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Fresh off an emotional win against Georgia Tech, the Hokies need to avoid a let down and take care of a very overmatched Austin Peay team this Saturday. Obviously, a lot of the fanbase still has nightmares about the JMU game but in reality, Austin Peay is just not on that level. They don’t have the in-state grudge in their favor and JMU could probably beat them by at least a few scores, if not more. This Austin Peay team lost to Western Kentucky 49-10 last Saturday. And, that’s not a good Western Kentucky team either.
The Governors have some pieces on offense that could allow them to hang around for the first quarter or so. We’ll discuss a few of those names below. They also bring back nine starters on defense this season but judging from last week, I don’t know how much that will help them at this level.
Overall, this Austin Peay team is a very average FCS team. In fact, they might not even be average. They’re only on their seventh year of scholarship football after going non-scholarship from 1997 to 2005 and they’ve struggled to put together many winning seasons in their 76 seasons of football.
But, in football you need to expect the unexpected so the Hokies need to take care of business on Saturday. In fact, I would love for Logan Thomas to not even have to play the 2nd half and just let Mark Leal take over. Our backups need reps and hopefully they get a full workload on Saturday.
The Offense
QB Jake Ryan – Most notably, the Governors offense is led by Sixteen Candles character Jake Ryan. Ryan struggled in last weekend’s game, going just 2-10 passing for 11 yards and tossing one interception. Obviously, that’s not indicative of his talent as he is a three year starter for Austin Peay. Ryan has thrown for 3,202 yards in his career and 20 total touchdowns. The problem lies in Ryan’s health or lackthereof. He’s missed time in each of the last two seasons due to injuries. With the Hokies having a talented pass rush that may cause a problem this Saturday if his offensive line can’t protect him.
RB Wesley Kitts – The only playmaker the Governors have in the backfield is Kitts, who rushed for 104 yards on just 10 carries last Saturday. Kitts is a poor man’s version of Sam McGuffie (Michigan recruit who transferred to Rice). He’s quick and agile but he’s not a between the tackles type of back. Against Virginia Tech’s defense, I’m not too worried about Kitts out running anybody though. Just need to keep him from turning the corner.
RB/WR Terrence Oliver – Kitts is the starting running back but Oliver is their change of pace back. Much like J.C. Coleman, Oliver is only 5’7” and 162 pounds. He’s a slight of build guy that’s going to try to use his speed to beat you to the outside. According to AP’s official website, Oliver is actually listed as the starter at their slot receiver position. But, he carried the ball 12 times for 32 yards last weekend. Perhaps, some end-arounds should be expected on Saturday.
WR Devin Stark – The only Governor to record a catch last Saturday, Stark is Austin Peay’s best wide receiver. He recorded 53 catches for 627 yards a year ago and he’ll probably better those numbers this season. I don’t see the senior as an NFL caliber receiver but at 6’3” and 206 pounds, he certainly will look like one on the field.
C Jacob Langsten – The offensive line for Austin Peay actually has some decent size. Normally, with a lower tiered FCS team, you can see 6’2” 270 pound guys sneaking into the starting line. But, the entire starting offensive line will average about 6’4” and 290 pounds. That’s not bad. The key to this line will be the play of center Jacob Langsten, who moved to his new position after starting 15 games at both guard positions over the past two years. At 6’5” and 300 pounds, he has the size to matchup with our interior offensive line.
Defense
FS Antwaun Majors – Despite being a little undersized at 5’10” and 180 pounds, Majors is a tacking machine. He’s up to 203 career tackles and is in his 3rd season as a starter at free safety. He was also the only Governor player to record a sack last weekend against Western Kentucky.
LB Craig Salley – Another slightly undersized but savvy football player, Salley is a tenacious linebacker. He finished last weekend with six total tackles and one tackle for loss. He will give up some size, especially against our offense (and our quarterback) but he’s a solid tackler. Expect Salley to start at Austin Peay’s outside linebacker position.
DE Earnest Smith – The entire defensive line is in for a physical outing on Saturday. Smith goes 6’2” and 233 pounds and will be matched up against 6’6” 300 pound Vinston Painter. Despite that, Smith has recorded at least one tackle in every game he’s started.
S Steven Rich – New to the starting lineup this year, Rich is an intriguing safety prospect. At 6’3” and 215 pounds, he’s almost bigger than most of this team’s linebackers and defensive ends. But, he has good mobility and will man Austin Peay’s weakside safety position. The sophomore finished last Saturday’s game with six total tackles.
S Jeramy Ross – The Governors will play a lot of different bodies in the secondary and one of the primary reserves will be Jeramy Ross. Ross recorded Austin Peay’s lone takeaway last week, when he notched his first interception of the season. The senior doesn’t quite have the size or skill as Rich or Majors, but he’s experienced.
Specialists
K Stephen Stansell – The good news for AP is that their specialists are pretty good. Stansell made a 44 yard field goal against Western Kentucky last weekend but missed from 48. He was nine of 15 last season with a long of 43. Stansell will also handle the kickoff duties. He had three kickoffs with 0 touchbacks, so expect our returners to get some work this weekend.
P Ben Campbell – Campbell took over the starting duties at punter during 2nd game last season and has improved since. He averaged close to 41 yards per punt last Saturday with a long of 49. Overall, he’s a solid punter and hopefully he gets a lot of work this Saturday.
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{ 19 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s funny one of my good friends was the head manager for Beamer. But before he was the defensive manager for foster. He would hold up te plays and stuff like that. But he wore the headset that the coahes wore and you could hear stinespring, Beamer, gray, and foster ect. And you can turn it to a different frequency so other coaches couldn’t hear. And foster would turn his so just the defensive guys could hear it. And he would cuss out the offense and the play calling. Like “what the hell do I have to do to win a f****** game! And just get pist at you know who up in box calling the plays… So obviously we are not the only ones who criticize.
Why don’t they let TGray take over the offense and let Bud have a shot at the O? You would think that having spent all of that time trying to stop an offense (and being damn good at it) that he would have an idea of how to run an offense that would be tough to stop!!
No….Let Shane take over the offense.
Could you imagine if hosley and wilson had stuck around? A few questions, what happened on the first fg attempt, did gresh lose his helmet? When will Edwards be back? Why didn’t benedict or scales play? Did anyone get hurt? Were any recruits at the game? Do the fullers have anymore kids after Kendall? Who played on the O-line?
Haha I’ll take these one at a time.
1. Not sure.
2. Edwards should return by November. Right now, my guess is the Cincinnati game.
3. Via was a better matchup for GT. He can move his feet more where as Benedict is a better fit for say Miami and FSU. We went with who was better for this particular matchup and gave Via the start. He played well. Scales is our 3rd string RB. The reps just weren’t there.
4. Coles is gimpy still but other than a few bumps and bruises we’re fine.
5. CJ Reavis, Holland Fisher, Parker Osterloh, Braxton Pfaff, and a few others. I think Kendall might have been there too.
6. No. Although Vinny needs to start working on grandkids.
7. Pretty much our starting five. I didn’t see much substitution in this one. I’d have to rewatch the game to see though.
Coles is done for the year! He will redshirt and be back next year
Alec,
I might believe you more if you wrote that Bud said these things during a private meeting with the defensive coaches but i don’t think he’s so careless to say them over a “private” frequency during a game. There’s just too much risk that (a) it’s not really private or (b) someone clicks the wrong button and Coach Beamer hears it – bad, because Stiney and O’Cain simply carry out Beamer’s instructions.
Unfortunately, people often suffer serious consequences from similar mistakes, i.e. incorrectly thinking their phone’s on mute (when it’s not) or accidentally hitting “reply all” on a sensitive email (when they only mean to reply to one person.
BTW, Stiney and O’Cain are far from offensive geniuses but again, they’re simply regulated to carrying out Beamer’s orders. To Stiney and O’Cain’s credit, they’ve made lucrative careers for themselves despite one guy basically marrying his way into the program and another guy who’s just an old retread from NCSU and Clemson.
I’m very greatful to Frank for all he’s done but he’s almost 66 and 66 year olds typically don’t change much – we’ll need Shane to fill the case and I’m confident he can and will do it. His first recruiting job will be Foster and than find an OC who’s actually qualified to win a national championship at the FBS (not HS) level. Then it’s just bringing in better and better players until everything comes together with a little luck one year.
+1 to everything you just said, hokie pokie
I mean I’m just going off of what my friend told me who works for Nike now. And he told me Bud would get pretty verbal during games about how the defense is always bailing tech out. He was around the program pretty much 24/7. So I believe what he says. But do you really think Bud is bestfriends with Stiney on the staff? Haha my guess is not. I would believe he has some form of anger towards the offensive struggle the past couple years.
Speaking of coaches and headsets. As I watched the replay last night, I paused and re-wound the final 3 minutes of regulation 5/6 times and it was interesting to watch the assistant coaches pull their headsets and look over at Frank B. as the tension mounted on the sidelines Every one of the coaches that were on video wanted to approach him but didn’t (can’t tell the boss what to do) until Shane B pulled his headset off and went up to his Dad and pointed to the clock and to the line of scrimmage and ball location looking for permission to call a TO! Frank quickly got rid of him in what could have been a major Beamer FUPA. Because let’s be honest no one wanted the last play to hinge on C Fuller breaking several tackles to get in FG position with a time out to spare…But anyway would love to have listened to the tape of the coach’s chatter on that one!
Why are people making such a big deal about this? Considering how our defense played and how our offense played, whose hands would you, more times than not, put the game in? Our defense had held a strong offense in check the whole game, we were up by 4 points, and they needed a touchdown to beat us. If you’re putting the game in the hands of the D, calling a timeout only helps the GT offense. It’s a double-edged sword, situations like that, and sometimes you make the wrong call … but I totally understood what Frank Beamer was doing. The only reason I could see him calling timeout, which I thought he should’ve done in the early part of that GT drive, was to give the defense a breather.
I love you guys that are constantly playing Monday morning quarterback. I’ll admit that clock management in the Sugar Bowl was poor but when you’re putting your money on the defense, stopping the clock only gives the offense time to plan better.
I am a huge critic of VT football. However, clock management was not that big of a deal to me in this game. You know why? BECAUSE WE WON!!!! I understand it could have been a huge gaffe, but it wasn’t. I had confidence that the Defense was going to shut down GT and not let them score a TD. I honestly believe that Frank Beamer thought the same thing or he would have called a timeout to preserve some time. GT had to score a TD to go up, so why would Frank Beamer have taken a timeout? I don’t believe I would have. Shoulda, coulda, woulda. It’s easy for everyone, including myself, to nitpick and critique everything while your sitting on your couch or in the stands. We won! Hopefully, this is a learning experience for the coaching staff and players. The only thing everyone should take out of this game is that we are 1-0 and have a chance to make it to the ACC Championship game again. I believe VT is stronger than the way they played the other night and hopefully after the next few games we will see that. I found this an exciting game and we do not get to say that we got the better end of something at the end of the game.
Also, without all the Timeouts that VT had they may not have been able to use the middle of the field. This may have eliminated both of the plays that Corey Fuller gained big chunks of yards on. But because VT had ll of their timeouts (I believe) they were able to use the middle of the field and attack the GT defense. GT was defending the sidelines and would have even more if VT had no timeouts. Not that big of a deal guys.
As a VT and a football fan and not just a Homer…I dont want to see Frank become Joe Pa….It’s called “old coach creep” and it happens very fast and before you know it things go bad…keeping it real
Honestly, I see both sides of it. Calling a timeout would have left more time on the clock but you do lose one TO, which is better spent on offense just in case someone doesn’t get out of bounds. 44 seconds with 3 timeouts though is plenty of time to march down the field. So, it’s a wash. It worked out for us in the end and that’s all that matters.
So it is basically pass or fail ?? The grade does matter!
Any chance of moving Randall Dunn over to WR? He was a WR is High School. He’s big, but may help by having a WR that can block. I don’t think hes going to get a lot of PT at TE.
Also, what about moving Tweedy over to FS or Rover? Doesn’t look like he is going to get any playing time at Whip and he is talented enough to make some plays. Saw his name come up a lot on Monday on Special teams……..
I doubt either will happen. I would like to see Dunn used in some sort of Shotgun, 3rd and long package where you know we’re going to throw the ball. He’s a better option than Malleck and Martin there.