All month long we've been hearing it: the Hokies shouldn't have been invited
to the Sugar Bowl, they can't sell out their ticket allotment, they don't win
the big games ... these discussion points are bookended by a 38-10 pounding in
the ACC Championship Game on one end and Cody Journell's arrest and suspension
on the other end. Whoever thought a month that included a Sugar Bowl bid could
be so unpleasant to live through? It's time for the Hokies to change the
conversation.
A December of Hokie-bashing isn't new. We romanticize the 1995 Sugar Bowl win
because of how things ended up, but December of 1995 was just as unpleasant as
December of 2011. VT was a newcomer to the national scene, just three years
removed from a hideous 2-8-1 season and irrelevancy. The Hokies tied with Miami
for the Big East crown in 1995, and there was drama at the end of the season as
to which team, the Hokies or Canes, was going to get the league's invitation to
a "Bowl Alliance" bowl.