Dillard was one of the fastest, if not the fastest, players on the team. Now returning wide receivers Zach Luckett and Ike Whitaker are the leading candidates for the starting position next season, and both should see a large amount of playing time.

Also, watch out for Macho Harris. Macho is expected to play some offense for the Hokies this season, and now Frank Beamer may want him to play more than originally thought.

He may make the team, he may not, but one thing is certain; Washington was the most exciting player in college basketball last year with his electrifying leaping ability and athleticism, and his play helped put Virginia Tech basketball on the map. He wasn’t the best basketball player in Virginia Tech history, but he will certainly be one of the most memorable. Hopefully he can make a name for himself in the NBA, and make it onto Sportscenter a few more times!

Third baseman Charisse Mariconda fielded the ball cleanly but made a poor throw to first.  This allowed the runner to score from second.  Megan Gibson pitched a great game for the Aggies, and it was her hit ball to third that scored the only run of the game.  She went all seven innings with nine strike outs, and allowed five hits.  The Aggies came in as the best fielding team in the nation making only 27 errors this season, but made two in the game

The Hokies will play the number one overall seeded Florida Gators on Saturday at noon.  Florida lost in extra innings to UL Lafayette.

On the right arm of senior pitcher Angela Tincher, the Hokies rallied in the series against sixth ranked Michigan to win two must win games on Sunday. The Hokies scored only one run, but that would be enough for game two.  Tincher was phenomenal in the first game when she struck out 15 batters and allowed no runs.  Her fastball was consistently reaching 68 MPH, which was nearly impossible to hit.   With the way the first two games went in the series you would have thought game three would have gone much of the same.  However the Hokies had something different in mind.  When the third inning rolled around the Hokies exploded offensively scoring four runs in the inning.  That would be all that Tincher would need in this one.  The Hokies scored two more runs and the nations ERA leader gave up a solo homerun late in the game.  Tincher finished with seven strikeouts in this one, sending her total to 22 for the day.  This was the first time all season that Michigan lost back-to-back games.

Virginia Tech will take on Texas A&M this Thursday to open up their World Series dream.  Hopefully the Hokies can roll like they have since winning their second straight ACC Championship under head coach Scot Thomas.

Michigan is the number four overall seed in the country, and leads the nation in ERA.  However Anglea Tincher holds the lowest ERA by a pitcher in the nation, so the low score should have been expected.  Tincher allowed four hits and one walk on the day, but also struck out 10 batters.  Tincher is now 36 and 8 on the year and will look for a must win tomorrow when these two teams will finish up the best of three series.

Sorry it’s been so long, but finals are over and football season is right around the corner.  The Hokies have had an interesting spring so far, with a number of injuries to what used to be a deep part of the roster; running back.  Kenny Lewis Jr. has a torn labrum in his shoulder, which happened in spring practice.  Lewis was the front-runner for the starting job after Branden Ore was kicked off the football team for unspecified reasons.  Jahre Cheeseman, in my opinion our most electrifying running back, broke his fibula in spring practice as well.  Chesseman should be ready in time for summer camp, or at least some of it, but Lewis could miss some time at the beginning of the season.  So for now there is a two-way race for the starting running back position.  Darren Evans and Josh Ogelsby are both redshirt freshman, and they could both contribute in different ways.  Ogelsby had a better spring game than Evans, but not by enough to give him an advantage.  For now those two are alone but come summer time another running back will be added to the list, and that is Ryan Williams.  Williams is considered by some to be the best running back on the east coast coming out of high school.  If he can learn the playbook and adjust well to the offensive system of the Hokies he could receive substantial playing time, and possibly start; however, this race will eventually play itself out in late August.

Now to the quarterbacks.  Sean Glennon had a very good spring game where he threw for a couple of touchdowns, and connected on a number of passes.  On the flip side, Tyrod Taylor seems to have a lot of work to do.  Taylor was nothing short of horrible through the air in the spring game.  To be fair there were a couple of dropped passes, but otherwise just a poor outing.  Taylor was coming off an ankle injury that limited him in some of spring practice, so maybe that was the issue.  Whatever the reason for his play he needs to be better if he wants to see the field this year.  There has been talk of Frank Beamer throwing the proverbial redshirt on him this year, but the likelihood of that is low.  For now Glennon should have a substantial lead in the quarterback race.  It’s unknown if Beamer will go back to the two-quarterback system, but if he does Taylor will be the man coming off of the bench.

On the defensive side of the ball things looked pretty good.  We’ve lost a number of players, many of which were taken in the NFL draft or signed after, but there are a lot of familiar names on the defensive side of the ball that remain.  I don’t believe we will have many problems on defense this year.  Victor “Macho” Harris looked great, getting two sacks in the spring game on Taylor and he had a number of tackles and pass deflections.  With Harris and Kam Chancellor being the anchors of the secondary they will be able to help the younger less experienced guys that fill in.

If you haven’t already heard, Macho is likely to be playing on offense, defense and special teams this upcoming season.  When Beamer recruited Harris he promised him he would get to play on offense.  Harris was a running back in high school, but Beamer feels he could be one of the better wide receivers we have on the team this year.  Saying that, Harris will likely get only 10-15 snaps on offense per game because he will probably be the punt returner as well.  Beamer and Bud Foster are going to need Harris to be fresh on defense, but this should make for a pretty exciting year for the senior corner who has aspirations of the NFL. 

Frank Beamer announced today that redshirt senior Branden Ore will not be back with the Virginia Tech football team.  He did not disclose the reason, but Ore has run into issues in his time at Virginia Tech.  

Back in his sophomore year Ore was removed from the team for spring practice because he wasn’t attending classes, and was showing up late to practice.  After spending the spring unloading the back of 7-11 trucks at their warehouses, Ore claimed he was a “changed man”.  Ore stayed out of trouble for that season and had a pretty good year.

Last season Ore was injured for much of the season, but started most of the games.  However, Ore showed up late to the last practice before the Orange Bowl and was suspended for the first quarter of the game, which hurt the teams running attack.  He went onto rush for 116 yards in the game with a touchdown.  

Also shortly after the end of last season Ore was in trouble with the law again.  Nothing really transpired from this, but Ore was in the car with someone who had cocaine in his possession and it was up in the air whether Ore also had cocaine.  This may be what led to his suspension, but it could be something else Ore has done.

Virginia Tech has had a number of players that have been suspended in the past for off the field issues.  Now that Ore is gone Virginia Tech doesn’t have any real character issues on the team.   At first glance you may think this could hurt the Virginia Tech team this upcoming season.  However, the Hokies have a number of good running backs on the roster.  Kenny Lewis Jr. is an upcoming junior this season and Darren Evans (redshirt freshman) has been highly talked about.  The guy I’m most looking forward to watching is Ryan Williams.  Considered by many to be the best running back on the east coast, Williams will be a true freshman this year and could see significant playing time.  The Hokies will be fine at running back, and could be competing for a National Championship despite losing their troubled running back.

Virginia Tech’s football schedule for the upcoming season was released on Friday, and a game at Nebraska highlights the out-of-conference schedule.  Despite heading to Nebraska the Hokies have a very weak schedule outside of the ACC.  They open against East Carolina in Charlotte, NC. and then play Furman on Sept. 6, for their home opener.  They play Nebraska on the 27th of Sept. and they finish their out-of-conference schedule with a home game against Western Kentucky on October 4th.  

The Hokies also have two Thursday night games on the schedule.  The first will be against Maryland in Blacksburg on November 6, and then the very next week at Miami on Thursday November 13.  They will close their season against Virginia and after that the Hokies hope to be heading to Tampa Bay for the ACC Championship.

Not to get ahead of myself, but the Hokies have a very winnable schedule in 2008.  There is a great chance of the Hokies going undefeated in the regular season even though they lost a number of players on both sides of the ball.  Nebraska, Florida State and Miami aren’t the huge forces they used to be, but these teams all had very solid recruiting classes; Miami was considered to have the best recruiting class in the nation.  However saying this these teams have great athletes and they can compete with any team in the country on any given day.  On top of having to play these three teams the Hokies don’t play one of those three at home in 2008.  Another game I’m looking forward to is against Boston College on Oct. 18 in Chestnut Hill, MA.  Boston College has lost a number of players from last year’s roster and they often don’t recruit as well as Virginia Tech.  This game has become a rivalry game inside the ACC and Boston College has had success against Virginia Tech during the regular season.

The Hokies will have a lot of new starters on both sides of the ball this season, but Virginia Tech is a well coached team and shouldn’t struggle but so much.  They have two very winnable games at the beginning of the year, and this should give them some momentum when they open up conference play against Georgia Tech at home.  They have four games, all of which they should win, before they play at Nebraska.  I think we will see what this young team is made of after the first three games, and if all goes well I believe Virginia Tech could run through their schedule untouched and find themselves in the ACC Championship to possibly play for a national championship bid come December.

Wednesday was national signing day and the Hokies finished with the fifteenth best class in the nation, according to scouts inc. and ESPN.  Virginia Tech will never overwhelm you with five-star recruits, but the Hokies always seem to recruit a number of three- and four-star athletes.  I like to compare recruiting in college football to the NFL Draft.  You don’t build your team through first-round picks, but rather through the later rounds.  I would much rather Virginia Tech gain a number of three-star recruits that in a couple of years may look like they were five-star athletes coming out of high school.  

As long as you have great coaching, which Virginia Tech does, the players rank coming out of high school doesn’t matter.  For example, Virginia Tech’s starting rover, Kam Chancellor, was a two-star recruit coming out of high school.  He had only two other scholarship offers and some Virginia Tech coaches have gone on record to say that Chancellor is one of the best athletes they have ever seen.  Not to say that every two-star athlete turns into a star, but a number of kids are overlooked and aren’t given a fair chance if they come from a smaller school.

The player I’m looking most forward to watching is Ryan Williams.  Williams is a running back from Manassas, VA. who was the only Virginia Tech recruit from ESPN’s top 150.  Williams is considered by many to be the best high school running back from the east coast, and he could see playing time right away.  I won’t get too carried away with playing time as a true freshman since Frank Beamer has only played a true freshman one time in his coaching career.  That just happens to be Tyrod Taylor.  Another player I’m looking forward to in the future is Bruce Taylor.  Taylor is a middle-line backer from Myrtle Beach, SC. and he has been on Virginia Tech’s radar for a couple of years.  Virginia Tech has always had very good linebackers and I expect Taylor to be another name added to the list.

Once again the Hokies aren’t going to blow you away with their recruiting class, but they recruit solid athletes that know how to play football.  They almost always get the top players from the state of Virginia, which is a state loaded with high school football.  The Hokies have a very good class of freshman arriving on campus next fall, and they will be able to build off of this class for years to come.