement, and quite an accomplishment.
Right now, I would like to see Trey as the featured back to wear down a defense with J.C. as the secondary back to blow past defenses once they are fatigued. That is a scary thought. But, as has been noted, the passing game is going to have to develop or defenses are just going to load up to stop the run.
We basically went toe to toe with an NFL team. If we can find a receiver that can catch and a special teams player that can tackle, I think we might actually be pretty decent this year.
 
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