ECU Week, Volume 5 (Everyone Exhales edition) ...

Well, it certainly wasn’t pretty. The offense started off – again – with three drives deep in opposing territory that netted two field goals and a fumble out the back of the end zone.

After QB Tyrod Taylor fumbled at the goal line, it marked the 12th consecutive time Tech had been in opposing territory in the first half – spanning three games – and failed to score a touchdowns. At that point, those 12 drives had resulted in nine total points. Ouch.

And that defense? Stout most of the night, but for the third straight game they gave up a long scoring drive on the opponents’ final possession (in the final three minutes) of the first half.

That’s the bad and the ugly. The good? For the Hokies, it was a 16-3 win (emphasis on the win part) to end a two-game skid and avoid an epic tank job not seen since 2003.

For Ryan Williams, it was a career-high 179 yards on 26 carries – including another handful of highlight runs worthy of ESPN’s top plays list. That’s the way you bounce back from a fumble that allowed UNC to kick the winning field goal seven days ago. Afterward, he was ecstatic.

For Taylor, who was again imperfect, it was a night when his leadership shined. After the fumble, he took the team right back and scored on a run almost identical to his crazy-cool scoring scramble against Cincinnati in the Orange Bowl last year. Taylor’s arm was a little erratic, but he hit some clutch throws and he ran for 61 hugely important yards.

Despite its scoring struggles, the offense piled up 250 yards in the first half and gave Tech a 10-minute edge in time of possession. The Hokies ran 73 plays tonight. There’s no underplaying the value of that to a young, sometimes-shaky defense.

Oh, and speaking of veteran leadership, LB Cody Grimm (aside from getting burned on a pass play that didn’t end up costing the Hokies) was a man on fire tonight. He had 12 tackles, a sack and a forced (and recovered) fumble that pretty much sealed the deal on this win.

It wasn’t all good. But it was a victory. And it was very apparent that’s exactly what the Hokies needed tonight. What I need now is a nap. Here’s the quick and dirty version of post-game interviews, some of the highlights if you will.

(Not included – and I’m not making this up to dig at some of you – was Ryan Williams’ proclamation that O-coordinator Bryan Stinespring called a brilliant game. He said that unprompted. I’m just saying.)

HEAD COACH FRANK BEAMER

OPENING REMARKS: “It’s been a tough couple of weeks here, but I’m really, really proud of our players and our coaches. They kind of hung in there through some tough times and kept working. To come in here and beat this crowd, now, I’m proud. They look the part and they’ve got speed and they’re a tough football team. For us to come in here after last week, the tough loss at the end, it just says a lot. I use that word relentless, and that’s exactly how I’d describe this football team.”

ON RYAN WILLIAMS: “I tell you, some of those runs, that was relentless. People looked like they had him and he just kept going and, I mean, a couple of those runs were amazing. They need to be on ESPN tonight, I think.”

ON WILLIAMS AFTER THE FUMBLE: “You saw him in that dressing room and knew how much that hurt him ... how much he felt like he let people down. And you appreciate that, too. He cares.”

LB CODY GRIMM

ON GETTING A WIN: “It feels real good to get everyone off our back. It feels good.”

ON GIVING UP A LONG DRIVE BEFORE THE HALF: “It was a little upsetting. In our cover three, I wasn’t setting up as wide as usual. It’s a little bit my fault. They started recognizing it and running quick routes. They just ran good plays. But as long as they don’t get in the end zone, it’s good.”

ON NOT CARING HOW IT LOOKED, BUT JUST NEEDING A WIN: “We were talking about the weekend off. A bunch of us are going home. I don’t want to sit at home again and watch everyone else play football and we lost. It’s a real good feeling to watch football and be happy about it.”

ON THE DEFENSE AFTER TWO ROUGH GAMES: “We stayed calm. We even had some mistakes tonight, but we made up for them.”

RB RYAN WILLIAMS

ON BOUNCING BACK: (All smiles) “I’m proud of myself. Words can’t describe how I feel right now, coming from where I was last week. It’s a lot more smiles, right? No bags under the eyes, right?”

ON COPING: “I just did a lot of research. I researched on Walter Payton, how many fumbles he had. All my favorite running backs. And I just realized that it happens to everybody. Nobody can be perfect. After I realized that, I came out to practice with the same mentality as always.”

ON THE PLAY: “It’s been gone. It was gone last week. Thinking about it right now, it still makes me sick to my stomach. But things happen. I can’t be perfect. But I can try to be as perfect as I can be.”

ON TALKING TO HIS MOM BEFORE THE GAME: “That’s my best friend. The last thing we said – I talk to her every day and I called her as soon as we got off the bus – she said, ‘Do your thing, Ru.’ That’s all I needed to hear.”

QB TYROD TAYLOR

ON THE FUMBLE ON WHAT LOOKED LIKE A TD RUN: “I still think it is. ... It was a little frustrating, but when I came to the sideline, I told the guys, ‘I’ll eat that one, but when we get back on the field, I’ll make sure I get y’all another one.’ ”

ON NOT A PERFECT GAME, BUT A WIN: “Sloppy or not sloppy, I think a win was good for this team, just to get us back on track and just to get the team together. ... If it was 3-2 or 2-0, we would take this win.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

ECU Week, Volume 4 (Sweating the Snap edition) ...

Looking for a little thing that could be a big deal tonight at ECU? Look no further than the starting center for the Hokies, who is likely to be a redshirt freshman with 24 snaps of collegiate experience.

Michael Via, who is a very good prospect down the road, will be replacing arguably Tech’s most consistent lineman this season – junior Beau Warren, who has played more than 400 snaps this year.

Warren is listed as doubtful for tonight’s game with a sprained knee. If he doesn’t go, Via will start and be backed up by senior Richard Graham, a former walk-on who actually has nine career starts.

Graham is a utility guy for the Hokie who was used heavily in the past when injuries arose, but who has played the same number of snaps (24) as Via this year. He has played games at both guard and tackle, but never center – where he has been working this week in practice.

I’m not sure how to find out, but I’d be curious if Graham happens to play at center whether he has maybe played all five positions on the offensive line. It’s doubtful he ever took a snap at left tackle, but it’s possible.

Regardless of all that, I think you can see the situation is a little unsettling. The center is a HUGE part of what makes an O-line work. Having a freshman – or a guy who has never played there – is not ideal.

That said, offensive line coach Curt Newsome routinely pointed out Via during August camp and early in the year as one of the back-up linemen he was really impressed with. He mentioned him along with guard Greg Nosal, who has become a major part of the line lately. Newsome said that Via would be playing plenty if it weren’t for the staff’s aversion to rotating at center.

Tonight, against a couple of very good defensive tackles for East Carolina, we’ll find out if Newsome’s faith was founded. Here’s the coach (and the kid) to talk about a tough assignment for the rookie ...

O-LINE COACH CURT NEWSOME

ON WORKING RICHARD GRAHAM, LONG-TIME UTILITY LINEMAN, AT BACK-UP CENTER THIS WEEK: “Yeah, and he played there in the spring, so he’s had some reps there. It’s a guy that knows what we’re doing up front and has got plenty of experience.”

ON GETTING REDSHIRT FRESHMAN MICHAEL VIA READY TO START IN PLACE OF INJURED BEAU WARREN: “Right now we are. Beau is ahead of where they thought he would be, but he didn’t practice (Sunday). He was in there (training room) today and Mike (Goforth) said he was well ahead of where they thought he would be. That’s the only statement I know on him. That’s good news. Where he thought he would be, I don’t know. But he’s ahead of it.”

ON SPEAKING IN THE PRESEASON ABOUT VIA BEING ONE OF THE YOUNG GUYS WHO HAD IMPRESSED BUT UNLIKE GREG NOSAL AND ANDREW LANIER, HE WOULDN’T PLAY MUCH BECAUSE TECH WON’T ROTATE CENTERS: “He’s a very athletic guy. There’s no question he’s the same type of kid (as Nosal and Lanier). He was just not big and strong enough a year ago. I want to say he was 255 and got to 280. He’s gotten stronger. He’s a smart kid; his father’s a football coach. He’s a football guy. He’s a competitor. He’s got good feet. I just wish it was this time next year. And we’ve even messed around with the fact that we wouldn’t want to leave him as a back-up center, get him a place to play a year from now.”

ON WHETHER BOTH HE AND WARREN CAN PLAY ELSEWHERE NEXT YEAR: “Well, Beau’s played more center. I think Michael has the body that he could possibly be a tackle in the future. But that’s way down the road. We’re trying to get to Thursday night right now with a guy that doesn’t have much experience, but a guy who cares a lot and works at it.”

ON HOW VIA DID WHEN HE CAME IN FOR WARREN AGAINST NORTH CAROLINA: “He got in the game the other day and I thought he did an adequate job. He was in for the last 11 or 12 plays. He’s a competitor. He’s gotten big enough. My only reservations are he’s still a freshman. That’s a hard place to play and – it seems like I say this every week – they (ECU) have two very good (defensive) tackles. Joseph and No. 90 ... so we’ll see.”

ON VIA’S MAN BEING THE ONE WHO FORCED THE FUMBLE ON RYAN WILLIAMS: “We would’ve liked to have reached him on the play. ... He came off the block. We had run the play earlier when we scored (and it was called back) and we had reached him. But it’s a tough situation for a young guy. He got in there and I think he gave us great effort.”

ON THE CONTINUED PROGRESS OF BACK-UP GUARD GREG NOSAL: “I tell you, I like him. He gets in there and he battles. He battles. He’s done a good job getting Jaymes out of there and Sergio. I treat him as a starter. I felt like Andrew Lanier (back-up tackle) would get some reps and he didn’t get any. It was just everything was so tight.”

ON HOW VALUABLE THIS EXPERIENCE HAS BEEN FOR NOSAL, AS HE’LL LIKELY BE A STARTER NEXT SEASON: “He’s been such a good surprise because you know, a year ago he had to go in a game. Blake (DeChristopher, starting right tackle) went out against East Carolina on like the third play. Greg was not even close to being ready to play. He had to play like three plays. Just to watch where he has progressed to is really kind of remarkable. He’s become a physical football player, and that was his big issue. He’s got great feet. He’s got good hands. I think he’s a young guy with a bright future.”

ON SERGIO RENDER’S STRAINED PEC: “It’s an injury that the only thing you worry about is one good shot and you tear one and you’re done. That’s our only concern. He played most of his snaps (against UNC), and when Greg rotated for him it wasn’t long series.”

C MICHAEL VIA

ON HOW MUCH WEIGHT HE HAS ADDED SINCE COMING TO TECH AND HOW MUCH STRONGER HE’S GOTTEN: “Since last year, I’m about 30 pounds heavier. Everything kind of went up a good bit (in the weight room). Right now, I’m benching probably 300. (Before that?) Probably 260.”

ON HIS MAN BEING THE ONE WHO FORCED RYAN WILLIAMS’ FUMBLE AGAINST UNC: “He was a little bit wider than what we call a shade – to my right, toward the play. I did the best I could to get over there. Jaymes Brooks left a little quick, but nothing too out of the ordinary. It’s really something you can’t avoid in that situation. It was just how they were lined up.”

ON TRYING TO ‘PLAY LOW’ AS A 6-FOOT-7 CENTER: “My dad was my coach in high school and he always told me to play low. He would tell me to play 6-2, not 6-6, so I’ve always kind of had that in my mind.”

ON HOW MUCH OF HIS DAD BEING A COACH HAS HELPED HIM: “I’ve been around the game all my life, so I’m pretty used to everything. I watch it all the time. It can be pretty important, recognizing defense and such.”

ON HIS PROGRESS THIS YEAR AND WHETHER HE EXPECTED TO GET SOME PLAYING TIME AT SOME POINT: “Going in, I knew I’d probably get some playing time, like I did against Marshall and BC when we got ahead. I didn’t really expect to in closer games.”

ON HIS THOUGHTS WHEN WARREN WENT DOWN AGAINST UNC: “I was surprised, but I was ready to go. I knew what I needed to do.”

ON HIS MAIN IMPROVEMENT THIS YEAR: “Playing firm and physical, and that comes with the weight and the strength, just getting a push on guys.”

ON HE AND GUARD GREG NOSAL TRYING TO PACK ON – AND KEEP ON – THE POUNDS: “Oh, yeah. Greg and I talk about it. He’s trying to put on weight; I’m trying to put on weight. I eat just about everything I can. Make sure you eat breakfast. That’s an important one. All last year we had breakfast checks, so I’d have the biscuits and gravy and all that kind of stuff, so that really helped me.”

ON HOW LONG HE’S BEEN AN O-LINEMAN: “Ever since I started playing. I was in pee-wee league around 6. I was always the taller one. (Dad was a center in high school and at Guilford College.)”

ON WHY, IF HE PLAYED GUARD AND TACKLE IN HIGH SCHOOL, HE IS A CENTER NOW: “Well, there was a need for center this year. Shuman (last year’s starter) left. The third-stringer left last year. So it was just Beau. They needed someone to fill the position. I was a tackle last year (moved to center in spring).”

ON THE LAST TIME HE PLAYED CENTER: “Middle school, I think.”

ON WHETHER THE MOVE WAS WEIRD: “You’ve got to make calls on plays, like where the Mike linebacker is. You’ve got to locate him first and based on that is what other people on the line do and what backs do. And then you’re the main guy that has to recognize blitzes.”

ON MAKING ADJUSTMENTS IN THE GAME: “We have game plans ready, but once you’re out there, there’s certain little things like alignments or a defensive lineman’s stance that maybe tip you off that a blitz is coming.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

ECU Week, Volume 3 (Inside the Ineptitude edition) ...

This one goes out to all my peeps who say I’m too easy on the offense. I hear ya, folks, so I’m breaking out the broken record.

I put on my stat hat and dug up the dirt. You mad men were right. It’s bad, bad, bad.

Well, in the first half of the last two games, anyway. Even I – apparently now a staunch Stiney defender – can see that the Hokies’ failures when they’ve had scoring shots has been a key contributor to the last two losses.

You can’t be within 35 yards of the opposition’s end zone six times in the first half and come away with a grand total of three points. I’m with you guys on that one.

So below you’ll find the cold, hard facts. No more waxing outtawhack opinions for this guy. It is what it is, and in the first two quarters of the last two games, it has been beyond brutal. Inexplicable, really.

After the numbers, you’ll find a couple of Hokies who try to explain it. Interestingly, they agree with their coordinator’s theory: They’ve been pressing lately.

(But you and me know it’s really all that Stinespring fella’s fault.)

Oh, and if anyone is interested in a brief break from the Anger Train, here’s a story I had in today’s paper about tailback Darren Evans’ road to recovery. I’ll probably post some of the extended interviews from this story tomorrow.

http://hamptonroads.com/2009/11/virginia-tech-running-back-recovery-injury

Now back to the regularly schedule bad news ...

AGAINST GEORGIA TECH

1st drive: Reached the Yellow Jackets’ 33 before a delay of game and a sack forced a PUNT.

2nd drive: Reached the Yellow Jackets’ 35 but lasted only three plays and ended in a PUNT.

3rd drive: Started on the Yellow Jackets’ 48 and ended on the first play with an INTERCEPTION.

5th drive: Reached the Yellow Jackets’ 16 and ended with a FIELD GOAL.

TOTALS: 4 of 6 first-half possessions were inside Georgia Tech territory, 3 of 6 reaching at least the 35, and they resulted in a combined THREE points.

AGAINST NORTH CAROLINA

1st drive: Reached the Tar Heels’ 27 before ending on a FUMBLE.

2nd drive: Reached the Tar Heels’ 38 before ending in a PUNT.

3rd drive: Reached the Tar Heels’ 34 before an incompletion on fourth-and-3 resulted in a TURNOVER ON DOWNS.

6th drive: Reached the Tar Heels’ 37 before two sacks resulted in a PUNT.

7th drive: Reached the Tar Heels’ 35 before an incompletion on fourth-and-5 resulted in a TURNOVER ON DOWNS.

TOTALS: 5 of 7 first-half possessions were inside North Carolina territory, 3 of 6 reaching at least the 35, and they resulted in a combined ZERO points.

*** In the last two games, 9 of 13 first-half possessions for Virginia Tech have reached the opposition’s side of the field – six of those reaching at least the 35 – and have resulted in THREE total points. There was a field goal, four punts, two turnovers on downs, an interception and a fumble. Yikes.

*** Combined, the Hokies have run 54 plays for 258 yards in the last two first halves (4.78 yards per play) and scored a combined three points. In the second halves of the past two games, Tech has run 47 plays for 332 yards (7.1 yards per play) and scored a combined 37 points.

*** In the past two games, opponents have run 141 plays to the Hokies’ 101 while controlling the clock for 74:36 to the Hokies’ 45:24, a difference of 29:12 over that span. That, ladies and gents, ain’t gonna get the job done. (Part of that, though, is a direct result of a defense that hasn’t been able to get off the field at all in the second half of the last two games. GT and UNC were a combined 18 of 34 on third down and 2 of 3 on fourth down. Ouch.)

*** For those who would argue the last two games are the sign of continued impotence for the offense, I’d point out that in wins over Marshall, Miami, Duke and Boston College (teams with a combined 22-12 record), the Hokies averaged 473 yards and 41 points. Three of those games were consecutive, so you could argue that for a stretch the offense was consistently good. Now Tech is in the midst of a tough two-game skid. A third Thursday night against ECU and I will join the croud who claims the O is consistently bad. But there have certainly been signs of life this season and reasons to think an resurgence is possible against ECU, which is 103rd in pass defense with opposing QBs completing 63.4 percent for 250 yards per game.

TE ANDRE SMITH

ON TECH’S TROUBLE SCORING WHEN IN OPPOSING TERRITORY THE LAST TWO WEEKS: “It’s very frustrating. We all know how important the red zone is. And when you get opportunities like that, we always look to come out with the six points. For me and for most of us, we know that that’s part of the game. Sometimes, we just haven’t been as consistent as we need to be. But we continue to keep fighting to better ourselves in that opportunity in the red zone. We do know that we have to get better in that situation in particular.”

ON OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR BRYAN STINESPRING SAYING MAYBE HIS PLAYERS ARE PRESSING A LITTLE TO MAKE THE BIG PLAY: “Pressing to make big plays? I would say I agree with that. As the season’s gone on, we’ve been doing pretty well in the red zone. But a lot of times we’re looking to make bigger plays. Instead of just getting the four yards or three yards that we need just to keep moving the ball, we would much rather make the huge plays. And that’s something that we don’t need to be doing.”

WR DYRELL ROBERTS

ON WHETHER THE OFFENSE HAS BEEN PRESSING AT ALL THE LAST TWO GAMES: “When you get in the red zone, everyone’s trying to make big plays. I guess that is contributed to the fact that we’re that close to the end zone. When you’re in the red zone, of course every team wants to score 100 percent of the time. When you get in the red zone there’s just a sense of urgency that clicks in that you’re just trying to get in the end zone and make sure that drive ends with some type of points, if possible. I think that’s really all it is, really, just being that close to the touchdown.”

ON NOT BEING ABLE TO CASH IN: “It is very frustrating because of the fact we put in the time and effort, that we’re driving down the field, putting together a great drive. But not being able to finish it off, it’s just leaving a whole lot of points out there that need to be scored that, maybe if they are scored, we wouldn’t be talking about this right now. We can’t dwell on it. All we can do now is just try to fix the problem and just go into each one of these games, and every time we get into the red zone just score 100 percent of the time.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

ECU Week, Volume 2 (Pointy Fingers edition) ...

Ah, vitriol! And here I thought the Hokies were going to get through an entire season without someone needing to be fired or have their scholarship pulled or just their general dignity stripped of them to appease the angry mob.

Just ... wow. I knew my take on offensive coordinator Bryan Stinespring last night would stir the pot a bit but, boy, some of you folks REALLY don’t like the guy. And as it turns out, now some of you really don’t like me much, either.

On both counts I say only: Fair enough. Hate who you will. Don’t, however, question my journalistic integrity. Don’t tell me I’m on the VT payroll. Don’t speculate that I fear for my job or my access to the team if I don’t act like a Frank Beamer puppet.

Don’t. Not because it hurts my feelings. It doesn’t. I sleep great even with an in-box full of hate mail. But don’t say such silly things because they just aren’t true.

I’m not afraid of backlash from Beamer if I’m critical of his team. I’ve been critical many times in the past and he hasn’t clubbed me with a crow bar or barred me from interviewing anyone. He and a few of his assistant coaches have had quite a few choice words with me before. We’ve agreed to disagree on some things. Here’s a little secret: We’ve even screamed at each other.

But at the end of the day, both sides recognize and respect that we’re each just trying to our jobs. And Beamer knows that mine is to tell the truth as best I understand it. Last year, that truth was that the offense was outright impotent for almost the entire first nine games or so. And I wrote that. I went to great lengths to find the stats to confirm for you, the interested and frustrated reader, that no team had won more with less offense over the previous three seasons.

I am nobody’s puppet, folks. Just ask my boss, who would frequently like to bludgeon me for zigging when I should have zagged because I just happen to like zigging better.

So if I tell you that I don’t think this season’s shortcomings should be hung exclusively on offensive coordinator Bryan Stinespring, I’m saying so because I believe it. I think he has called some pretty excellent games this season (along with a fair number of calls that I’m sure he wants to have back). Even the guy who runs the Web site whose sole purpose is to get Stinespring fired wrote multiple posts earlier this season about what a nice job Stiney was doing and that a positive trend was developing.

But now that same guy is publicly insulting me for being some sort of Hokies PR flack. Uh, no. Even the biggest cynic was willing to admit Stinespring stepped up his game this season and the offense was getting better and players were executing better. Great? No. But better. I keep hearing how all this program needs is a top-50 offense and after six games, Tech was climbing toward that. It was a top-25 rushing team and a top-30 scoring offense.

So now, after two tough games, two crushing defeats for the Hokies ... Stiney is back to being an idiot and totally at fault for everything that has ever gone wrong for Virginia Tech in the last eight years? Come on. Step back. Take a breath.

And to those of you who took offense over my comments about defensive coordinator Bud Foster ... relax. I wasn’t saying, ‘Blame Bud.’ Hardly. As so many of you have pointed out, Tech owes a great many (most) of its wins over the past five seasons to Mr. Foster and his perpetually top-10 defense.

So maybe in my haste, I wrote it wrong last night. The point I was trying to illustrate is that no one ever says, ‘Whoa, Bud is slipping. What’s his problem?’ EVERYONE is saying, ‘If his defense is struggling, he must have less talent than in the past. It must be the players’ failure to execute.’ And Foster has essentially said as much. What I don’t get, though, is why that’s a viable excuse for Foster and not for Stinespring?

Maybe it’s just TRUE in both cases. Everyone within the program talked about the horrible strikeouts in offensive line recruiting several years ago, which led to porous units up front the past three seasons. Is it a coincidence, then, that the offense struggled mightily in those years? But it couldn’t be the players, right?. And if Stinespring said so, he’d just be “throwing them under the bus.” But if Foster says so, it’s just true and the players need to step up.

Does nobody see the double standard in that? My point last night is that I think fans are letting the past few years color their perceptions of today. And the fact is, things change. This year is not the same as any of the previous three (or five).

This year, the Hokies have won most of their games as a team. They’ve lost all three of their games as a team. There have been great successes and great failures in all three phases of the game.

So maybe it’s possible that, despite all the hype – admittedly perpetuated in part by people like me – this was always just a team that was going to lose two or three games. No shame in that. No blame in that.

Ah, but we need goats, don’t we? Maybe someone wants to send this guy below some hate mail? No? Well, that’s good to hear. It wouldn’t surprise me. With some of the fire that comes spewing out of folks after a loss, no wonder this kid didn’t want to leave his house ...

RB RYAN WILLIAMS

ON HIS NIGHT AFTER THE FUMBLE AND THE LOSS AGAINST UNC ON THURSDAY: “I didn’t go to sleep until about 8 that (next) morning. I stayed up all night. Couldn’t sleep. I stayed in my room in the dark. That play just ran through my head over and over again. When I say over and over again, I mean over and over again. If I wasn’t tired, I probably still would be up thinking about the play.”

ON WHETHER HE’S OVER IT NOW: “Yeah, I’ve got to be. I’m a guy who doesn’t like dwelling on things about that past. If I keep dwelling on it, my future, the future for this team and me helping this team won’t probably be very good. I can’t have something negative lingering, sitting on my mind.”

ON THE TEAM’S MOOD GOING FORWARD: “The same mood for every game. We’ve got to come in and play our ‘A’ game. Some games, we’re going to play our ‘A’ game. Some games we don’t execute like we want to, and that’s where those losses come from. If we would’ve executed every play the way we needed to and come up with our ‘A’ game, we would be undefeated by now. But things happen. We just need to come out and execute.”

ON WHEN HE WOKE UP FRIDAY IF HE DIDN’T FALL ASLEEP UNTIL 8 A.M.: “Ten thirty. I just woke up. That play, that was the first thing I thought about. It still makes me sick to my stomach. But the difference now is that I’ve come to terms with it. That’s the difference now. Before, I didn’t come to terms with it. Just being able to say, ‘Yeah, I fumbled. I fumbled and that might have cost us the game.’ That’s what I’ve been able to come to terms with. I couldn’t do it before. I hate fumbling. I only fumbled once or twice in high school and I played all four years. I hate fumbling, but things happen and you’ve just got to keep going.”

ON WHAT RB COACH BILLY HITE HAS SAID TO HIM: “He pulled me to the side and he told me he already thinks that I’m a great player and that everyone he’s coached and been considered great here has fumbled. I guess arguably the best running back, Kevin Jones, put the ball on the ground multiple times. I want to be considered one of the great running backs here. Things happen. So (Hite) told me don’t get myself down about it, that I wasn’t the reason that cost the game, even though personally I think so. He said ... there were multiple times we should’ve put points on the board and we didn’t. He just said keep my head up and you’ve got to keep going.”

ON WHETHER HE’LL BE HIGHLY MOTIVATED THE REST OF THE WAY: “I’m just going to be the same old guy. That fumble doesn’t motivate me to run even better or run even harder or do things any differently. I’m going to come out against ECU the same guy I’ve previously been. I’m going to try to make plays.”

ON WHAT HE DID FRIDAY TO FORGET ABOUT IT: “I just chilled. That’s all I do anyway. I just chill in my room and watch TV. It was probably about Saturday, Sunday when I started talking to people. I was really down on myself. I didn’t even go to class Friday. I stayed in my room. I couldn’t stomach looking at people’s face, the same people who look at me every day and tell me how proud they are of me and tell me I’m their favorite player on the team ... that they look up to me. To look in their face and know I may have disappointed them in some way, I just couldn’t do it. I went out Saturday ... and it made me feel a lot better, that a lot of people were still in my corner. They just basically told me that regardless of what happened ... one mistake don’t compare to my whole season. I was still apologizing to people that were coming up to me. They gave me a hug, gave me support. I was apologizing to them because I still feel bad about it. That’s something that probably won’t ever leave my mind, but it’s got to.”

*** And here’s the Big Whistle ...

HEAD COACH FRANK BEAMER

OPENING REMARKS ON EAST CAROLINA: “I’m really impressed with this East Carolina football team. It all starts out with their quarterback, Pinkney. He’s a dynamic player. Their running backs are really coming along, and I think this wide receiver, Harris, is really a special player. ... Defensively, they’ve got eight seniors. They’ve got experience. They’re very strong up front. They’ve got a kicker that kicks it a mile. ... This is a very good football team.”

ON THE TEAM’S MENTALITY AFTER CONSECUTIVE LOSSES, INCLUDING A HEARTBREAKER AT HOME: “We certainly had a tough loss, but I think what we’re playing for is pride in each other, pride in our football team, and just going out and trying to get a win. That’s what we need to think about right now. We’ve got a good group of players here. We’ve got good kids, got good leadership. It was just a tough loss and you’ve got to go on to next week. We’re playing for the pride of each other and all the work that we’ve put into this thing and we just need to work to get a win right now.”

ON HOW HARD RB RYAN WILLIAMS TOOK HIS FUMBLE AT THE END OF THAT GAME: “He knows he’s got everybody’s support. He’s a tough guy and he’ll come through it. In athletics, you’re out there and you’ve just got to realize there’s some bad with some good. And there’s going to be a lot of good from that guy. There already has been in the short time he’s been here, and there’s going to be a lot more good before he leaves here.”

ON HEAVY FAN CRITICISM OF OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR BRYAN STINESPRING AFTER THE LOSS: “Well, I appreciate people’s interest and people’s passion for our program. I don’t think now is the time. Anything along those lines is not helping us beat East Carolina, and that’s all I’m concerned about right now is beating East Carolina. That’s going to take a major, major effort.”

ON HIS MESSAGE TO THE TEAM DURING THEIR MEETING AFTER THE LOSS: “I told them that we were in the exact same position last year as far as record: just lost two conference games. We kept working, stuck together and we ended up the season feeling good about ourselves. That’s what needs to take place now. I talked about some tough losses back in 1998. We lost three games that were just tough, tough losses. That’s life. You get disappointment in life and you’ve got to come back from it. ... We always came back (in ’98). That’s just part of football. You’re going to have disappointment. How you come back from it is what’s important. That’s where we are right now.”

ON WHETHER THIS ONE WAS HARD TO SHAKE OFF FOR HIM PERSONALLY: “Well, you’ve got to move forward. We’ve got such a tough opponent coming up that it doesn’t take you long to figure you better forget about North Carolina and start getting ready for East Carolina. This crowd, they can play. ... This is a football team that beat us last year and we need to play a great football game at their place to have a chance to win it.”

ON LYNDELL GIBSON STARTING TAKING JAKE JOHNSON’S STARTING SPOT AT LINEBACKER: “I think Lyndell’s got some real talent, just a natural nose for the football. He’s very quick, stocky. Jake’s going to continue to play. Both of them are just young. We’re you’re young, sometimes it’s inconsistent. But both of them are going to play and Lyndell, I like his possibilities.”

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ECU Week, Volume 1 (Skewering Stiney? edition) ...

Yes, I’ve seen the fliers. Honestly, I think they’re a little much. A tad distasteful. A pinch immature.

Hey, I get the frustration. I understand that fans need a guy to hate, to blame, to poke pitchforks at when things fall apart.

But if you honestly believe offensive coordinator Bryan Stinespring is fully at fault for these last two losses, you’re really, really, REALLY not paying attention.

To say nothing of the defense’s glaring goofs – and I’m not pointing fingers at Bud Foster in the least, but why does he get an apparent lifetime pass on criticism? – let’s just take a closer look at Stiney’s “failures.”

What everybody is so fighting mad about, best I can tell, are those infamous six possessions that got inside the Tar Heels’ 40-yard line and resulted in a total of three points. Ouch. Listen, I’d be angry about that, too.

But how much of that impotence was actually Stinespring’s fault?

His offense opened the game with a 25-yard run and a 20-yard pass. What more do you want? Tech was gashing the Tar Heels right out of the gate. The Hokies were deep in UNC territory. And ... receiver Jarrett Boykin fumbled at the end of the 20-yard catch. How do you hang that one on Stinespring?

Or how about when Jayron Hosley returned a punt to the Carolina 37 ... then QB Tyrod Taylor danced around too long, waited forever for a receiver to come open down the field, and took two sacks. TOOK two sacks. The line didn’t break down. The play wasn’t bad. The quarterback held the ball too long. And Tech punted.

Maybe you’re mad about that drive where Stiney drew up plays that resulted in completions of 13 and 16 yards, then a 20-yard Ryan Williams touchdown run? Where did the offensive coordinator go wrong there? By calling down to right tackle Blake DeChristopher and asking him to negate the TD run with a holding penalty? Come on. That was a nice drive, squashed by a flag – not poor playcalling.

Sometimes, it really is just about players making (or failing to make) the plays that are called. Now, is Stinespring ultimately responsible for getting his players ready to make the plays he’s calling? Of course. But the guy has been better this season. There’s no arguing that. The Hokies, while still lower than you’d like, are improved in every major statistical category.

And when Tech was winning, people were off Stinespring’s back. Now we’ve seen two straight losses and the students are organizing a rally at Frank Beamer’s radio show tonight to call for Stiney’s head. Consider me in the camp who thinks that: 1) the rally will be poorly attended and fall flat, and 2) is terribly timed and a total knee-jerk reaction.

Where was this rally last season? Or the year before? You’re coming at the guy now, after his offense – not of late, but in general – has improved???

I guess you’re also fully discounting the Hokies' 13-play, 82-yard touchdown drive that tied the game early in the third quarter against North Carolina? That’s the kind of thing that the Hokies needed more of, sure, but got almost NONE of last season.

Did you know the Hokies have more offensive plays of 20-plus yards (44) through eight games this year than in they had last year (40) in 14 games?

Meanwhile, I suppose Stiney haters are also fully discounting the previously mentioned defensive disasters in the past two games. You know, like the 270 rushing yards Georgia Tech had in the second half as the defense absolutely could not stop the Yellow Jackets while the offense put up 195 yards and 21 points over the final 23 minutes. Or, you know, like the offense scoring 17 points in the second half against the Tar Heels to take the lead ... only to see the defense give up a ridiculous, 16-play drive that tied it for Carolina (on which UNC converted third-and-7 and fourth-and-7)?

Look, I’m not hanging this on the defense, either. Nor am I saying it’s all about the players failing, leaving the coaches liable for nothing. I’m just always amazed by the total lack of perspective that often follows disappointing losses. The offense squandered some serious scoring chances. The defense wilted when Tech needed it most. There were stupid penalties on both sides of the ball and no doubt a few calls both coordinators would like back.

The Hokies, all of them, lost this one. Same story with the previous one. To hang it all on any one person is both unfair and uninformed.

Just trying to inject a little fact, a little reason, into what I understand is an emotional debate. Something went badly and now you need a villain. I get it.

Here then, Hokies, is your guy ...

O-COORDINATOR BRYAN STINESPRING

ON HIS THOUGHTS WHEN CENTER BEAU WARREN WENT DOWN: “For Beau to go down, you knew it had to be bad. Beau is the toughest guy we have on this football team, and he plays as hard as anybody we have on this football team. For him to go down and not get up, you realize pretty quickly it was an injury that wasn’t going to allow him to come back into the game.”

ON HOW BAD IT IS: “He’s just getting better every day. That’s kind of Beau. That night and the next morning, it was very sore, very doubtful. And each day he’d come out and put some type of miracle treatment on it, I guess. I don’t know, but he’s just making great progress as it goes on, so we haven’t ruled out anything right now.”

ON WHETHER, BESIDES QB, CENTER IS THE TOUGHEST SPOT ON OFFENSE FOR A FRESHMAN TO PLAY: “Oh, I don’t think there’s any question. I think it’s the most difficult position on the field, with the exception of quarterback. You’ve got to snap and step. Then you’ve got to go block. Then you’ve got set the scheme in the motion of your runs. You’ve got to help set the scheme in the motion of your protections. The center spot is not any different than baseball. You’ve got to be good right up the chute, to be able to handle a lot of things that go on inside. It’s a difficult spot. Not just the blocking that you have to do, but understanding your front side and backside on any given play. Who you’re working with changes on any given play. There’s a lot involved in the position.”

ON WHETHER THEY CHANGE ANYTHING THIS WEEK FOR THE ROOKIE, MICHAEL VIA, AT CENTER: “Yeah, he’s got some great help around him, some people that can make some pre-snap profile awareness deals. And they all work in conjunction with each other anyway. That element will probably increase if Michael were to play. But I thought when Michael went out there to play, he did a tremendous job out there. We tried to help as much as we could, but he had to go out and play the game. We were in a game that we had to move the ball ... and he went out there and played the game. The first time we put him in the shotgun, you all hold your breath a little bit, but he did a great job.”

ON LOOKING AT SOME OF THE SACKS IN THAT UNC GAME – AND ALL SEASON – WHETHER HE SEES A NUMBER THAT WERE MAYBE NOT ON THE O-LINE AND MORE ON THE QB: “I’m not sure if the line actually gave up a sack (against UNC). I know they get credited for it. I think in general, we all tried to make big plays, to make plays and not just do the little things and let the big things occur. When you get back there, if we’re holding the ball, the longer things happen, there’s a chance that somebody’s going to eventually get to the quarterback. That was part of it. And we had a mental error at tight end that caused one. That’s the best thing about being a tight end coach. People know when a guy gets sacked, ‘It had to be the line.’ But the tight end coach didn’t do a very good job with the tight end. We had a mental error that created a sack.”

ON WHETHER THE OFFENSIVE PLAYERS HAVE BEEN PRESSING AT ALL: “You’ve got to make sure you don’t confuse press with panic, because there was not a bit of panic within our football team. There’s been too many battles our football team has been in already this season. But I think sometimes during the course of this game, when you look back, we pressed to make big things happen. When you do that, if we’re not careful, we’re not doing some of the little things that allow the big things to occur.”

ON THE AVERAGE DISTANCE FOR THE HOKIES ON SECOND DOWN AGAINST UNC BEING SECOND-AND-9 AND WHY THEY RAN THE BALL 11 TIMES ON 15 SECOND-DOWN PLAYS: “Some of those runs were quarterback runs. Some of those were quarterback draws to try to get you back in a manageable situation. A couple of those were actually called passes that turned into runs. We tried to spread the field and take what they were giving us and we called some decide-option game with some alerted throws off of it and we ended up giving the ball (to the RB). It was an either/or principle there. It wasn’t like we were designing to say, ‘OK, on second-and-long let’s run the ball.’ We had some either/ors there and we ended up running them.”

ON STARTING THE GAME WITH A 25-YARD RUN THEN 20-YARD PASS, THEN A FUMBLE: “It was disappointing because that’s what we talked about. That was the first key to success: Set a tone early. You pop off a long run. You come right back off of it with an aggressive play-action pass that already puts you in the red zone ... and that didn’t happen. Frustrating is not the word. It was disappointing. But there’s disappointing aspects of the game and you’ve got to rebound from it. You’ve got to go to the next series, go to the next play. That touchdown that’s called back ... you can’t lament over the fact that a touchdown’s called back. You’ve got to figure out a way to come back and get points again, overcome the holding call.”

ON DRIVING INTO OPPOSING TERRITORY SEVERAL TIMES IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE LAST TWO GAMES AND HOW MADDENING IT IS TO NOT BEING SCORING IN THOSE SITUATIONS: “That is very frustrating. It is one that’ll cause you to bang your head on the table. It is one that’ll start making you talk to yourself. I haven’t started back, but it’s getting close. It’s disappointing, because we battle ourselves into that red zone. In the first games, we’ve capitalized and been very good about getting points, getting into the end zone or kicking field goals and getting points. That’s been the difference. We’ve gotten it down there and we haven’t capitalized. That’s as big a difference as anything for us.”

ON WHETHER THERE’S A RHYME OR REASON IN THOSE SITUATIONS: “If there was a rhyme or reason, I promise you we would work to figure it out. It’s a combination of a lot of little things. Sometimes it’s defensive play, but more often than not it’s something we’ve just got to do a better job of. Some of the things that are happening ... is a little maddening, because it’s things we’ve done well – things we have done throughout the season – then all the sudden you have a couple of those that you scratch your head. I don’t like to use the term execute, but sometimes it’s been a little bit of a breakdown here or there, combined with a good defensive play. And all the sudden, now you’re not capitalizing on those opportunities, whether it’s missing a third-and-short down at Georgia Tech; whether it’s a great punt return by Jayron Hosley setting us up; or driving it down the field and not capitalizing. It’s frustrating.”

ON RYAN WILLIAMS’ FUMBLE AT THE END, WHETHER THAT WAS THE SAME PLAY CALL AS THE ONE HE SCORED ON THAT WAS CALLED BACK FOR HOLDING: “Yes it was. You know, it’s a fine line between success and failure a lot of plays. The end result is we didn’t get the first down and North Carolina got the football. But what’s really disheartening is you go back and look at the film and we’re a half a arm tackle away from splitting it and the backside corner is going to have to make a play down the middle of the field. That’s the ones that haunt you.”

ON THAT PLAY FURTHER: “That play is something at halftime that we talked about we needed to get going a little bit. We started looking at ways we could run the ball, because everything was an eight-man front. Unless we got in four wides, unless we got in trips, everything was an eight-man front. The first snap of the game was a front that they had not shown all year. They had not shown that specific look, walking linebackers into the line of scrimmage and an eight-man front on top of it. We compensated for it. Some of those play-action passes were to get some plays down the field, because we basically had man-to-man coverage and we hit it ... That was our play for us to spread it out and still be able to run basically a power play, an outside zone play. We ran it and the one pop was 22 yards, but it was called back. We ran another one quickly there after and it went for seven yards. And we ran one to start that two-minute that went for five yards, I think. And that was the one that also created the final aspect of the game.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

UNC Week, Volume 8 (Last Call edition) ...

One last post before tonight’s (literal) fireworks. I’m pretty interested to see the video (no, he’s not playing live, while wearing his uniform) of punter Brent Bowden, an accomplished guitarist, shredding his ax to Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” for this evening’s entrance. That should be cool.

I’m emptying out the old tape recorder below. None of these are full interviews. I figured I’d pick out the most interesting stuff from the Big Whistle, the Big Play, the Big Return and the Big Little Guy. (For the uninitiated, that’s Beamer, Williams, Roberts and Grimm.)

First, let me leave you with a few numbers I dug up during research for a two-hour pre-game show with Sean Bielawski of ESPN Blacksburg. Check us out from 4-6 p.m., but here’s a preview:

* The Hokies are 15-4 all-time on ESPN Thursday night games. They’re 9-2 at home. At one point from 1999 to 2005, they won 11 in a row. Tech is 5-0 against North Carolina since joining the ACC. The Tar Heels are one of six league teams who’ve yet to beat the Hokies since 2004. All but two league teams have a losing record against VT. Carolina coach Butch Davis, dating to his Miami days, is 1-7 against Frank Beamer.

* Hokies QB Tyrod Taylor is ON FIRE. Since the start of that final Nebraska drive, Taylor is now 40 of 58 (69 percent) for 802 yards, 7 TD and 2 INT (one of those was a Hail Mary). His passer rating over that stretch is 218.05. The nation’s leader in pass efficiency is at 171.27. Before that last drive against the Huskers, Taylor had started the season 28 of 60 (47 percent) for 352 yards, 2 TD and 1 INT. That’s a passer rating of 103.61, which would not rank in the current top 100.

* RB Ryan Williams is Mr. Big Play. He has 14 plays of 20-plus yards this season, seven of which have been for 30-plus. He has broken runs of 28, 29, 32, 44, 46, 57 and 66 yards. He has catches of 36 and 43 yards. Nasty.

That’s all for now. Here are the Hokies ...

HEAD COACH FRANK BEAMER

ON HAVING TO WIN OUT AND NOT WORRY ABOUT GEORGIA TECH: “Our message is there’s a lot of football to be played. Every weekend, people win that you wouldn’t think would win and people lose that you wouldn’t think would lose. And you can’t control that. The only thing you can control is how we prepare and how we play against North Carolina. I really believe we’ve got the makings of a really good football team, but we’ve got to keep progressing, got to keep getting better. So I’m saying, ‘Put blinders on. Straight ahead. Get better. Play as hard as you can, as good as you can, and then we’ll take what happens.’ ”

ON WHETHER HE DANGLES A POTENTIAL AT-LARGE BCS BID AS A CARROT TO KEEP HIS TEAM MOTIVATED: “Yeah, I think there’s a lot of things out there: a BCS game, a 10-win season. It’s possible, and there’s only three teams that have done that the last five years. There’s a lot of good things that happen if we play some great football, but it’s going to take some really, really outstanding football – and starting this Thursday night, I promise you.”

ON HOW GLAD HE’LL BE FOR THE UNC GAME TO KICK OFF AND EVERYTHING TO BE ABOUT THIS NEXT GAME INSTEAD OF THE LAST ONE: “I thought we were over Georgia Tech last week as a football team. We played hard. They made some great plays against us, got some great players. We didn’t quite play as well as we needed to and lost. And really I thought it was behind us. I think it is. We practiced well Tuesday and Wednesday, took some time off and came back and practiced on Saturday. Then the question came up yesterday (about the GT blocks) and then things got a little crazy. But I think coaches and players put that loss behind them and have moved on. We’ll see Thursday night. But I thought we moved on. We lost to a good football team. We lost to a good team.”

RB RYAN WILLIAMS

ON WHAT HE SAYS TO HIS TEAMMATES AFTER THE LOSS: “As far as being vocal with the team, I’ve never really been that way. I feel like all the older guys are really the vocal leaders. Coming from me, it would kind of be like, ‘Be quiet.’ So that’s why I really don’t say anything. But, yeah, I was really disappointed in the Georgia Tech game – mostly because of how bad I was feeling throughout the whole game. I wish I could just rewind and not feel as bad as I did so I could make the plays that I wanted to. But my body just wasn’t really right. It was disappointing, but we’re moving on.”

ON HOW HE’S FEELING NOW: “I’m feeling better. It was probably last Monday or Tuesday where I started eating and I could keep it in. I lost like 8-9 pounds. This was the first time I weighed in the 190s since my junior year of high school. It was kind of scary. I was surviving off IVs for a couple days. But I’m back to normal. I can eat; I don’t wake up weak anymore. It feels good to go to practice and not feel like I’ve got somebody 400 pounds on my back.”

ON HOW MUCH THE WEIGHT LOSS AFFECTS HIM: “It doesn’t affect me at all, because I don’t play with my weight. I play with my heart.”

ON STILL GETTING 100 YARDS IN A GAME HE WAS SICK: “It was one play. If it wasn’t for that one play, I think I averaged 2-point-something a carry, below three. I was feeling terrible that whole game, but I tried to play through it. That one play sprung me to the 100. But I really don’t look at the big, big plays. I want to be consistent through every carry, and I really wasn’t.”

ON WHETHER HE GAINED ALL HIS WEIGHT BACK: “Nah. I’m like 203, 204. I’m usually in the 208-210 range.”

ON WHETHER THIS SEASON HE’S HAD SURPRISES HIM: “I just kind of take it in stride. I really try my hardest not to pay attention to numbers. But when you have people throwing them in your face all the time, people on the outside, your friends or people that’s really excited about what you’re doing, it kind of brings it to your attention. But I don’t pay attention to it, because I don’t want to get distracted by chasing anything.”

WR DYRELL ROBERTS

ON THE BALL HE CAUGHT ON HIS BACK AGAINST GEORGIA TECH: “Tyrod has thrown that ball 100 times in practice. We always work on the deep ball, the jump ball. It’s just little things you work on every day to improve your deep game. Last year, as you know, I struggled on the deep balls. Those were the two big drops I had last year. This year, I’m really trying to perfect that part of my game, go up and get it, keep my eyes on it, instead of catch it with my body, catch it with my hands.”

ON NOT PRACTICING CATCHING IT ON HIS BACK, THOUGH: “Oh, no, I’ve never caught none on my back, but he throws that ball to all of us. We work on our timing. It’s really just a year of being older and him knowing us and us knowing him.”

ON WHETHER THERE WAS SOME MOTIVATION WATCHING COALE AND BOYKIN CATCH THE DEEP BALL AND HE HADN’T REALLY: “Oh, yeah. But it’s really not competition between us, because we’re on the same team. We look at it like we’re brothers. We congratulate each other. Whoever catches a ball, it’s just, ‘Good job. Way to bail us out.’ All of us are growing together, so that as time goes on, it won’t be, ‘Such and such is this type of receiver and such and such is that type of receiver.’ It’ll be all the receivers we have, you can go down the list and say they’re all complete packages; they can all do the same things. That’s our goal.”

LB CODY GRIMM

ON WHETHER HE HAS BAILED ON HIS FAVORITE TEAM, HIS FATHER’S OLD TEAM, THE REDSKINS: “No, I haven't bailed on them all the way yet. I was joking with the guys on the team not to call it a comeback when we win the NFC East. But, yeah, they're not playing so good right now.”   ON PAYING ATTENTION TO GEORGIA TECH’S SCORES: “Yeah, I'll definitely watch the game. But at same time we've got to concentrate on us right now. I mean there's lot of football for us to play. A lot of things can change, a lot of crazier stuff has happened and right now we're just concentrating on how we can beat UNC.”   ON THE BOOK ‘THE BLINDSIDE’ AND THE INTRO DESCRIBING HIS FATHER RUSS AND BEAU WARREN’S DAD HAVING A MAJOR ROLE IN JOE THEISMAN’S GRUESOME INJURY: “Richard Graham read the book and he was telling me about it, so I called my dad and asked him about it. He said Mr. Warren was supposed get help from the running back on the outside and that Lawrence Taylor ran around the outside – and my dad wasn't supposed to slide out at all. He said it was the running back’s fault in the blocking scheme.”

ON WHETHER HE REALIZED HIS DAD’S SIGNIFICANCE IN THAT PLAY: “I knew my dad was playing tackle during the play but I never heard it was his fault or anything until I read that book. And he blames it on the running back. (laughing).” ‘

ON WHAT HE, AS A SENIOR LEADER, SAYS TO THE TEAM AFTER THE GEORGIA TECH LOSS: “I don't think you really need to say anything after the loss. Defensively, it's more when you get a win you've got to keep the guys honest. After a loss, we understand what we need to do and how we need to play. We didn't do it against Georgia Tech and we're going to have to come out and do it the rest of the season. We’re upset about the loss. We know what kind of team we can be.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

UNC Week, Volume 7 (Don't Doubt Defense edition) ...

My nonstop number-crunching got delayed this week by Chopgate. Did you miss it? Or should I talk some more about those dirty (I’m kidding) Yellow Jackets?

Yeah, let’s get back to the good stuff. So if it’s not low blocks that has you worried, I’m guessing its the Hokies’ sort of sporadic defense, no? Hey, I hear you. The big play problem persists. Tech has given up 12 runs of 20-plus yards in seven games. The defense only gave up 14 such runs in 14 games last year.

HOWEVER ... I’m here to tell you that if I were a betting man – and if Vegas allowed wagers on such things – I’d empty my savings account on this hunch:

Virginia Tech’s defense is going to see a drastic jump in every major category over the next five games. Why? Well, it’s a simple, two-fold formula: 1) Bud Foster’s defenses always get better as a season goes along and ... 2) The Hokies aren’t going to play any offenses even remotely as good in the final five games as they did in the first seven.

No, seriously. Tech’s first seven opponents are averaging 380 yards per game. Four of those teams rank top 50 nationally in total offense. The Hokies final five opponents average 325 yards per game. Four of those teams rank 90th or worse in total offense. (P.S. Tech's first seven foes all have winning records and are a combined 38-15, while only two of the final five opponents are above .500 and the closing quartet is a combined 16-20.)

That’s why I think despite this year’s defensive rankings after seven games – which look almost exactly like they did last year after seven games – they will be end up being about as good as they did in 2008.

Check out this little graphic, then here what the Hokies have to say ...

                                      2009 (7 games)            2008 (first 7 games)      2008 (final ranks)

Total defense              No. 31 (317 ypg)         No. 33 (312 ypg)               No. 7 (279 ypg)

Run defense               No. 76 (150 ypg)          No. 43 (123 ypg)               No. 14 (104 ypg)

Pass defense             No. 15 (167 ypg)          No. 39 (190 ypg)               No. 16 (175 ypg)

Scoring defense        No. 28 (19.1 ppg)        No. 37 (19.9 ppg)             No. 9 (16.7 ppg)

DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR BUD FOSTER

ON GETTING BACK TO WORK AFTER THE LOSS: “Yeah, we’re going back (to work). We’ve got to focus on the next game. We lost a tough one. Move on. Can’t have a hangover. Can’t let one game affect the other. All we can do is go out and control our own destiny. Hopefully that’s what we’re going to do the rest of the way.”

ON NEEDING SOME HELP NOW FROM GEORGIA TECH IF THE HOKIES HOPE TO WIN THE ACC: “Well, yeah, I guess so. We need some help from somebody, but we’ll see how that goes. Georgia Tech is a good football team. We’ve got a lot of respect for them. We’ve got a good football team and we just need to take care of what we can control. That’s one game at a time, and we’ve got five tough games the rest of the way.”

ON WHETHER HE ALMOST SAYS TO HIS DEFENSE, ‘THROW THIS ONE OUT THE WINDOW’ ABOUT GT, BECAUSE THAT OFFENSE IS SO UNIQUE: “Yeah. It’s a unique offense. It’s a one-time shot. For the first half, we played it about as well as you can play it. Then there’s some unique things they do. They do a great job of scheming you. We changed our scheme and they adjusted to it. We’ve got to go back and maybe adjust it again. We’ll get better from it the more we see it. Just like they get better from it the more they see defenses. But we don’t have to play that offense again (this season) unless we end up with Navy or Air Force in a bowl game. But then you’ve got a month to prepare for it rather than three days.”

ON WHETHER IT’S UNFAIR, IN A WAY, TO A DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR WHO HAS SEEN THAT OFFENSE TWICE COMOPARED TO PAUL JOHNSON, WHO HAS RUN THAT OFFENSE FOR YEARS AGAINST EVERY CONCEIVABLE DEFENSE: “Well, don’t know if it’s unfair, if that’s the right word to say. I know this: I’ve got to do a better job myself. We tried to do some things. Down the stretch, we made some adjustments, had a couple pitches on the ground. We recovered one. We had one we didn’t recover that could’ve been big. And then they countered us again. That’s what (Johnson) does a great job of. We have to be able to add another wrinkle or two to our scheme just to be able to offset what they do, that they’ve got to keep adjusting to us, too. But we’re building a package as you go along. That’s something he’s got. He’s got a package for every defense known to man, where we see it once a year and this is the second time since 1995 that we’ve seen this kind of deal.”

ON ALL THE TALK ABOUT THE SECOND-HALF ADJUSTMENT TO THE WAY KAM CHANCELLOR WAS BEING BLOCKED: “When we adjusted, they did a good job with their slots and a good job with their receivers cracking and doing things, just reading out. Reading what we were doing. That just goes back to them knowing their scheme and knowing how to handle the different things they see.”

ON HOW MUCH HE’LL WATCH GEORGIA TECH’S SCORES THE REST OF THE WAY: “Obviously, we watched Virginia. It’s probably the first time in a long time I’ve pulled for U.Va. But we can’t control that. We’re going to pay attention to that, but all we can control is what we do. We can’t let that game affect this one. You guys are talking about Georgia Tech. We need to talk about North Carolina, because they’re a damn good football team who just lost a couple tough games themselves. They’re a talented football team, a young football team at skill spots. But you saw against Florida State, they’ve got some capabilities of being a great offensive team. They’ve got an outstanding defense. That’s who we’ve got to focus on.”

ON HIS ASSESSMENT OF THE DEFENSE THROUGH SEVEN GAMES: “I think we’re OK. Still, we’ve given up too many big plays. We’ve given up too many plays in the run game, which to me is disappointing. That’s one thing that we pride ourselves in, making a team one-dimensional. Throw Georgia Tech out, because they’re going to run the football. You’ve got to throw them out of the mix. But everybody else, we’ve had a couple people that’s had some success running the football. That’s unacceptable around here, and our kids know that. For us to have the type of team we need to down the stretch, we’ve got to play great defense. And we’re going to have to play it against some really good football teams. But our season’s not over. We’ve got five key games left. We’ve still got a chance to win 10 football games, which would put us in elite status. Depending on what Georgia Tech does, we’ve still got a chance to win this league. So that’s kind of what we’re focusing on. That’s all we can focus on.”

ON AREAS OF WEAKNESS: “I’m not going to point guys out. I’m not going to do that. We just need to do things better. Do things better within the scheme and do things better within their position. If we do that, we’ll be alright.”

ON ESPN SINGLING OUT KAM CHANCELLOR AS A WEAK SPOT AGAINST GEORGIA TECH: “Those guys, they’ve got all the answers now. Bob Davie’s got all the answers. That’s all I’ve got to say about that.”

ON WHETHER ANYTHING ABOUT THE DEFENSE’S OCASSIONAL STRUGGLES HAVE SUPRISED HIM: “Well, you’ve got young kids that are learning. The best way to learn is through experience. You guys keep talking about that and that and that. I hope we’re done talking about that. Let’s move on. Let’s talk about North Carolina.”

ON WHAT HE’D LIKE TO SAY ABOUT UNC THEN: “They’re young. They lost all their receivers. They’ve got a talented corps. They’re a lot like our kids (at receiver) last year. Maybe a little more speed. Young kids each week play a little bit better. They’ve got two good backs. They’ve got a quarterback who last year I thought was one of the better quarterbacks in our league and playing very, very solid right now. His numbers aren’t the same because of the receiving corps he has, but you see him getting better each week and gaining more confidence. They rushed for 230 yards last week against Florida State. They run reverses. They do it all. It’s a group that does a lot of misdirection in their passing game. It’s another challenge for us. A lot of people picked them, in publications, to be better than us this year. You’ve got two good football teams going to play each other. Two teams with a lot of potential and two young football teams.”

ON UNC COMING IN A LITTLE WOUNDED: “I hope they’re wounded and having the hangover. But I doubt that. Butch (Davis) will do a great job getting them ready to play. And you get into this time of year, obviously we’re still in the hunt for the ACC championship. I don’t know if they are, but now you start playing for bowl implications.”

ON WHETHER HE’D LIKE TO SEE THE HOKIES NOT ONLY WIN OUT, BUT DO SO CONVINCINGLY: “Well, yeah, obviously you’ve got to that. It helps the polls. You never know how that works out in the BCS. We lost to the No. 1 team in the country. We lost to another top 15 team. And both those games could’ve gone our way. You had an LSU team ... that played for a national championship that lost two games. There’s still hope out there. We’re not writing anything off. But the biggest thing we’ve got to focus on is one game at a time and that’ll all take care of itself down the line. Georgia Tech’s still got a couple tough ballgames and we’ve got five ourselves that we’ve got to get ready to play for.”

ON REMINDING HIS GUYS THAT EVEN IF GEORGIA TECH LOSES, IT DOESN’T MATTER IF ... “if we don’t take care of business. That’s really what we’ve got to focus on. That game is behind us. Everybody’s disappointed. We had some opportunities. The best defense against that offense is having control of the ball yourself and putting up points and putting them where they’ve got to play catch-up and we had some opportunities early in the game and it didn’t work out. But the biggest thing now is put that one behind us. If we let that game affect this one, then shame on us.”

ON UNC’S OFFENSE HAVING POTENTIAL, BUT STATISTICALLY THEY’RE PRETTY TERRIBLE: “Well we don’t look at statistics. All you’ve got to do is turn the film on and watch their talent. You look at what they can hurt you with, what we’ve got to be good at. That’s why you play the games, because every week, anybody can beat anybody. You guys have seen that. This is a good team. We’ve got to go play great football.”

ON WHAT HE HAS SEEN FROM HIS PLAYERS SINCE THE LOSS: “I think they’re very focused. We had a couple days of practice last week just to stay sharp and keep our timing. But at the same time, we wanted them to get away from us a little bit, get their minds right, get fresh. And as coaches, you’re working 7 to 11 about seven days a week. You need a little break, too. Lucky for us, we got to go recruit. But to me, they got a chance to get back fresh. We had a couple guys, Gravy’s banged up a little bit ... just your typical deal for this time of year. You’ve got some nicks and bangs and bruises and you’ve got an opportunity for those guys to get in the training room and get a little better. ... At the same time, sometimes the best deal is to get back out there an play. That’s the thing about basketball: You get beat on Saturday and turn around and play on Monday or Tuesday. We’ve got 10 days.”

ON WHETHER THAT CAN BE GOOD: “Maybe. They know I’m not happy. But it doesn’t matter about me. It’s about them and those guys being ready to play. That’s where we challenge them, going out and being consistently good. We’ve got to earn it. We’re always going to have a bulls-eye on our chest because of who we are and what we’ve developed here – and I like that, because it means we have to play at the highest level. If we don’t, we’re going to get everybody’s best shot and they’ve got a chance to beat us.”

CB RASHAD CARMICHAEL

ON MIAMI’S LOSS, GIVING GT CONTROL OF THE COASTAL: “I just heard about it this (Sunday) morning, actually. Somebody was talking about it at Bojangles. I didn’t know anything about. Some people in line behind me was talking about it. But Coach Foster just tells us we can’t worry about all that stuff. It doesn’t matter to me. All we have to worry about is coming out and trying to win this game against North Carolina. We don’t control our own destiny anymore. All we can control is these few games we have ahead of us.”

ON MISSING AN OPPORTUNITY IN ATLANTA: “We came and we fought our hardest and I don’t feel like we lost. The time just ran out. They controlled the clock very well. We ran out of time. I think our team would be ready to play those guys any day. Any day, we’d take that challenge again.”

ON WHERE THE DEFENSE IS THROUGH SEVEN GAMES: “(Foster) pretty much is just putting on us. After the Georgia Tech game, he told us this is our team. ‘The seniors, the leaders, whatever you guys want to call yourselves, this is your team. Where you guys are going to go, it depends on you.’ He put it on our back. He let us know, this is your brother ... and when your brother’s down, you’ve got to pick him up. You’ve got to be ready to go to war with your brother. That’s the sense, the feeling we’ve been having in practice.”

ON HOW HE THINKS THEY’RE PLAYING: “We’re playing pretty good ball. We’re not playing great ball, but I don’t think nobody else in the country is playing right now. You’ve got to look at our schedule. You’ve got to be realistic and look at our schedule. We had the toughest schedule in the nation and we lost, what, two games? I’m very proud of those guys. You can’t let the team know that, because you’ve got to keep pushing everybody. But when you sit back and look at it, I’m proud of those guys. Each week, each game, just like last season, we started to build up a little more chemistry and hopefully click together at the end of the season like we did last year.”

SS DORIAN PORCH

ON WHETHER IT HELPS THE HOKIES STAY FOCUSED HAVING HAD THE EXPERIENCE THE PAST TWO YEARS OF NEEDING SOME HELP DOWN THE STRETCH TO MAKE THE ACC TITLE AND IT HAPPENED: “Yeah, definitely. The most important thing is that we go out every week and prove what our team is about and that we are the best team in the ACC. It’s a challenge every week because everybody is playing to prove they’re the best. You just take care of what you can control and hopefully things will work out for you. Luckily, the past two years they have for us. That’s what we’re kind of counting on right now. It’s not a focus on somebody else losing. It’s a focus on us winning every game, because that’s what has to happen now.”

ON HOW THE HOKIES SPENT THE BYE WEEK: “We got two days to ourselves to kind of get away from things and relax and get our mindset back. I think that was good for us. We came back with a high intensity and it was like nothing changed around here. That’s the most important thing about our team. The way we practice all the time is the same. You can’t tell from week to week whether we’ve won or lost. It’s always the same. That helps.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

UNC Week, Volume 6 (Where's the Wild Turkey? edition) ...

Admit it: The real reason you’re mad that tight end Greg Boone hasn’t been more involved in the offense this season is because you haven’t gotten as many chances to bellow, “Boooooooooooooooooooone!”

I kind of miss that, too, because it’s always kind of funny to me when visiting media look at each other confused and say, “Why are they booing their team after a good play?”

But one of the reasons for fewer Boooooooones is because there have also been fewer Boooooooooooos for the offense in general. The Hokies have found other weapons, have become more productive across the board, despite Boone’s less visible role. In fact, the offense has thrived in part BECAUSE of Boone’s less visible role. That is to say, his important blocking has helped quarterback Tyrod Taylor buy more time to throw, directly resulting in his drastically improved efficiency.

At least that’s what the coaches are saying. I’m not football-smart enough to know. I’ll let Boone and coordinator Bryan Stinespring try to explain it to you. I can, however, give you the raw data.

A preseason first-team All-ACC pick, Boone was coming off 22 catches for 278 yards and two touchdowns as a junior in 2008. He had also run Tech’s popular Wild Turkey formation, taking direct snaps and rushing 21 times for 76 yards. He also attempted one deep pass. During August camp, we heard a little chatter about developing the throwing portion of that package.

This year, however, Boone has zero carries and only five catches. He has no passes attempted. We’ve seen one Wild Turkey play from RB Ryan Williams.

So what gives?

TE GREG BOONE

ON WHAT HAPPENED TO THE ‘WILD TURKEY’ FORMATION: “I can’t tell you. I don’t know.”

ON WHETHER THE OFFENSE IS DOING ENOUGH CONVENTIONALLY THAT TECH DOESN’T REALLY NEED THE TURKEY THIS YEAR: “I don’t really think we need it this year, just because of the offensive production and the depth we’ve got at each position. I’m fine with it. I miss it, but I’m fine with it.”

ON WHETHER HE’S IN O-COORDINATOR BRYAN STINESPRING’S EAR ASKING FOR A FEW MORE PASSES: “Nah, we haven’t really talked about it. We’re just going with the offensive game plan.”

ON THE OFFENSE’S IMPROVED CONFIDENCE: “That just came from Nebraska. We’ve got to thank Nebraska for that. We played the whole game, as opposed to Boston College (2007), when we let up the last couple minutes and they beat us. We have a mindset now that we’re going to play until there’s zero seconds on the clock.”

ON WHETHER HE FEELS A DIFFERENT MOOD ABOUT THIS OFFENSE: “Yeah, we’ve got a lot of confidence. Last year, we had a young group everywhere. This year, they’ve matured up.”

ON ONLY HAVING FIVE CATCHES IN SEVEN GAMES AND WHAT HIS APPROACH WILL BE TO THE REMAINDER OF THE SEASON: “Just do what I’ve got to do to help the team when. I don’t really care what that is.”

O-COORDINATOR BRYAN STINESPRING

ON WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO THE WILD TURKEY: “Well, first of all, Greg early in the year wasn’t healthy. That’s been a big part of it. Especially early in the year. It was not practiced much for a couple weeks. It’s a set like any other set. It’s a scheme like any other scheme that you’ve got to work on in practice. With him not being healthy early in the season, we just didn’t rep it a whole lot. As he has gotten healthier, with the running of Ryan Williams, with Tyrod being able to run the ball, with Josh Oglesby, we just really haven’t put a lot of time into it. It’s something you’ve got to put a lot of time into to have any type of success at it. We’ve repped it more the last couple of weeks and will continue to do so and hopefully get it back into the swing of things.”

ON SUCCEEDING MORE IN A TRADITIONAL WAY BEING PART OF THE REASONING, WHEREAS LAST YEAR THEY NEEDED THE TURKEY FOR A SPARK IN THE OFFENSE: “Last year, I thought we probably needed an additional way to run the ball, an additional way to line up to make defenses adjust. With the way we have been playing for the most part this season, we’re in a pretty good rhythm, we’ve been in pretty good sync and we haven’t really wanted to take Tyrod out of the game or take a tailback out of the game. Last year, when we got into the Wild Turkey set, we were kind of taking a quarterback and a tailback out of the game. Right now, those two guys are playing exceptionally well for us. We have lined up in a version of it. We lined up with Ryan as the quarterback one time. But we really feel like we’re capable in what we’re doing and moving the ball for the most part and want to keep building on that.”

ON HIM HAVING ONLY FIVE CATCHES, TOO, THOUGH AND WHETHER THEY WANT TO GET HIM MORE INVOLVED IN THE PASSING GAME: “Absolutely. We’ve talked about it as a staff. If there’s a disappointing aspect of our offense right now, it’s that we haven’t gotten Greg as involved as we’ve wanted to. And certainly it’s not that we’re not trying to. With the way our receivers are playing, the ball is getting spread out to them a little more. We’re getting the ball out to our tailbacks a little more. So it’s getting spread out a little more. Last year, we moved our tight ends around. They were our third receiver. Now we line up with three or four receivers, so that’s cut back. But we need to get Greg more involved. That’s been discussed quite a bit. But as your receivers has grown, there’s a confidence level. The way our quarterback and receivers are working together, that’s also taken away some of the touches he would get. It is a good problem to have, but I think there’s been some times we could’ve gotten the ball to them. They’ve kind of been unfortunate in some regards. Some of the times where they were the No. 1 read or the ball was going to get to them, we’ve had a mishap and some other situation has prevented them from getting the ball.”

ON ANOTHER REASON FOR THE TIGHT ENDS’ ROLE DIMINISHING AS PASS-CATCHERS: “We’ve brought our tight ends into protection quite a bit this year. To be able to half-roll our quarterback, to be able to change the launch point, part of that is getting your tight ends to secure an edge. Although the number of catches has gone down, they’ve enabled us to be more efficient throwing the ball. They don’t get enough credit for that, and they’ve had to do it quite a bit.”

ON WHAT HE SAYS TO BOONE WHEN TIMES ARE LEAN: “I think he understands it. Does he want to have a more viable roll in the passing game? Absolutely. Every time he catches it, it seems like something positive happens and there’s a bunch of people trying to drag him to the ground. He understands that, but he also understands that with what we’re doing, trying to throw the ball a little more, that he’s had to assume an additional responsibility, as other tight ends have had to do. That goes back to being a team player. He hasn’t sat around and moped about it. But you can tell when he gets the ball early in the game, he gets a little juiced up out there and every other aspect of his game enhances itself.”

ON WHETHER THE TIGHT ENDS COACH EVER TALKS TO HIM ABOUT THAT (A JOKE, BECAUSE HE’S BOTH TIGHT ENDS COACH AND COORDINATOR): “In the offensive staff room, they think I’m talking to myself a lot. And I am, because I do think he’s a tremendous weapon. I think he’s been a viable part – and he still is. It’s just in a hidden commodity. (People) don’t understand how he’s involved in the end result of a play, whether it’s run blocking or pass protection. Some of the things we’ve done has been a direct correlation to how he’s been able to get us to the edge in some routes and some protections. It’s not the number of catches right now that’s sticking out to us. It’s some of the other things he’s doing that’s enabled us to move the ball. That doesn’t get any statistic.”

ON WHETHER BOONE IS AN NFL TIGHT END: “I think he is, and I don’t think people (scouts) who come through here get caught up in how many times. It’s just: Can you do it? And he’s proved what he’s capable of. I think he’s got a chance for that next level.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.

UNC Week, Volume 5 (Do You Know Nosal? edition) ...

Watch out! Two days before the Hokies host North Carolina in a Thursday night game ... we’re finally getting around to talking about something other than a loss to Georgia Tech that happened 10 days ago.

Hey, I know I was among those who contributed to the ongoing saga by posting about it. But when it’s out there, you can’t ignore it. Thank goodness that now seems to be behind us and we can talk about something that’s relevant to the REST of the season.

One of those things – although I bet it’s not the one you thought I’d start you off with – is back-up offensive guard Greg Nosal. If you don’t know his name (because even starting linemen are often anonymous), you should.

Nosal, a redshirt sophomore from Kellam High in Virginia Beach, is quickly becoming a critical cog in the offensive line. He’ll be an even bigger part of it next season, when he’ll likely become a starter.

This year, though, Nosal has emerged as the line’s top back-up, spelling both starting guards – Sergio Render on the left side and Jaymes Brooks on the right – fairly frequently.

Nosal played just 21 snaps all of last season but has played 136 snaps through seven games this year (an average of 19 per game). He graded 83 percent on 24 snaps in relief of Render (strained pectoral) against Georgia Tech. He also graded 83 percent on 30 plays against Boston College.

If you haven’t paid much attention to Nosal, check him out on Thursday night. He is as solidly put together as any offensive lineman you’ll see. Nothing sloppy about that guy. That’s mainly because he is a converted tight end who has packed pounds and pounds of muscle, not gut, onto his 6-foot-6 frame.

He is agile and he is aggressive, which offensive line coach Curt Newsome loves. Nosal’s high school coach told me this spring that Newsome had instilled quite the mean streak in his former star.

I’ve noticed his steadily improving play (and role) and decided this week would be as good as any to catch up with Nosal. So here he is, along with offensive coordinator Bryan Stinespring.

WARNING: Stiney does talk briefly about Georgia Tech. Avert your eyes if you can’t take any more about the Jackets ...

OT GREG NOSAL

ON BEING A REAL FACTOR ON THE O-LINE THIS SEASON: “I’m really enjoying it. Last year, I really didn’t get a lot of playing time. This year, I’ve worked hard enough to get in the rotation with Sergio and Brooks. I’m just trying to live it up as much as I can.”

ON THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE IN HIM THIS YEAR: “I think my technique has gotten a lot better this year. I’ve gotten bigger, stronger and faster. I feel like that’s helped me a lot.”

ON O-LINE COACH CURT NEWSOME INSTILLING A MEAN STREAK IN HIM: “I think he did. When I was in high school, I thought I was just a tight end and I didn’t really need to block. But when I got here and I moved to offensive line, coach Newsome was really on me about getting my head in there and being physical on every play. I eventually got more physical as time went on.”

ON WHETHER HE THOUGHT OF HIMSELF AS MORE A FINESSE TIGHT END IN HIGH SCHOOL, MORE OF A RECEIVER: “Oh, I definitely thought I was. Some people said differently. I wasn’t the fastest guy, but I sure thought I was. I’ve really liked the transition, though, and I’m really enjoying the offensive line.”

ON SEEING THIS AS THE BEST POSITION FOR HIM FOR THE FUTURE: “I really think so. You can eat whatever you want. You can get as big as you want as long as you’re able to move. Offensive line has been great. I’ve really enjoyed everyone.”

ON BEING VERY SOLIDLY PUT TOGETHER, THOUGH, NOT SLOPPY LIKE SOMEONE WHO EATS WHATEVER HE WANTS: “I do eat whatever I want. I could have anything for breakfast, even McDonald’s and stuff like that, and still be OK with it. I’ll have subs for lunch, then dinner here (at the team training table), then maybe order a pizza at night.”

ON WHETHER HE NEEDS TO DO THAT TO KEEP THE WEIGHT ON: “Oh, I definitely do. I was probably 295 at the start of camp and now I’m probably down to 280, 285. If I don’t keep on it, I’ll lose it quick.”

ON HOW MUCH STRONGER HE IS NOW: “All my lifts have gone up dramatically. Since I got here, my bench has gone up about 135 pounds in two and a half years. I bench 435.”

ON WHETHER HE WAS NOT A BIG LIFTER BEFORE COLLEGE: “I think I lifted hard in high school, but I don’t think I lifted properly – just wrong techniques, wrong lifts. Here, I got all the techniques and really have hit it hard.”

ON WHETHER HE HAS FOUND HIS ‘MEAN STREAK’: “I get pretty intense before and during the game. I’m still not the meanest, like No. 70 over there, Sergio, but I’m aggressive now. I really feel like I get into it. I just listen to music to get excited, then Enter Sandman really gets you up.”

ON PART OF HIS SUCCESS MAYBE BEING BECAUSE HE KNOWS HIS SNAPS, HIS CHANCES TO IMPRESS, ARE LIMITED: “I definitely think that is. I can get as tired as I want, because I’m in a rotation and able to go a series or two off. So I go as hard as I can for the plays that I’m in. It really changes the tempo up. I’m never really tired like people who go the entire game.”

ON THIS BEING A BIG SEASON OF PREPARATION FOR HIM, SINCE HE’LL LIKELY BECOME A STARTER NEXT YEAR: “Big-time, because going into next year, if I didn’t have this playing time, I would think that would hurt me. But now I’m competing with them, seeing how the level of play is, and it will help me in the future.”

ON HIS INCREASING ROLE: “It’s a dream come true, really. All the pressure isn’t on me yet, because I’m not taking every snap. When I get in there, I can go as hard as I can and not have the pressure of every-down playing.”

OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR BRYAN STINESPRING

ON THE INCREASED ROLE OF BACK-UP GUARD GREG NOSAL, PLAYING MEANINGFUL SNAPS IN RELIEF OF BOTH STARTERS: “He’s probably been one of the guys we’ve been most pleased with. We consider him an additional starter. He’s been able to afford us the opportunity to rest two guys that are better when they can get a break. That’s Sergio (Render) and Jaymes (Brooks). I think the more we can get a rotation going at guard, it has enabled us to have more successful plays. You can go back and look and say Jaymes is grading higher; Sergio is grading higher; and I think that’s a correlation of they’ve got somebody breathing down their neck and they’ve also got somebody enabling them to stay fresh.”

ON NOSAL SERVING TWO IMPORTANT FUNCTIONS THEN: “He sure does. Competition is a great thing. We’re all guys that like to have some type of incentive pushing us forward. We’d all like to be self-motivated, but there’s nothing quite like the motivation of knowing there’s other guys pushing you for playing time.”

ON FACING UNC’S DEFENSIVE LINE THIS WEEK: “Their defensive line worries us a great deal. I think they’re a talented, talented defensive line. And they’re deep at that position, too. They’ve got three or four defensive ends, three or four defensive tackles. All of them have played well. All of them have played together for a couple years. I don’t think you get ranked third in the country in total defense just by chance. I think it occurs over a lot of snaps and a lot of games that they’ve played. They’re a terrific bunch.”

ON MOVING THE BALL AT WILL LATE AGAINST GEORGIA TECH AND NOT GETTING ANY POINTS ON FOUR DIFFERENT POSSESSIONS IN JACKETS TERRITORY EARLY AND WHAT WAS THE ISSUE IN THOSE DRIVES: “We went back and what we’ve started doing offensively is meeting in the morning and showing where we’ve done some things well and what were some things we didn’t do well. The biggest disappointment in the Georgia Tech game was early in the game when we got in the red zone and didn’t capitalize. We’ve been very good at that aspect, not only securing points, but securing what we’d like to think is a high productivity rate. We’d like to get 75 percent or more – and we didn’t do it. Against Georgia Tech, give them credit, but we had a great situation on third-and-7 off our first drive. They max-blitzed and we were in a max protection, and we had Xavier Boyce free right down the middle. If we get the ball off, it’s a touchdown. Instead, they blitzed two guys through. We had two guys waiting on them. The timing of it is a fine line and we ended up getting two guys on one and the other guy came free. If we pick it up ... we got what we want. That’s one that grinds you a little bit, because you only get so many opportunities, and that was a missed opportunity.”

ON TYROD TAYLOR’S FIRST INTERCEPTION, A TIPPED BALL AT THE LINE THAT WAS PICKED OFF: “We get the ball in a pretty good situation (at GT’s 48-yard line) and we know we’ve got a weakside out-cut that we know we’ve got a great shot at. The defensive tackle spins, throws his hand up in the air, taps it, spins again and picks it. Instead of a 12-yard gain on a first-down throw, we throw a pick. (LATER, DEEP IN GT TERRITORY ...) Just a bad deal for us. They changed defenses late and I would have liked to call timeout, didn’t, and they had a good situation set up for us. Three trips down there and we got three points. We needed more than that.”

ON HOW MUCH HEALTH WAS AN ISSUE FOR THE OFFENSE WITH TWO BANGED-UP STARTING LINEMEN AND A SICK STAR TAILBACK: “There’s a lot of factors in every game and that certainly played a little bit of a part, but you need to be good enough and play well enough to overcome whatever obstacle is out there. We just didn’t take advantage of some opportunities early in the game and we needed to do that. For lack of a better expression, it was a lot of near-misses. We didn’t capitalize. We all understand how it could’ve been a little better ... but instead of hanging our head in the first half, we came back out and were able to make a few more plays and move the ball. But we still go back on Sunday and we knew then that we had some chances early to get some much-needed points and we didn’t get it done.”

ON WHETHER, EVEN SO, HE IS ABLE TO FEEL FAIRLY ENCOURAGED ABOUT HIS OFFENSE AFTER THEY FINISHED WITH 21 POINTS AND 195 YARDS IN THE FINAL 23 MINUTES: “We didn’t come out of that game feeling very good. We didn’t win the game and that was the single reason for being there. We didn’t win the game. We didn’t score enough points.”

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UNC Week, Volume 4 (Can't We All Get Along edition) ...

OK, so unless Paul Johnson comes back this afternoon and calls Frank Beamer a sissy, I think this will (I mean it this time) be my final post about chopgate.

Yesterday would’ve been the last word on the subject, but how could Beamer NOT respond after Johnson basically said, “Stop whining; I crushed you”???

So the Hokies’ Big Whistle began his press conference today by saying that he’d gotten on the phone with the Big Jacket and the two had a “good” conversation about this whole mess.

I’ll let Frank take it from here. And after this, as Beamer said, that’s all of that ...

HEAD COACH FRANK BEAMER

OPENING REMARKS ABOUT THE CHOP/CRACKBACK BLOCKING SAGA WITH GEORGIA TECH: “I’m going to take about three minutes here and talk about the Georgia Tech situation and then we’re going to move on. I just got off the phone with Paul Johnson. I told Paul that I said the wrong statement yesterday in saying the last touchdown was a low block on our 17 (free safety Kam Chancellor). It was a similar play, but it wasn’t the last touchdown. It was a play where Nesbitt went out of bounds on about the 2 (a 31-yard run in the third quarter that put the ball at the 4 and set up Georgia Tech’s second touchdown). I apologized for that. I don’t like giving out wrong information. It shouldn’t have happened. And I apologize for that.”

ON THE ACC’S OFFICIALS: “I will say a couple things. I never felt better about officiating than the conference that we are in. Doug Rhoads, the guy that heads this thing up, I think he works hard at it. I think our officials work hard at it. I’m very, very pleased with the officiating in the ACC. I think they’re doing a great job and I think they’re getting better all the time. I think it’s improving all the time.”

ON THE WHOLE CONTROVERSY NOT BEING ABOUT A PARTICULAR OPPONENT OR A WIN OR LOSS: “It’s not about Georgia Tech. It’s about some things that happened within this game that I think are just wrong in general. I think they’re dangerous. And that’s the only thing I’m saying. And I want to give Georgia Tech credit. I tell you, they played a great football game. They played hard. They played tough. They played well. They’re well-coached. I don’t want anything to take away from their win, because they played well and they deserved to win. But my points are – and I don’t just sit around and complain about something – I want to get one thing changed. And I feel like it needs to be changed for the good of the game.”

ON WHAT HE WANTS TO SEE FIXED: “Number one, when you’ve got a guy coming out of the backfield, coming back around, blocking toward the line of scrimmage, the rule’s already there (referencing crackback blocks). That just needs to be called because it’s a dangerous play. And generally speaking, let me say this: I’m all for chopping, cutting. I think that’s part of football. If I can see you and you’re cutting me, there’s no problem with that. I think the problem comes when I can’t see you and you’re cutting me. That’s where the problem is. When I’m looking in here and getting cut from the side, to me that’s a dangerous play. And you’re putting people’s, well, you’re putting them in danger.”

ON WHAT RULE HE WANTS TO SEE ACTUALLY CHANGED, THOUGH: “The other one – and this is the one I want to work on – is on the offensive line, where you’ve got a guy engaged or the guy’s braced up, and then you get cut from behind, on a knee. I think it’s dangerous. There was a rule there, engagement, if a guy was engaged. Well, they took that word out. And what I’m going do is put this out there, and if enough coaches agree with me, then I think we’ll get the thing changed. And if people don’t agree with me, we’ll keep playing the way we’re playing. But I think it’s a dangerous part of football. When this happens, this lead guy (offensive lineman) is trying to get up to the next level. But when you get braced in there, you get a shoulder in there, or you get this guy (defensive lineman) fighting that block, and then you get another guy (second offensive lineman) coming, you put a (defensive) guy in a dangerous situation. And I think generally speaking, the only way that you solve it is if a (defender) is engaged or if he’s involved with a guy at all in any way, then you can’t chop him. You’ve got to block him higher. Then I think that takes care of our problem.”

ON SAFETY BEING HIS TOP CONCERN: “That’s the only reason this is coming around, is I want to do what I think is right for the game. And this is what’s right for the game. It’s not sour grapes. It’s not that Georgia Tech beat us. It’s not that. It’s just some situations came up that I think put guys in dangerous situations. So that’s all of that.”

ADVISORY: Users are solely responsible for opinions they post here and for following agreed-upon rules of civility. Comments do not reflect the views of The Virginian-Pilot or its Web sites. Comments are automatically checked for inappropriate language, but readers might find some comments offensive or inaccurate. If you believe a comment violates our rules, click the "Report Violation" link below the comment.