Hokies Journal

In last Saturday’s 38-10 win over North Carolina State, Virginia Tech used the "Wild Turkey" formation for four plays. It was the most the formation has been used this season, but it will not be the last time.

“We’ll see it again,” offensive coordinator Bryan Stinespring said. “It’s been a positive addition to us.”

On Saturday, tight end Greg Boone ran the Hokies’ variation of the Wildcat offense. He handed off once, ran twice for nine yards and threw an incomplete pass. Before Saturday, the Wild Turkey was used only once this season, on a three-yard rush by running back Ryan Williams against Nebraska on Sept. 19.

The Wild Turkey provided a nice boost for the Hokies’ offense last season, with the big-bodied Boone (283 pounds) rumbling for yardage out of the shotgun formation. Stinespring said the Hokiers were “anxious to get out there and go” in the Wild Turkey.

Virginia has had an offensive identity crisis this season. The Cavaliers started with a spread system. Then they reverted to a more traditional pro-style offense. Last weekend, they ran out of the Wildcat formation and pulled daring trick plays.

So what offense will show up Saturday in the meeting between the Cavaliers and the Hokies?

In Blacksburg, there are few answers. Virginia Tech’s players and coaches are expecting the unexpected from a Virginia team that has tried to adjust its offense depending on the skills and match ups each week.

But Coach Frank Beamer said he was less concerned with schemes, and more concerned with athletes like multipurpose player Vic Hall and quarterback Jameel Sewell.

“You just kind of look at the personnel, and regardless of what they’re running exactly, I think they’ve got the ability to hurt you,” Beamer said.

Before the season, Virginia Tech defensive end Nekos Brown talked about wanting to seize his first opportunity in a starting role. Now, after putting together a nice senior year, Brown said he was hoping to parlay his play into an NFL opportunity as an outside linebacker.

“At the next level, I know I can play outside linebacker,” Brown said. “I really can’t wait to stand up and show what I can do. I think I’m going to excel and show that I’m very athletic standing up.”

At 6 feet 2 and 248 pounds, Brown has a body built more in the mold of an outside linebacker than his position at Virginia Tech.

In fact, he said, Virginia recruited him to be an outside linebacker in its 3-4 defense. The Hokies’ 4-3 defense is designed differently, and he has played with his hand on the ground since coming to Blacksburg.

Safe travels to all of you going to see family for Thanksgiving. And now, some links.

So you might have heard the Virginia Coach Al Groh's sitting on the hot seat, skating on thin ice, headed for the guillotine . . . any more cliches? Anyway, who exactly is going to replace him if he's fired as the Cavaliers' coach? Jerry Ratcliffe of the Charlottesville Daily Progress has come up with some possible answers.

Aaron McFarling of the Roanoke Times says that Groh should have announced Monday that Saturday's game would be his last at Virginia. Why? McFarlings writes that Groh would get the send-off he deserves and "more importantly, perhaps the Cavs would get that extra modicum of motivation that would help them beat their in-state rivals for the first time in their last six tries."

Meanwhile, Darryl Slater of the Richmond Times-Dispatch takes an in-depth look at the development of Virginia Tech quarterback Tyrod Taylor. The numbers speak for themselves. But the less-obvious benchmarks of Taylor's improvement and perhaps the greatest sign of the coaches' increased trust in him, as Slater writes, is "their recent willingness to let him, and not his offensive coordinator, pick a play at the line of scrimmage based on what he sees in the defense’s formation."

ESPN.com's Heather Dinich offers her predictions for Saturday's games. Her take on the Hokies-Wahoos game is perhaps closer than some might expect. What's your take? Feel free to drop a score prediction in the comment section below.

Virginia Tech completed its 2010 schedule by adding James Madison, a division I-AA program, to fill the void left when its meeting with Western Michigan taken off next year's slate.

The Hokies will host the Dukes on Sept. 11, 2010, marking the seventh football meeting between the two Virginia universities, dating to 1980. Virginia Tech holds a 6-0 advantage in the series.

On Oct. 23, Western Michigan announced that it replaced Virginia Tech for Notre Dame on its 2010 schedule. The meeting between the Hokies and the Broncos in Blacksburg, Va., was moved to 2016.

The announcement created an opening in Virginia Tech's schedule, which Athletic Director Jim Weaver had been working to fill.

The Hokies non-conference schedule in 2010 also includes home games against Central Michigan on Sept. 4 and East Carolina on Sept. 18 and a meeting with Boise State at FedEx Field on Oct. 2.

On Monday, a reporter asked Dyrell Roberts about his tough night in Virginia Tech's 38-10 win over North Carolina State. The Hokies wide receiver immediately responded by saying he assumed such an inquiry was coming.

Roberts was thrown at five times Saturday but did not have any receptions and was credited with one dropped passes. (There was another incomplete pass his direction toward the end of the first quarter, but it was ruled a defensive pass interference.)

"It looked like on film it was some tough catches," Roberts said. "The one that really got me mad was the curl because I took my off of it and tried to turn up field."

The curl he was referring to was the dropped pass he was credited for. Early in the second quarter, Tyrod Taylor looked toward Roberts, but the catchable pass fell from his hands to the turf.

In-state rivalries like the one between Virginia Tech and Virginia start at a young age. These videos illustrate that, so check them out if you feel like wasting a little time.

The Little Hokie

It's going to be a busy Tuesday. No time to waste. Here are your links.

So the Al Groh's Last Game Week is officially on in Charlottesville. He was asked if he could hear the ax coming down on his tenure at Virginia (okay, not exactly in those words) on Monday. "It's not really about me," Groh said. "It's about the team and it's about the players. You know, that's all I'm really thinking about, so I don't really have any thoughts on it."

Meanwhile, the Cavaliers are just hoping to get healthy. My colleague Zach Berman reports on Cavaliers Journal that running back Mikell Simpson (hamstring) and defensive end Nate Collins (shoulder), two Virginia seniors who were injured in Saturday's loss to Clemson, both expressed optimism that they will play Saturday against Virginia Tech.

Virginia's special-teams failures have haunted them this season. The Cavaliers hired Ron Prince, the former Kansas State coach, to help work with the special teams this season. To no avail. "It's been frustrating for everybody on the team," Groh said. "We certainly expected more. There's been an awful lot of energy and effort put into it - more than ever."

And finally, ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit shows us what a rivalry is all about.

Virginia Tech brought out the turkey – the Wild Turkey – just in time for Thanksgiving.

For only the second time this season, the Hokies ran their variation of the Wildcat offense, the Wild Turkey, in Saturday’s 38-10 win over North Carolina State. In the third quarter, senior tight end Greg Boone took four snaps in the formation – and nearly completed a touchdown pass.

“It felt better because it was Senior Day,” Boone said of running the formation, “coming out here for my last Saturday at Lane Stadium, hearing the crowd scream my name.”

Last season, Boone ran 21 times for 76 yards and a touchdown out of the Wild Turkey. But he had yet to run a play in the formation this season; he was injured earlier in the year and the Hokies’ coaches said they did not need to run Wild Turkey because the offense had improved moving the ball without that added wrinkle.

“It wasn’t something we really needed to run like last year,” Boone said.

When Jarrett Boykin came to Virginia Tech, his teammates were so fascinated by the size of his large hands that they created plenty of nicknames for the wide receiver. But this season, Boykin (known also as Meat Hands or Meat Hooks or Boat Oars) has drawn attention for attributes other than his big paws.

Boykin, a sophomore, had a career-high 164 yards receiving on six catches in the Hokies' 38-10 win Saturday over North Carolina State. But the standout performance was no anomaly. Boykin's big day was indicative of his development as a pass catcher and the connection that has developed this season between him and quarterback Tyrod Taylor.

"I thought he made a couple great adjustments to the ball and got those big claws up there and grabbed it and came down with it," Coach Frank Beamer said of Boykin's performance against the Wolfpack. "He had big plays in the ballgame. Huge plays."

Beamer added: "He’s very, very dependable. Get that ball up in the air around him and we’ve got a pretty good shot of getting it with him.”