It has been a month and a half since Virginia Tech fired Brent Pry as football coach. The school has a search committee in the process of searching for the former Penn State defensive coordinator's successor.
The problem with the coaching cycle and parting ways with Pry this year, which needed to be done, is that it is setting up for the wildest coaching carousel we have seen in college football in recent memory. Current jobs open along with Virginia Tech that are high-profile jobs are Penn State, Arkansas, Florida, LSU, and others.
There are sure to be more openings from schools cutting ties with their current coaches, as well as coaches bolting for other programs. There have been several names linked to the opening in Blacksburg, and Tom Fornelli of CBS Sports made his pick as to who he thinks will be Pry's replacement.
Tom Fornelli predicts Shane Beamer to Virginia Tech as Brent Pry's replacement
Fornelli predicted who would be hired at some of the power conference openings, and he predicted that Shane Beamer would land at Virginia Tech.
"This is the great storyline,'' said Fornelli. "This is Shane Beamer leaving South Carolina to take over at Virginia Tech to take over the program his father built from pretty much the ground up... If you look at how things have gone this year at South Carolina, I don't think Shane Beamer is in any kind of immediate trouble; it's just having the success that they had last year. High expectations were coming into 2025. Now, we're staring at a South Carolina team that might not even make a bowl game.
"Maybe Shane Beamer is looking around and saying I might not be in trouble now, but this makes sense as far as timing and resetting my clock and starting somewhere new.''
The more time goes along, and with the season South Carolina is having, this is starting to make more and more sense: Shane Beamer to Virginia Tech. He played there under his father and coached there under his father. You have to think that he would be at the top of the committee's list.