Troubling trend for Virginia Tech's defense

BLACKSBURG - Virginia Tech's defensive players and coaches take pride in performing well enough to win games. And they've done it often enough over the years that many observers identify Tech's program with its defense.

But Tech likely wouldn't have beaten Duke 34-26 last Saturday if its offense hadn't gained 477 yards, including 327 passing. The defense, meanwhile, allowed five plays, all passes, of 20 yards or longer, which totaled 237 of Duke's 397 yards.

"We were fortunate the offense played well," said defensive backs coach Torrian Gray. "We gave up too many long plays, too many yards to win an ACC championship. Those are the type of games that you don't always get away with."

Maybe it was just an off week, which every team is bound to experience. Maybe the Hokies couldn't replicate the emotional intensity of their first four games, three of which were against teams ranked in the top 19 nationally.

Whatever the reason, last Saturday underscored a troubling trend for Tech's defense. Though the Hokies are 2-0 in the ACC and 4-1 overall entering Saturday's noon home game against Boston College, long plays are stinging them, as they did early last season.

Their defensive coordina tor, Bud Foster, wants to see better fundamentals and more leadership from his players, while he hopes they can improve as they did last year.

Tech this season has allowed 20 plays of 20 yards or longer. Those plays account for six percent of opponents' snaps and 45.3 percent of their yards. Through last season's first five games, when Tech also was 4-1, opponents had 23 such plays -- 7.9 percent of their snaps for 40.8 percent of their yards.

But the Hokies allowed just 30 20-plus plays in last season's final nine games. Their total yards per game also improved from 328.6 in the first five games to 252.1 in the final nine. (This season Tech is allowing 339.8 yards per game.)

After watching video of the Duke game, Foster said the culprit for long plays continues to be technique errors rather than the way he aligns the defense. "They've got to see that they've got to execute," he said. "There's not a call I'd want back."

Foster deemed two plays "totally unacceptable" -- a 48-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter and a 74-yard pass in the third.

The 48-yarder was a play-action pass. Rover Dorian Porch bit on the run fake and bailed on his responsibility to cover the deep part of the field, which turned a 10-yard toss to tight end Brandon King into a 7-0 Duke lead. The 74-yarder was another 10-yard pass, to wide receiver Conner Vernon, that ended up moving Duke to Tech's 7-yard line because cornerback Stephan Virgil failed to maintain leverage. Virgil was supposed to keep inside leverage and force Vernon outside, toward the sideline. But Vernon cut back inside, and Virgil whiffed on the tackle.

This irks Gray, because he always emphasizes to his defensive backs the importance of maintaining leverage, "because when we screw up, it's big plays and it's big yards."

Tech's 12 20-plus plays in the first three games made Foster challenge his players to perform better. They responded by holding Miami to 209 yards and three 20-plus plays, as the Hokies won 31-7. But the mistakes at Duke left him looking for more seniors to take charge. "It's their team," Foster said. "They're the ones playing."

Junior defensive end Jason Worilds said he often talks to his teammates about "wanting to be great all the time, not just on Saturdays, not just when you feel good on a certain day," adding, "I feel as though I've been on the front line as far as trying to be an example for the young guys since day one. So I really can't speak on anybody else stepping up."

Wherever the motivation comes from, the Hokies know they must replicate last season and become more consistent, because, as Gray said, "The great ones, the great defenses, the great secondaries, they'll do it game in and game out."

Contact Darryl Slater at (804) 649-6026 or dslater@timesdispatch.com