In 2019, Virginia Tech trailed Wake Forest 10-6 at halftime.  The Hokies were moving the football, but two costly turnovers while they were driving – one by Hendon Hooker and one by Terius Wheatley – cost the offense an opportunity to put up more points.

Watching the first half of yesterday’s game was pretty similar.  The Hokies moved the football, but they just couldn’t quite score.  Brian Johnson uncharacteristically missed a short field goal (42 yards is short by his recent high standards), and Hendon Hooker was picked off in the endzone at the end of the first half.  Like the 2019 game, I felt that if the defense could get a few stops, the offense certainly had the ability to win the football game once they worked those drive-killing mistakes out of their system.

It didn’t work out that way, though.  I got 50% of what I wanted.  Tech’s defense played their best half of football in the second half, and gave the offense ample opportunities to get the Hokies a win.  But the offense failed, for various reasons. 

We knew that at some point the offense wouldn’t rush for 350 yards, and that the Hokies would have to put the ball in the air in a traditional manner to win the football game.  If you listen to or watch our podcasts, or read most of our articles, you knew Will and I were concerned about that very thing.  It was going to happen at some point…but when?

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