The roller coaster of a game on Saturday didn't end well for Virginia Tech as the Hokies lost at Pittsburgh 45-29. However, the offense looked as good as it has maybe all season despite facing possibly the best defense they've played to date. With that said, here's a look at 3 of my offensive takeaways from VT's 45-29 loss at Pitt.
1. Malachi Thomas Provides Instant Boost to Rushing Attack
Virginia Tech's rushing attack showed signs of life for the first time since Keshawn King's 65-yard touchdown run in the first half of the Boston College due in largely to one player: Malachi Thomas.
After missing the first 5 games of the season, Thomas made his 2022 debut at Pittsburgh and wasted no time leaving his mark on this VT team with his first touch of the game being a 5-yard rushing touchdown. Thomas would go on to have 15 carries for 84 yards and a touchdown plus 5 catches for 14 yards in what was a very productive day for the sophomore from Georgia.
Tech's run blocking was slightly improved but not in the type of way that seemed ready to have a running back average well over 5 yards per carry on double-digit carries given how much they had been struggling. Some good draw and counter plays boosted those numbers too, but Thomas just looked like the type of running back that fits the power-running style Tech wants to have.
Thomas' style since his emergence last season has proven to be a more downhill, aggressive approach with good vision to help him take advantage of the holes he gets. That includes him driving into tacklers well and seeming to always go down forward to get an extra yard or two to keep Tech either on or ahead of schedule compared to the down and distance. That made a rushing attack that had been anemic look a whole lot better simply because Thomas is not only Tech's best RB but his style fits quite well and he knows how to get those extra yards after contact.
While Tech's run blocking still has a whole lot of room to improve, Malachi Thomas has provided a much-needed boost to the rushing attack.
2. Braelin Moore vs Jesse Hanson Has Arrived
After playing sparingly through the first 5 games, highly-regarded true freshman Braelin Moore saw his first significant action of the season Saturday playing 34 snaps while starting left guard Jesse Hanson 48. For an offensive line that hasn't really rotated any backups up in prior to this game, that's a rather significant shift at the left guard spot.
Of course, we thought we might see a lot of Braelin Moore after he had a great fall camp that had coaches hinting at a fairly open competition with Hanson for the starting left guard job despite how Moore spent the spring at defensive tackle and only moved to guard in the summer.
I won't call myself an offensive line evaluation expert, but Moore did grade out better than Hanson this past week with a significantly better grade in pass protection and a slightly worse run blocking grade though both of their grades in that area were in the 50s. That's only one data point but that combined with Moore receiving this sudden increase in playing time in a divisional ACC game is a clear indication of a tightening competition here.
This competition did have somewhat of a vibe similar to what we saw with Silas Dzansi against Luke Tenuta and against Parker Clements in recent years with Dzansi as the starter to start the season before the younger, higher upside tackle took over. While Hanson has held on to his starting job more strongly over the first half of the season than Dzansi did, his grip seems to be loosening a little similar to Dzansi.
While Hanson is still the starter at left guard, it's clearly that Braelin Moore has closed the gap significantly making left guard a spot to watch in the coming weeks.
3. Grant Wells and the Missing Changeup
Grant Wells definitely has loads of arm talent as you can see from not only his arm strength but some of the great deep balls he threw against Pittsburgh especially to Kaleb Smith who he seems to have great chemistry with. However, we've seen areas where Wells has to grow including his accuracy and decision-making.
One of the biggest though is his lack of touch that he can bring as a passer and specifically, the lack of a changeup.
There's plenty of times where Wells has had a fairly accurate pass that should be caught but is a fastball that makes it harder than it should be for the receiver to make a play and may get there sooner than they would expect given the route they're running.
We saw another example of this early on to Nick Gallo who had a nice little TE version of a wheel route and got by his man but instead of floating it in over the top in stride, Wells threw a fastball right to the inside shoulder of Gallo. Now Gallo should have caught that pass to be clear, but that ball has to be a leading lob, a changeup as you could call it, instead of a fastball on a not easy angle to turn around and make the catch while trying to get the runout and not check up a step to turn the inside shoulder to make the catch.
This wasn't the only time in this game nor this season that we've seen Wells struggle to have a changeup to go with his fastball. There have been signs of development as well especially with Kaleb Smith who he has great chemistry with but if Wells is going to take the next step, he's going to need to develop a changeup as a passer.
The good news is that's something that can definitely be developed.
