“Wow, Virginia Tech is going to beat Louisville.”
When that pass went sailing through the air to a wide open Donavon Greene, that’s what I thought, and I’m guessing I wasn’t alone. That had the potential to be a 75-yard touchdown pass which would have put the Hokies up 23-14. Yeah, it’s certainly possible — perhaps even probable — that the Cardinals would have stepped on the gas and asserted their dominance down the stretch and go on to win the game.
But please allow me my brief moment of hope. We haven’t had that feeling very often this season. The Hokies were not only hanging in there, but they were beating Louisville at that moment in the game, and a long touchdown pass like that would have swung the momentum in their favor.
Alas, it didn’t happen. The ball bounced off Greene’s outstretched fingertips. It was just like the Braxton Burmeister to Tre Turner play against Notre Dame back in 2021, except it came down the left sideline instead of the right. Instead of scoring a 75-yard touchdown, Virginia Tech had to punt, and Louisville promptly returned the punt to the 5-yard line, where it punched it in to take a 21-16 lead.
That incompletion was basically a 14-point swing, and if you want to upset a team like Louisville, those are the types of plays that you have to make. It’s been extremely rare this season that a VT wide receiver has been running that wide open. It finally happened against the defense you’d least expect it to happen, but the Hokies didn’t make the play. Sigh.
That two-play sequence basically sums up the entire season. It’s been extremely frustrating more times than not, though I certainly appreciate the fact that the Hokies have improved under Philip Montgomery and haven’t checked out despite all the things happening around them.
It’s not easy to find different things to write about following most of these game this season. I just don’t have a lot to offer, and I probably won’t have much to offer until Virginia Tech settles in on a new coach. Again, the heavy smoke is around James Franklin. It’s legitimate smoke, too. It’s not just an agent leaking a name. If Franklin wants to become Tech’s next head coach, he has the option to do so and be extremely well-compensated in the process. My understanding is that VT has met every single demand. If he chooses not to take the job, it sure won’t be for a lack of effort on the Hokies’ part.
You know how this stuff goes, though. Maybe he’ll take the job. Maybe he won’t. Maybe the process will be over in the next couple of days. Maybe it will drag out until the end of November like we originally thought. As I said last week, I wouldn’t be placing any bets on it either way. But I’ve heard enough details (despite the non-disclosure agreements) about what’s been going on that I’m certain these aren’t just internet rumors. I’ve beat around the bush about a potential Franklin hire because I was told the committee didn’t want it out there in case he doesn’t take the job. But it’s very much out there now, so we have to talk about it.
Somebody I was tailgating with yesterday put it very well. Of all the candidates on the table, James Franklin has the best combination of ceiling and floor. I don’t think he’s a national championship-level coach. If he were, we would have found out about it at Penn State. But he is a solid coach. If you can win at Vanderbilt, you can certainly win at Virginia Tech.
Franklin would bring instant credibility to the job. He would improve recruiting. The Hokies would have a well-organized and well-staffed football program. And he’s not the type to sit by idly and let inefficiency in the athletic department trip him up. I’ve heard he can be difficult to work with at times, and I think that comes from being a hard-driving person. If somebody gets in his way — whether that’s due to incompetence or inefficiency — he’s going to bulldoze them.
If Franklin takes the job, this isn’t going to be the old school Virginia Tech athletic department anymore. The Hokies aren’t going to have a guy who will toe the line. Franklin would try to bend things to his will. That’s basically what Buzz Williams did, but since the basketball facility is its own little separate world, the impact wasn’t felt across the entire department. There isn’t a part of the athletic department that wouldn’t be affected by Franklin’s hire, though. That place would be a whole new world. He’d swing a bigger sword than any coach at Virginia Tech since Frank Beamer. There’s no question about that.
Quite frankly, I think Virginia Tech needs that. He’s not a warm and fuzzy guy. He’s going to rock the boat if he takes the job, and I think the Hokies need their boat rocked in a whole lot of ways.
But I can’t spend all day speculating about that. There will be plenty of time for that in the future, if the deal goes through. Let’s talk about yesterday’s game a little bit more.
The Disappearance Of Donavon Greene
I guess he hasn’t disappeared. He was very much in view on the aforementioned incompletion. But the production from the Wake Forest transfer just hasn’t been there. Check out his stats over the last three games:• Georgia Tech: 0 catches
• California: 0 catches
• Louisville: 0 catches
Yep, you read that correctly. One of Virginia Tech’s starting wide receivers has not caught a pass in the last three games. He caught four for 52 yards against his old team back on October 4, but by the time the Hokies play a football game again, he’ll have gone an entire month without catching a pass.
Greene had a banged-up career at Wake Forest. When he was healthy, he was really good, like his 11-catch, 166-yard performance against Virginia last season. When he wasn’t healthy, he was fairly ineffective. But he’s never gone three consecutive games without catching a pass before.
In fact, I could only find one example of Greene not catching a pass in a game in which he appeared during his Wake Forest days. He had a catch-less performance against Miami last season. Other than that, he caught at least one pass in every single game he played on offense for the Demon Deacons.
Yeah, he probably should have hauled that one in from Kyron Drones in yesterday’s game. That’s on him. But my point here is that Greene was always a pretty good player for Wake Forest. And now that he puts on a Virginia Tech uniform, he literally isn’t catching any passes. It’s unfathomable in the modern game of college football that a starting wide receiver goes over a month without recording a reception.
That points to Virginia Tech’s entire passing operation. It’s not a Greene thing, though he is part of it. It’s also a Drones thing. It’s also an offensive line thing. It may also be a coaching thing. I’m not sure. I find it interesting that Franklin tried to hire Fontel Mines at Penn State. I know he’s a very good recruiter. I haven’t been convinced that he’s a top coach yet, however, though I’m also not unconvinced. I definitely realize that his players would look a lot better with a good passing quarterback behind a decent offensive line, and they don’t have that luxury this year.
A Traditional Running Game Finally Beat Virginia Tech
Until Louisville came to town, the Hokie defense had dominated traditional running games with non-running quarterbacks. Here were those numbers after the Cal game:- South Carolina: 37 carries, 119 yards, 3.2 ypc
- NC State: 32 carries, 59 yards, 1.8 ypc
- Wake Forest: 32 carries, 91 yards, 2.8 ypc
- Cal: 27 carries, 39 yards, 1.4 ypc
- Total: 128 carries, 308 yards, 2.41 ypc
Louisville sure changed that. The Cardinals have two really good backs, and both Browns — Isaac and Keyjuan — had big games on Saturday afternoon in Lane Stadium.
• Isaac Brown: 16 carries, 130 yards, 8.1 ypc, 1 TD
• Keyjuan Brown: 12 carries, 94 yards, 7.8 ypc, 2 TDs
Overall, Louisville finished with 235 yards on the ground and averaged 6.9 yards per carry. Ouch. Tech’s pass defense was good, with Miller Moss only throwing for 136 yards on 28 attempts. It was the running game that stole the show.
Why? Preliminary PFF grades show that four of Tech’s top six graders were defensive tackles. Those guys held up pretty well, as they’ve done all season. But the Hokies’ run fits in the back end were pretty rough, as they’ve been in most of Tech’s losses this season, and they compounded the issue by missing tackles. Tyson Flowers missed three tackles. Jordan Bass missed two.
The Hokies are young back there in a lot of positions, and in other cases, they simply aren’t talented enough. Flowers is an evaluation miss. He’s missed a whopping 15 tackles on the season, and his tackling grade of 33.3 ranks No. 403 out of 421 safeties in FBS college football with 200-plus snaps. Bass, with a tackling grade of 34.2, ranks No. 400. Bass was supposed to redshirt this year coming off his injury at Pitt, but he’s been forced into action after moving from linebacker to safety.
I like a lot of the young players on the back end, namely Sheldon Robinson and Noah Chambers. I had the pleasure of meeting Chambers’ parents at a tailgate yesterday (along with former VT wide receiver Michael Steuwe, whom I had previously met). They are fantastic people. I was already high on Chambers, and now that I understand what kind of family he comes from, I like him even more. I’m not worried about him portaling, either. He loves it at Tech.
Those guys are young, though. Not even Vince Hall and Xavier Adibi played as true freshmen. Neither did Jack Tyler. Even Tremaine Edmunds, a future first-round pick, only played in two games on defense as a true freshman, and he had sort of a rough go of it in those two games against Georgia Tech and Tulsa. Good true freshmen safeties have been few and far between, too. Remember, Kam Chancellor played corner as a freshman. Point being, it’s really hard to play safety and linebacker as a true freshman. Consistency just isn’t going to be there, and it would be unfair to expect it to be.
Those guys have a chance to be really good, though. I think Brennan Johnson does, too. There is plenty to be excited about there. Those are the types of guys I want to build the future of the defense around.
ACC Notes
Yeah, I just don’t have a lot of things to say about that game. On to some ACC topics. Here’s a funny tweet.
After suing the ACC and pushing through a revenue share based on TV ratings, FSU vs. Clemson next week will air on non-Nielsen rated ACC Network.
— Stewart Mandel (@slmandel) November 1, 2025
You can’t make that stuff up.
It’s funny, but it’s also bad for the league. Those two programs, plus Virginia Tech, simply aren’t holding up their end of the deal. When so many teams in the league are smaller, private schools with small fanbases, the big state schools need to hold up their end of the bargain. The Tigers, Seminoles and Hokies are not doing so. Throw in Miami as well, who lost its second ACC game this weekend. Here’s to another year of the Hurricanes not winning an ACC title.
Right now, UVa — who made a big commitment to NIL last offseason — is on top of the league standings with a 5-0 record. What’s funny is that the Cavaliers’ only loss came to NC State in a non-conference game. That’s just about the most ACC thing I’ve ever heard.
Here are the top six teams in the ACC standings and their corresponding conference record:
• UVa: 5-0
• GT: 5-1
• Pitt: 5-1
• Louisville: 4-1
• SMU: 4-1
• Duke: 4-1
Miami is 2-2 and lost to SMU and Louisville head-to-head. The Hurricanes are done. Everyone else in the league has three losses or more. If you’ve watched them play, UVa is fortunate to be 5-0. Georgia Tech should probably be 4-2, and they were also fortunate to not be down 17-0 to Duke. (It wouldn’t surprise me if Manny Diaz is No. 2 on Tech's big board, for what it’s worth.) Of that top group, Louisville seems like the best team on balance.
That means the Hokies were quite possibly a fingertip catch away from leading the best team in the league by two scores in the third quarter. That’s the same Virginia Tech team that trailed Old Dominion 31-0 in the third quarter in September. Point being, you’re never as far away as it may seem. The Hokies can be “back” a lot quicker than most people believe.
Another Open Week
I’m taking Andy’s advice. I’m not calling them “bye” weeks anymore because that’s not really what they are. Regardless, the Hokies don’t play a football game next weekend. That’s two open weeks nearly on top of each other, with the other coming on October 18. You don’t see that very often.
Open weeks are usually pretty boring. This one probably will be, too, unless Franklin defies the college football norm and accepts a head-coaching position before the season is over. I wouldn’t bet on that happening, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility. This has been a crazy year on many fronts. The Auburn job just opened up as I was finishing this article. If anything, it will get even crazier throughout the month of November.
Next week’s ACC slate isn’t particularly appealing, with Clemson-FSU being the big-name matchup, but both of those teams are struggling. Still, it will be a Saturday where Tech fans will be able to sit back and enjoy some college football. That’s always fun.