I’ve hit around the Virginia Tech roster the past few weeks, but haven’t really dug into it. Let’s start now with the defense.
I talked a bit about the defense in my second round of postseason thoughts but I was late getting to the comments, so I’ll respond to a few here.
First, here are my January thoughts on what I expected to be the starting lineup for the defense:
DE: Garbutt and Griffin
DL: Pollard and Kendricks
SAM: Tisdale
MIKE: Hollifield
WILL: Artis
NICKEL: Murray
FIELD SAFETY: Stroman
BOUNDARY SAFETY: Conner
CORNER: Strong and Chatman
That’s from my scheme review on Pry, which you can find here: The Brent Pry Scheme, Part 2: Coverages And Blitzes.
The front four, Mike, and corner are self-explanatory. I thought Tisdale had the best combo of athleticism and experience for the Sam spot, and could make the move from boundary to field. Artis had the most snaps at Backer after Tisdale, so he was my Will candidate. I thought Conner was too good to keep him part-time at Nickel, so backing him up deep made sense. Stroman was the big reach, but he struck me as smart enough to start at the field despite his youth.
From what I’ve heard, this wouldn’t have been too far from the early spring lineup. Midway through spring, though, the coaches started moving pieces around. The big news was converting the Sam spot into more of a hybrid position with Jenkins and Walker. Murray also seemed to get most of his snaps at Nickel, but was a corner in games. In the deep secondary, the coaches almost agreed with me about starting Jalen Stroman, but not quite. They ended up putting Conner to the field, and Nasir Peoples to the boundary.
The Virginia Tech Defensive Line
This worked out about like I expected it to. TyJuan
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