Ron Crook had never worked with either Brent Pry or Pry’s dad Jim, a longtime assistant coach at numerous stops, but they’d crossed paths in West Virginia and Pennsylvania so frequently throughout their careers that, as Brent puts it, they’ve “kicked a lot of the same dirt.”

So when Crook was still taking the temperature of Virginia Tech’s vacant offensive line job a month ago, he reached out to old friend Mike Terwilliger, an assistant coach for nearly half a century at Division II East Stroudsburg, where Jim Pry preceded him as offensive coordinator on the same staff for 11 years and Brent cut his coaching teeth in his first full-time gig in 1993 and ’94.

Terwilliger’s take on Pry? “Crooky, he’s family.”

“When that guy says that guy’s family,” Crook said, “I know I trust him and believe in him.”

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