Collegiate Times

Two years ago, coming off of a devastating fourth quarter 34-24 loss to Alabama, Virginia Tech left the Georgia Dome and headed home to start preparing for its season opener against Marshall.   

One week later, Tech took out any lingering frustrations stemming from that loss on an inexperienced Marshall team, defeating the Thundering Herd by a score of 52-10.

This season, the matchup will serve as Tech’s final tune up before receiving its first taste of ACC action next week against Clemson.

The Hokies (3-0) are coming off a 26-7 victory against Arkansas State, in which Logan Thomas threw for 292 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions. While, Marshall (1-2) is coming off a 44-7 loss to Ohio, in which the team committed six turnovers alone in the first half.

To prepare for Saturday’s game, coaches and players watched game film from Marshall’s season-opening matchup with West Virginia, according to Bryan Stinespring, Tech’s offensive coordinator.

“You watch (Marshall) play West Virginia, you understand what you’re getting ready to walk into,” Stinespring said. “It quickly got our player’s attention just watching that game and understanding whom we’re getting ready to play.”

Last week, Thomas led the Hokies to the red zone five times but was only able to convert three times for points. Although fans may be frustrated with the team’s inability to score more points, Stinespring is comfortable with Thomas’ presence in the pocket while in the red zone. 

“When you start moving in the red zone, and rolling the pocket and such, you allow a defense to play just half a field,” Stinespring said.  “(Thomas) likes being in the pocket — he likes having the whole field to play with.”

Running back David Wilson was held to under 100 yards for the first time all season, against Arkansas State. He saw different coverage, which was aimed at stopping the run. 

“It’s going to hurt (the opposing team) in the long run,” Wilson said. “It didn’t work Saturday — we got great receivers, and Logan is developing each week and getting better. I guess I’ll be doing my part if they want to stop the run so much.” 

Wilson’s sentiment isn’t unique among his team — his position’s coach Shane Beamer is one of many others who thinks the same thing.

“As we continue to work on that pass game, we invite teams to come up there and try to stop the run because we got the weapons outside and we got the quarterback to take advantage of that,” Beamer said. “As you do that, it opens up the running game too. On top of that, we got to continue to find ways to run the football.”

This season, one of the strongest parts of the Hokies’ game has been the defense.  Defensive coordinator Bud Foster credits the turnaround mainly to the maturity of the players, who learned the complicated schemes that Foster and his staff developed.

“The first group is playing so much faster, they know what they’re doing, know where their help is, from the run game,” Foster said. “You’re just seeing a group that is playing with a lot of confidence right now. And then there’s a group that doesn’t want to let each other down either.” 

One of the highlights for the defense last week was the battle between All-American corner Jayron Hosley and receiver Josh Jarboe, which Hosley won by picking off two balls and keeping Jarboe to just 38 yards receiving.

Now, he sets his sights on Aaron Dobson, who has twice as many catches as the next-best receiver and has scored three of the Herd’s four receiving touchdowns.

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A version of this article appeared in the Sep 23 issue of the Collegiate Times.