Virginia Tech Football: 5 things we learned from Virginia win

Needing a win to take the next step in the rebuild going into 2024, the Virginia Tech football team took a giant step in that direction with a 55-17 blowout of Virginia Saturday in the annual Commonwealth Cup in Charlottesville.

After starting the season 0-4 on the road, the Hokies completed their second road-dominating victory in two weeks after blasting Boston College, 48-22, on Nov. 11. This just wasn’t a win, it was a total domination of the Cavaliers to continue their dominance in the rivalry.

With Virginia Tech becoming bowl-eligible, here are five things we learned in the latest edition of the Commonwealth Cup to close out the 2023 regular season.

1. Virginia Tech’s defense is relentless

In their five ACC wins this season, the Virginia Tech defense has been relentless and made life miserable for opposing quarterbacks. Phil Jurkovec was pulled as Pittsburgh’s starter after losing to the Hokies, Wake Forest went through two QBs against Tech, Syracuse lost Garrett Schrader to an injury and he finally returned this past weekend against Wake Forest. Boston College quarterback Thomas Castellanos was pressured all day by the Hokies and Saturday, Virginia’s Anthony Colandrea was running trying to avoid the Hokies rush.

Colandrea was sacked five times and threw for 243 yards, but most of them came in the second half with the score out of hand. Virginia had 286 yards of total offense, again most of that came in the second half. The Cavaliers had 18 first downs, but four of those came by penalty. It was a total domination from the unit as a whole and set the tone for the game.