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LANDOVER, Md. — The Virginia Tech football team fell in agonizing fashion to the Boise State Broncos on a national stage Monday night.
At one point the Hokies were down by 17 in the first quarter, but they rallied back and held the lead late in fourth quarter. However, Boise State quarterback Kellen Moore capped of the game-winning drive with a 13-yard touchdown pass to Austin Pettis. Tech’s offense was unable to respond in the final minute.
The Broncos rushed jubilantly onto the field, sealing a 33-30 victory and taking the first step in their quest for a national title.
“We just made way too many mistakes,” said Frank Beamer, head coach. “We made too many critical mistakes to beat a top-five football team. Look at the effort we made to come back and get out of a hole. I’m proud of what we are all about, I’m just not proud of how we play consistently, right now.”
While Tech’s running game was supposed to be the strength for the Hokies, running back Ryan Williams finished with just 58 yards on 21 carries. Yet Taylor kept the Hokies’ offense rolling, finishing 15 for 22 for 186 yards and two touchdowns through the air, as well as 73 yards rushing on 16 carries.
“We kind of got down and that changed the whole complexion a little bit,” Beamer said.
Following the first quarter, Tech was shut out 17-0 and appeared on its way to a humiliating opening season defeat.
Then, Williams scored a pair of touchdowns in the second quarter, including a 1-yard scamper and a 12-yard reception, cutting the deficit to 20-14. In the third quarter, Williams again converted on a 1-yard rushing touchdown, giving Tech its first lead.
However, Boise State would respond quickly with a 71-yard touchdown D.J. Harper run, retaking a 26-21 lead following a blocked extra point. Boise State’s lead would be short-lived, as a 28-yard pass from Taylor to Boykin gave the Hokies the lead again 27-26 following a failed two-point conversion attempt.
After extending its lead to 30-26 with a 34-yard Chris Hazley field goal, Tech milked the clock all the way down to about the two minute mark, forcing the Broncos to use all of their timeouts. Facing a third down, Tech’s coaches elected to go for the win, allowing Taylor to throw the ball. Boise State’s defense had other ideas and forced an incompletion, giving Moore an opportunity to become a hero.
With less than two minutes remaining, Moore drove the Broncos’ offense efficiently down the field, aided by a 15-yard late hit penalty on Hokies linebacker Bruce Taylor and threw the go-ahead touchdown with 1:09 remaining to put the Broncos up 33-30. Tech’s offense was stifled, and the Broncos walked away with their first victory of the season.
“We got the ball in good field position and though we’d do something with it,” said Chris Peterson, Boise State head coach. “We’ve practiced that so often and I thought our coaching staff did a fabulous job. They were very calm and the kids executed the plays like clockwork.”
The Hokies will look to rebound this Saturday against James Madison University at 1:30 p.m. The game will be televised on ESPN3.com.
A version of this article appeared in the Sep 8 issue of the Collegiate Times.
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Great game, VT, ya'll had us freaking out over here in Boise. That last late hit penalty had us scratching our heads over here too. There was no way Taylor could've known he was out.
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Honestly, Boise was better. If they kick all the teams on their schedule, they should see a championship game. We have to admit that.
Enough with the strength of schedule thing. We have to go after the Florida Gators most years for that too (they only play two good teams a year too).
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This one hurts, but so did the losses against LSU and Bama. Proud of the fact that the hokies came back after being down 17-0. And they nearly pulled it off. I think the play calling got a little conservative as we hit the 2 minute mark. But that is second guessing a coach who called a good game all night. Boise came out to play and Tech took its good ol time joining them. This loss is going to serve us well as we go through the season. You never know with College football but Tech may have lost its chance at Championship game.
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As a Boise State fan, I have to say you have one hell of a team (and especially quarterback) over there. Good luck on the rest of the season, but it's doubtful you'll need it!
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Great game to watch overall but really frustrating for Hokie fans. Hats off to Boise State, they beat us fair and square. Don't really agree with some of our offensive play calling late in the 4th though. Tyrod had a great game but I'm worried about that offensive line. #5 was running for his life in many cases and the running lanes just weren't there for Williams or Evans.
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BSU fan here....Fun game to watch - aside from the ticky-tac flags against both teams...VT has no reason to hang thier heads. I will be shocked if you dont win the ACC and go to a BSC bowl...Rematch anyone?
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My loyalty to Tech is strained. Same old Tech. Same sorry play calling at the end. If there's a way to lose a game, Tech sure will find it. It's as if they said on the last drive, "we don't deserve to win this game; let's give the ball back to them and win in dramatic fashion." The college football is not applauding Boise State. It is disappointed right now at the possibility that Boise actually has a chance to play for a National Championship. You have to be kidding me. Hokies, you let someone fly cross country, walk their dog in not only your back but also front yard, and allowed the dog to take a dump. After which, they threw it on your doorstep. Bravo Tech, bravo. When will you ever beat a top 5 team. Not that Boise is truly a top 5 team. You've let the college nation down.
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VT all time against top five teams 0-21, good news James Madison is on the schedule
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actually 0-26 now. That says it all. You have to beat the good teams to be considered one of the good teams.
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Really Boise State isnt truly a top 5 team?? Uhhh hey genius, we're reanked No. # we just went into a hostile (albeit bad ass opening number with the stadium rocking) and beat a really good (young) team. Taylor was great in a loss, if you want to beat up VT, that's your business, but for crying out loudx give the Broncos some credit!
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Tell me if you can identify a trend? Tech plays USC in opener at Fed EX and loses. USC plays for championship.
Tech plays LSU in opener and gets whipped. LSU plays for championship.
Tech plays Alabama in opener and loses. Alabama plays for championship.
Boise State?????
Tech, the same team you love is the same team that breaks your heart. Hey all you other college teams. Schedule Tech in your season opener and you too can play for the National Championship.
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Maybe they should play the University of Richmond for the opener next year.
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Not that it really makes a difference, but LSU was not our opener in 2007...We played ECU at home the week before.
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What an idiot,who cares
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I would certainly want to schedule the Hokies for my opener!
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After the shaky start, the team didn't quit and came back. I'm still wondering why they threw the ball on 3rd down when Boise State didn't have any time outs, and why shorter routes were not called. The personal foul call was horrible. The young defense played fairly well, but too many times the Boise receivers were too wide open, especially in the middle of the field.
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I sat there last night and asked the same question about the 3rd down play. Why not burn some more time off the clock with a run, might have made it a little harder for Boise, maybe the outcome would have been the same, but give your Defense a chance.
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Hokie football is an ACC, not BCS, level contender. Year in and year out we are ranked too highly in preseason. Frank Beamer has not demonstrated the ability to plot a strategy to win many big games out of conference. The question for Tech fans, are you going to be brave enough to demand Beamer get released from his contract for inability to take the program to the next level?
Probably not. Instead we will dance the Hokie Pokie and clap like baby seals for a 9-3 season and second tier bowl game appearance.
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The ACC is a BCS conference, smart guy. Preseason rankings mean squat; it all gets sorted out in the end. And you'd be a fool for letting go of Beamer...
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Try re-reading what I wrote. I said that Tech is a contender in the ACC, but has demonstrated year after year they can't match up to teams at or near the top of the BCS. One win and twenty six losses against teams ranked in the top five proves that.
A team has to be ready to win from week one. Beamer can't get that done, as demonstrated last night and the last three years as well.
Beamer can't take the team to the next level. He is an institution here and brought the program a long way in two decades from the days of 3-7 seasons in the Atlantic 10. But the repeated losses out of conference suggest to me that new blood is needed and Frank should be eased off the field.
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Hats off to Jim Weaver and the Algonquin Round Table who decided yet again to play a "neutral" field site to open the season... how many more seasons are we going to do this?
0-26 like the other commenter said opening against Top 5 teams... but it doesn't matter, because Weaver & Co. got their money from Nike, and Danny Snyder, etc. I hope the shot at a national championship was worth the fancy new unis... a halfway decent job by the kids, but as long as the current regime is scheduling games, they should be told up front their time is being wasted.
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Good job spelling "Dissappointment" wrong in the headline. One 'S'.
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VT will NEVER beat a top 5 opponent OR get to a national championship with Bryan Stinespring as OC and Frank Beamer as coach. Why? ....because Frank refuses to do anything about it and Beamer ball is dead as you saw Bosie gave us our own medicine last night. I haven't seen "beamer ball" since the two kickoff returns at Alabama last year.
All we needed to do to win this game was secure a first down and RUN the ball on 3rd down to milk the clock. But what does Stiney decide to do? He bombs the ball stopping the clock and giving Boise the ball in good field position. They score then we get the ball back and instead of good quick play action throws to get in field goal position, our last set of downs are bombs to the 20 hoping to pull off another Nebraska.
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The fact is we are just not truly a National Championship caliber team. We never have been since 1999. Yes Beamer built this program to the success it is today with consistent 10 wins and ACC championship appearances. However, how many of those do we need?
When do we say "ok this is great but lets shoot for the next level"
Yes Beamer brought us to this level but can he take us to the next? It appears not since he allows a terrible OC to stay in his position instead of moving him to another job on the team (recruiting) and he just doesn't seem to know how to win big games on national television. The team totally looked unprepared in the first quarter especially his special teams (what the team is known for!)
I guess big games are not of importance, and I agree we shouldn't schedule them if we don't even prepare enough to win them
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Part 2:
People wonder why ESPN never gives us the "spotlight" or "respect" we supposedly deserve. Well last night is why. We don't win big games when it matters. We have the offensive playcalling worse than a 10 year old newb playing NCAA on his xbox and nothing is done about it.
We consistently start in the top 10 then fall back and slowly crawl up every season and sometimes make an ACC championship/Orange bowl appearance.
But hey 10 wins is what this program's goal is every year and it keeps the older generation hokies happy. Our generation (my generation) have been crying for the next level since 1999. It appears we won't get there this decade with Frank unless he makes necessary changes. Those won't happen however because the older generation big money boosters are happy with 10 wins against cup-cake ACC teams(except for a couple that we loose)and an ACC appearance year after year.
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Part 3:
Those of us that hoped for a National Championship run had too high of hopes. I love scheduling big games because every time I hope we can actually win and gain some respect but we never do. I agree with everyone else, we need to stop scheduling big games that we blow in the 4th quarter since we only end up embarrassing ourselves on national TV as people call us the "chokies" with good reason to.
If most fans are happy with consistent 10 wins and ACC appearances every other year then there is nothing to complain about. However some fans like myself would actually see us get to the next level since we do have the talent and ability, just not the will of the coaches.
Maybe 3 or 4 years from now we'll have another chance and hopefully some coaching changes but until then don't expect any more of what we've seen the last 10 years.
Yea I'd rather have than than a 4-6 team but I just hate seeing talent go to waste year end and year out and blown NC chances.
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Tech lost because of the horrendous play calling in the final two minutes, not the players. Great job team and a terrible job to Brian Stinespring.
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The entire coaching team should be fired. You cannot expect to have the same plays for a whole decade. You opponents do have a brain you know
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Amen to that, but as long as they keep the big time money boosters and the majority of the fans happy with "10 wins" the majority of which are cup cake teams, and at least an appearance in a bowl of some sort,......... It won't happen.
Also no one will ever have the balls to push Beamer to retirement let alone talk to him about Stinespring.
What bothers me the most is that they throw the players under the bus instead of owning up to their own poor decision ex. going for two points instead of the extra point and that 3rd down call with 2 min left.
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Wow. Classy people on this board. Why aren't they at the games? I went to the USC game and this game, and the Tech fans are total asses to the fans of the opposition. I don't get it? You shake your keys on third down plays, but when the opposition shakes their keys after a touchdown, calling that a true key play, the Tech fans throw nacho cheese and beer on said fan. Then the Tech fans yell and attempt to start fights with cheering Boise fans celebrating as they leave the stadium. Classless fans at games. Then again, you do have the stadium that Vick built. How's his brother doing these days?
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I was at the game and I didn't see that anywhere, I'm sorry if you did. For the most part we are pretty respectful fans compared to those of other schools like Miami or UVA
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I was at the game. Maybe it was because they were still dumb students or it was the alcohol, but all the fans that were rude or classless on this trip were also from VT. Granted, there were some VT fans that were gracious, but they were older alumni. But damn, the difference in the Boise fan vs the VT fan where night and day.... Cocksure before, and crappy losers after. But, granted, I've seen my share of fans from the SEC and ACC that are just as bad.
For the record, I didn't go to Boise State, but was w/ my GF and her family that did.
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We lost this game because of poor clock management We're up 30-26 and Boise has two time outs. Conceivably, all we need to do is slowly pick up first downs to burn the clock and we win the game. Well, we picked up first downs but didn't burn any clock. It was ridiculous. Three times on that drive Taylor snapped the ball with 10 to 15 seconds left on the play clock. That's roughly 40 seconds wasted. Both Taylor and the coaches should have been more aware.
And then there's the ridiculous decision to throw on 3rd and 8 leaving Boise plenty of time. Run the ball in that situation. Even if we don't get the 1st down, we can burn 40 more seconds off the clock since BSU was out of time outs. Combine that with the lost time from the early snaps and you're looking at around 1 minute of game time. Boise would then have to travel the length of the field (provided no dumb penalties) with under a minute to go and no TOs. That's a totally different scenario and one that heavily favors us. Even with the early screw ups, we lost this game because of poor coaching.
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Honestly, VT students really don't care about 90% of the crap that is in the CT and that's why people don't read it. What do students care about most at this school? VirginiaTech FOOTBALL!!!!!!!!!!!! So why doesn't the CT have more football coverage. Maybe then people will pick up the CT.
Case and point --- this comment thread. Look on all the other articles online.... Nobody cares about it and that's why nobody comments. Look at this article.... It's about VT FOOTBALL and there are a ton of people commenting.
I know we lost to Boise, but people will still care about football coverage way more than they do about the current front page stories
Just a thought-- and I know that others are thinking the same...
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Seriously! more football less bs
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have you not heard about The Extra Point? its coming out this year
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Ten win seasons against a weak schedule don't make you that worthwhile when you can't coach the Hokies to victory over a worthwhile out of conference opponent.
It's time for Beamer to retire and Stinespring to go with him.
The excuses that come from Beamer don't cut it anymore. His inept play calling cost the game AGAIN.
Older alums who contribute big bucks must like Frank based on fond but fading glories of the past. What Tech needs is a no excuses sort of coach, someone like a Nick Saban, who turned Alabama around from a scandal racked pushover that everyone spent a few years beating up into the wrecking machine of the BCS.
Instead we seem content with steamroller victories over the basketball schools of the ACC.
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soooooo true. Beamer is a figure head at this point, but i think we could bring someone in with more "talent" when it comes to coaching
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As much as much as we love the guy, ...the truth is Beamer is not the guy to bring us to a National Championship. Beamer is a nice guy with an "we played hard but we got to improve" personality season after season.
Take a guy like Nick Saban who has a no excuses personality and is pretty hard core. Look what he did at Alabama in just a few years. We don't need a coach as hard cut as Saban but maybe a mix of Beamer and Saban traits. Enter Bud Foster.
Foster is a "get the job done" type of guy and doesn't take excuses but he also gives credit to his players when it's due.
Beamer is just too complacent how the program is to win a championship. Granted he built the program out of nothing but even Beamer said he is totally ok if he retires with an empty trophy case.
So maybe we just shouldn't get our hopes up every year despite the talent and just come to expect a "decent" team but not a national championship caliber team. We just lack the discipline and preparation against top opponents (0-25 against top 5)as it showed against Bosie State.
It just won't happen with Beamer and now that his contract is extended, we shouldn't expect it until 2016 and IF Foster is still around to take over.
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An open letter to Frank Beamer
We suddenly find ourselves in need of an opponent for our first game next season. We would welcome an opportunity to get our first win, I mean play a worthy opponent. I hear your team plays hard, and has a nice locker room.
I would welcome the chance to block one of your punts, I mean witness "Beamer Ball" in person.
Sincerely
Some one who beats a top 5 team once in a while
Joepa Terno
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Dear Joepa Terno
Oh you are a card indeed. We do have nice locker rooms, and I would welcome a discussion on Beamer Ball, and perhaps you could share your secrets to beating a top 5 team!
I am sorry our schedule is full next year. We have a very competitive year full of teams from the ACC including Maryland and Duke and NC State. Oh the humanity!
Sincerely
Fran K Beamer
Desperately Seeking a NC
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Ahhh, this man would not have left Blacskburg alive if this came out before.
http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/09/06/1329226/bronco-fans-psych-up-for-big-game.html
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Allow me to get something off of my chest and provide some observations for a moment.......Call this random thoughts from a lifetime Hokie fan...
Ok people let's be honest. How many of you had the thoughts in the back of your head? You know.... The thoughts that you don't talk about at Hokie booster club meetings? You know the thoughts....The thoughts that say if there is a way for VT to give a game away they will find it. We have seen it time and time again. I will admit it. I have always had those thoughts. To borrow the quote from Denny Greene..."They were who we thought they were!!.....We had'em on the hook and we let them off!!!!!!...
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Hahaha, that Denny Greene press conference was running through my head the entire ride home Monday night. I'm surprised no one on here has mentioned our defense on Boise State's winning drive. Throughout the second, third and most of the fourth quarters, we were blitzing, and Kellen Moore was struggling to complete passes, often throwing to no one. Then, the last drive comes, and we abandon the blitz and go to a prevent. Just like the Thursday night game in 2007 against BC and Matt Ryan. I love Bud Foster, but when you're only up by 4, don't play the prevent, do what you've been succeeding at for most of the game! Maybe this is why Bud isn't a head coach yet?
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Bud manages to give us a top 25 defense every year however we are thrilled if our offense breaks into the top 50 (right now it's around 80).
Our defense could have been better in the 4th quarter but they have been playing great all game considering having the 7 starters.
What about Stinespring's decision to throw the ball on 3rd and 8 with Bosie out of time outs and his decision to do a quarterback keeper and to top it off throw long balls on the final drive instead of quick post routes to get into field goal range?
I think that had a more significant toll on why we lost than the defense. The defense is not blame free but more of the Blame lies on Stinespring's decision. All we needed was one first down.
In big games and critical decisions like this, Stinespring is why we always choke. It's about time people notice the pattern I've been noticing it ever since we lost to Kansas a few years ago.
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Sorry Boise, we just nerfed your National Title hopes
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