Story of the Statlines: Crushed by the Cardinals
The Story
This game pretty much speaks for itself, with the Hokies being defeated in rough fashion. Once primed to jump to second in the ACC with a win, Virginia Tech was issued a severe wake-up call by a very talented coach in Jeff Brohm and the Louisville Cardinals. The road woes continue for Tech as they move to 0-4 on the road, and with two out of three of their remaining games set away from home, Virginia Tech must set their sights on closing out the rest of the season strong and possibly reaching a coveted bowl game.
1. Virginia Tech allows three 35+ yard touchdowns vs. Louisville
The Cardinals were extremely efficient on both sides of the ball against Virginia Tech. Jake Plummer passed for an efficient 92% completion rate on 12 attempts and a 37-yard touchdown to Jadon Thompson. The ground and pound backs did their jobs as well for Louisville, as Issac Guerendo and Jawhar Jordan combined for 203 yards and four total touchdowns, with Guerendo breaking off two of his runs for 35+ yard TDs. Obviously, facing the No. 13 team in the country is always tough, but Pry and Co. have a ton of film to delve into as they prepare to face Boston College on the road.
2. The Hokies were held to 140 total yards, their lowest since 2015 at Pitt
Virginia Tech knew they had a tough matchup on the road against a very good Louisville defense, but this is probably not what Tech expected out of Kyron Drones and their offense. The Cardinals constantly brought pressure, limited Drones to only 69 passing yards, and forced an interception, only his second of the season. Bhayshul Tuten rushed for 57 yards on 11 carries, which was solid, but without a pass game, he couldn’t get much going. The Hokies were stopped right in their tracks for pretty much the whole game.
3. Kyron Drones rushes for only six yards on 11 carries
As talked about above, Drones had his worst performance as a starter thus far into the season. The norm for him has been to use his legs on broken down plays, which he has been very successful at this season, but the defensive line for Louisville made his day in the pocket miserable being held to his season low rushing the ball as well as passing. Let's just chalk this game up as one to forget for the Hokies and keep moving forward to next week.
