After a bye week, the Virginia Tech football team will head to Duke for an ACC game looking for their sixth win of the season to become bowl-eligible. Last week, the conference announced that kick-off in Durham will be at 8 o'clock and in primetime on the ACC Network.
After their trip to Duke, the Hokies will return home to play their final regular season game of the 2024 season on Nov. 30, two days after Thanksgiving, against Virginia in the annual Commonwealth Cup in a game that could have huge meaning for both teams. If Tech loses to the Blue Devils and the Cavaliers lose at home to SMU this upcoming Saturday, you would have two 5-6 teams looking to become bowl-eligible at Lane Stadium. Oh, the drama.
On Monday, the ACC announced that the game and for a second week in a row, the Hokies will play in te primetime slot at 8 p.m. A night game in Lane for Commonwealth Cup, what more could you ask for?
Last season, when Virginia Tech went to Charlottesville, they were 5-6 and needed to win to become. bowl-eligible. The Hokies went there and took care of business with a 55-17 rout of the Cavaliers and it didn't take much for Brent Pry's team to get up for the game after comments from Virginia starting quarterback Anthony Colandrea a week before the game.
Virginia Tech used the momentum from that win and took it with them to their 41-20 Military Bowl victory over Tulane University in December. In between, Pry and his staff got a ton of retainment from the 2023 roster to set themselves up for a big 2024.
The big 2024 hasn't happened and now they are left needing one win to become bowl-eligible over the final two weeks. If they don't it's going to be a much different off-season for Pry and his staff and it's going to be a long one, to say the least.