It’s been a wild season, and plenty of times I’ve swung from feeling like Nostradamus to feeling like Not-stradamus. Here are some of the stories I’ll likely remember from 2023.

Miss: Complementary Ball

Let’s start with a bad take. I had a feeling the Hokies were going to drag themselves to five, maybe six wins on the strength of their defense, and we’d have an offseason of the boards entering “Son of Stinespring” discussion territory. Well, that didn’t happen. The Hokies finished at 7-6, and for most of the season the offense and defense mirrored their level of play, i.e., when the defense played well, the offense did too, and vice versa.

Of the two units, the offense was the most impressive as it honed a style of play (and a few critical plays within that style) that allowed it to tear into most opposing defenses, while putting the remainder on notice. That’s a big flip from the ‘22 season, when the Hokies were a Split Zone team, then a run-of-the-week team, and then a Split Zone team to close things out. I’m not saying we’ve got the second coming of Sid Gillman anywhere on the staff, but it’s nice to worry about the next steps rather than the first steps.

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