During all my years of watching football, there is one undeniable fact when it comes to having a successful team: It’s all about the quarterback.
Saturday night as Virginia Tech’s football renaissance continued with a 35-26 win over Maryland to go to 3-0 for the first time since 2017, the Hokies showed they indeed have a very good one in Ethan Grunkemeyer.
Yeah, there are people who point out he’s missed a few deep passes, but with each game he is showing more and more that he’s not only a passer, he’s a field general who controls the game. Last night when the defense would make a mistake – and we’ll get to that in a minute – he’d calmly lead the offense down the field to answer.
He threw for over 300 yards for the second straight game, but just as impressive were all the adjustments you could see he was making at the line. Much like ODU last week, Maryland crowded the line to stop the Virginia Tech running game, but in the majority of cases Grunkemeyer effectively switched to a different play that moved away from the teeth of that defense.
The prime beneficiary was tight end Luke Reynolds, who at times made plays you normally see on Sundays. He caught 12 passes for 107 yards and a touchdown, and he and Grunkemeyer already are showing a special chemistry where one knows exactly where to throw the ball when the Hokies need a first down, and the other knows exactly where to go to catch it.
But last night was more than stats – and Grunkemeyer had plenty going 31 of 39 for 314 yards, three touchdowns and ran for a fourth score. There was a presence, a confidence, an air that the offense was properly prepared for what it was facing and if one play didn’t work, they’d get back in the huddle, figure it out, and be successful on the next.
That’s been about as foreign to me over the last decade as low humidity and cool temps in the DMV in July. At times I wanted to tell myself “relax, they’ll answer” but after years of Hokie gridiron emotional abuse, I couldn’t quite do it. With each week, however, it feels like I’m getting closer.
Of course it would help if I had a similar confidence in the defense like the days of Bud Foster, but that ship is continuing to take on water. Against ODU there were several situations where blown coverages left a man wide open, and even the most average of quarterbacks can lob up a successful pass when there’s nobody guarding the receiver.
Last night against Maryland it happened again multiple times. What was maddening to me is it did not seem to be a lack of talent, rather more a lack of communications. The team would be in one defensive set, a call would be made at the last second to switch to something more effective, and defensive backs that should have switched who they were supposed to cover did not. That left two DBs covering one receiver and the other receiver running all alone like he was in the upper deck of a USFL game.
You’d have thought that would have been fixed after the glaring ODU mistakes. You’d think now that it happened again versus Maryland it would be a 5-alarm fire in practice this week, because while it’s nice to be undefeated, that’s not going to last long as the Hokies play better and better teams.
Still, the team has now won as many games this season as it did in all of 2025. Hokie fans are waking up to a strange new sensation where the coffee tastes sweeter, the sun shines brighter and there is a noticeable reduction in the use of the phrase “I can’t believe they did it again.”
They’re happy.
Winning will do that, and this team seems to understand if they get off to a fast start, they vastly lower the anxiety felt in the stands. In their three games, the Hokies have scored 45, 34 and 27 points in the first half to seemingly take control by halftime. In years past it has seemed like the offense needed a quarter or two to get everyone comfortable, and they then spent the rest of the game playing catchup.
This team seems to be the inverse of that. They either take their foot off the gas or start making more and more mistakes in the second half after jumping to a big lead, almost as if they want to make sure everyone understands the Hokies are still a work in progress and folks should not confuse a few early wins with “we’re totally back.”
They’re not totally back, but after three games, they’re totally better than the last few years. They’ve got a solid quarterback, an all-star tight end, several very good running backs, and a defense that can stuff the run with the best of them.
Now if they could just fix the secondary…
