O.B. Eye in the Sky: (part II)

The O.B. had a second-half to it, one in which VT cut into the KU lead, and seemed close to taking control of the LOS once or twice. As our 3rd Quarter of play was prolly our best composite 15 minutes down on So.Beach. But things happen, and sometimes they happen more than once; as our football was the little O&M engine that (almost) could, but in the end, KU was “…King of the road.”

But there were some enjoyable VT plays along the way, some telling ones, and a few that I’ll just call unhelpful. So here’s a look at how this B.C.S. nite closed out.

3rd Quarter 11:52 remaining: helluva an effort play by the substitute Tech teacher know as Mr. Grimm; having to hustle back and get a mit on this Reesing pass to tip it incomplete.

3rd Quarter 11:35 remaining: epic open-field steal by #43 Jason Worilds on the Harper Punt-Return for six. Hats off to Frank and ER and Harp for executing the mid-air pitch, as opposed the the kla-assic handoff exchange. That is a tough play folks, even for a Qb (who typically would have lottsa option reps under his practice belt). Don’t believe me? Go outside and just try to hit a stationary tree with an option pitch while you are on the run. Then get a friend and run towards each other and see if you can avoid fumbling the exchange 5 times outta 10. I was very impressed by the risk factor on this play, as with a missed pitch and KU is sittin’ pretty tall in terms of at least FGA field-position.

3rd Quarter 8:49 remaining: Lucky play of the year. Mighta, coulda, even shoulda, been a KU pick. But “Booooooooooone” put forth an iron-Hokie effort level in rummaging for the football in the mimi-me pile up. This was straight outta the old-school John Mckay pig in the poke practice drill whereby a football is hidden in a pile of tackling dummies and severall players slam into the pile to ferret for the pigskin. This particualr time, VT dug it out.

3rd Quarter 8:49 remaining: Recall the Mel Blanc spoof for NFL Films way back when (The Son of Football Follies II if Ginko serves)? This play is straight outta that award winning series, “…who’s got 87?” Hell if I know is my answer? Did not look like anyone in White with Chicago Maroon trim knew either. SR got turned the wrong way, and Holland did not bother to block-down, and #87 did not bother with staying put on his side of the KU LOS. Used to be the kicking team counted off, L-R, R-L, on both sides of the C, whatever. But somewhere Mel Blanc is mouthing in his best Yosemite Sam voice: “…who’s got 87?!?”

3rd Quarter 4:11 remaining: watch Harp with the ugly turf-impact ball-and-socket injury upon impact with the ground OOB, this time it was a left-Shoulder hurt on the long-ball attempt from Sean Glennon (see: pic on the right).

3rd Quarter 1:49 remaining: Memo to the VT Head Coach: please ask our Pride & Joy coach why we did not call timeout, after we shifted our jammer’s inside off of the KU gunner’s when KU was punting; after KU clearly paused to call an audiblized fake-punt to take advantage of their not 1, but 2, uncovered gunners. Also note that KU threw to their SL, and then note the field positioning where this play took place. (i.e. why not try this high risk maneuver with KU pinned deep on their side of the field?)

3rd Quarter 0:39 remaining: #99 C.Powell on the Jake Grove’esq inexpensive shot almost 25 yards off the ball on the INT return by Parker. All I’ll say is this…….you kan’t make chicken salad outta chickenS.

3rd Quarter 0:00 remaining: Nice steal by Harp downfield on the all-American himself, Mr. Talib at the end of the Bore run. Bonus points hereby awared for Harp’ pulling a Rocky and getting up off the O.B. mat to land such a shot.

4th Quarter 13:00 remaining: Cody Grimm again busting his ass and giving as good as he got on this E.R. punt return. And speaking of E.R. when will his fascination with rolling punts ever end? Dude was within 4 yards, which might have been more like 4 feet, but he just won’t “Get away from it!”, and one of these days a rolling punt is gonna jump up and bite him. But that’s now the next levels problem; not ours.

4th Quarter 10:57 remaining: Reesing and V.Hall exchange something a little bit beyond Holiday Greetings after this play. Disney Channel savvy this moment twas not. That’s Reesing on the right yelling down Vince who is off-camera to the left yelling down Reesing. Vince melted-verbally-down at the 2:09 mark of the 1st Quarter as well. But he generally kept his infamous Bowl Game motor mouth in 1st gear for most of the nite. Though Vince had an off nite for Vince, as he was clearly unable to shift all the way into 5th, and his bum knee spent most of the nite red-lining for only 8 Tac’s while stuck in 4th.

4th Quarter 10:50 remaining: note what happened here, TT was in the game; in the VT huddle, getting the signal from the SL’s, SG attempts to enter the game and is sent back to the VT bench by presumably TT. I don’t know for sure, but I wondered out-loud if SG tried to sub SG in? I don’t know, but I do know that it was TT who stayed in the huddle and eventually ran the play.

4th Quarter 10:25 remaining: see TT get hurt on the pressure induced forced scramble towards our SL’s. Looked to me like TT landed on the football, the ole` wind knocked outta yah play. But is TT too small to play at the D-1 level? He sure looks like he’s still wearing his Sr. Prom body to the VT Ring Dance. (item #4 to fix) Though I suspect a Spring and Summer of Gentrification will remedy that. At least I hope it will.
4th Quarter 5:27 remaining: #70, big ole SR, barley survives the pinned right leg dreaded roll-up on he reverse side of the 2nd and short Qb sneak pile up. b’street