The Hokies laid a major whipping on Georgia Tech Saturday, a typical GameDay-was-here
thrashing, and the one theme that emerged from the game was
“discipline.” Sure, VT’s got talent, and VT’s got some experience at
key positions, but the biggest thing the Hokies have going for them right now is
discipline. This team has, for the moment, achieved the perfect combination of
pedal-to-the-metal energy with disciplined focus.

Georgia Tech is better than they looked Saturday. They were supposed to be a
combination of offensive skill players and defensive attack schemes that were
going to give the Hokies trouble. They were a team that had gone on the road and
beaten Auburn in 87,000-seat Jordan-Hare Stadium, just the latest in an
impressive list of road wins against ranked teams under Coach Chan Gailey.

But when it came to “go-time” against the Hokies, it was Virginia
Tech that was the more disciplined team, and the Hokies executed to near
perfection. Nearly everything went Virginia Tech’s way, but this wasn’t a simple
case of lucky bounces. It was a case of nearly every player on VT’s roster
executing to a fine point, right down to the punter, while GT’s players did very
little to distinguish themselves, and they went home victims of a 51-7 whipping.

Right off the top of my head, I can think of four things, outside of
coaching/playcalling and luck, that determine the outcome of the game: talent,
discipline, execution, and motivation.

...