Virginia Tech Football: ESPN’s grade for Brent Pry is absolutely spot on

Brent Pry is in his second season at Virginia Tech in charge of the Hokies. First and foremost, let’s be honest, he walked into not the greatest situation following Justin Fuente. He is in charge of a Hokies rebuild that might take longer than the fanbase is hoping it would take, but the first 16 games have not been great.

ESPN recently did an article grading the second-year head coaches in the FBS and there are some pretty big names in Year 2 with their current school. Lincoln Riley at USC, Mike Elko at Duke, Brent Venables at Oklahoma, Dan Lanning at Oregon, and Mario Cristobal at Miami are just a few of the other coaches who received grades. Pry was graded and graded low.

Brent Pry receives the lowest grade among second-year FBS coaches

Pry received a D and it’s hard to argue with the grade. In Year 1, the Hokies finished at 3-8 overall and 1-6 in ACC play with their only conference win coming over Boston College. The problems went deeper than the record as their offense finished near the bottom of the FBS in points per game with 19.7 in 2022 and the defense only forced nine turnovers, something that needs to be higher for a Power 5 school.

This season the Hokies are 2-3 and have not looked good at times, on both sides of the ball. Offensively they are scoring 24.8 points per game and defensively, they are still giving up big chunks and scoring plays against all five of their opponents. They are coming off their best overall performance of the Brent Pry era in a 38-21 win over Pittsburgh last Saturday night at Lane Stadium. Offensively they established the run and put up some big plays of their own, but also the defense gave up just 14 points, but both were big plays on 75-yard and 61-yard touchdown passes. They even forced a third-quarter turnover that led to a Kyron Drones touchdown run.

For one week, the win takes the pressure off of Pry and his staff, however, a trip to Tallahassee this weekend to play fifth-ranked Florida State could bring the doubters back out. Virginia Tech is up against it in the recruiting portion and they have found success this season from the transfer portal last offseason, but they need to hit in big quickly in recruiting and not rely year in and year out on the transfer portal.

Virginia Tech has one of the best fanbases when it comes to supporting its team. Despite them entering the Pittsburgh game at 1-3, Lane Stadium was sold out, and when they return next weekend on Oct. 14 to host Wake Forest for Homecoming, it will be sold out again and make it one of the toughest college football venus to try and win at. Hokies fans are patient for only so long, but it’s hard to argue right now with a D for Pry through his first 16 games with a 5-11 record.