Clemson, SC — Trailing 16-13 with less than two minutes remaining, Virginia Tech desperately needed a fourth-down conversion from the Clemson five-yard line. Ethan Grunkemeyer provided just that, finding Luke Reynolds wide open in the end zone to for the game-winning touchdown. Several plays later, Mylachi Williams brought down Tait Reynolds near midfield for a game-sealing sack to secure a huge road victory in Death Valley, the first for VT in almost two decades at Clemson.
"To see those guys be able to have some success and come into a venue like this, one of the best venues in college football, and get a win is not easy to do," James Franklin said after the game. "I don’t think we’ve won here since 2007. To me, that speaks volumes."
Things started off slow in Death Valley, as both teams opened the game with a pair of punts, but Virginia Tech (6-2, 3-2 ACC) found the board first with 1:20 to go in the opening quarter, with John Love sinking a 36-yard kick to give them a 3-0 lead.
Leading into the kick, Virginia Tech used a 13-play, 46-yard drive to slowly inch down the field and find the red zone.
Clemson would answer in similar fashion, using a 10-play, 59-yard drive to get to the edge of the red zone and ultimately finish with a rather easy field goal for Nolan Hauser.
Things would slow up there for a while, both offenses struggled to find any semblance of rhythm. Over the next pair of drives, both teams would run seven plays and tally 14 total yards.
Six of those yards came from the Hokies, who made a more than questionable decision on a fourth-and-12 from their own 23-yard-line.
The Hokies would run a direct snap to Luke Reynolds, who turned and threw the ball to punter Nathan Totten. The play gained only gained eight yards the Hokies turned it over on downs, giving Clemson the ball at the Tech 31.
Brent Pry's unit would stand up tall, though. Clemson's first play was a two-yard loss on a pass, and the Hokies would follow that up with a pair of sacks coming from Eric Mensah and Jason Abbey, pushing the Tigers out of field goal range and bailing out the questionable decision prior.
"It wasn’t always pretty, but we made critical plays at critical moments, and I’m proud of our guys," said Franklin. "Our depth is really starting to show on the defensive line. We continue to be able to get people off schedule with tackles for loss and some sacks."
Clemson punted the ball away and the Hokies took over from their own 13, putting together a 17-play, 87-yard, 7:43 drive to find the end zone. The Hokies finished the drive off with a familiar connection as Ethan Grunkemeyer found Luke Reynolds in the end zone to give the Hokies a 10-3 lead heading into the half.
Ethan Grunkemeyer finished with 156 yards on 20-for-32 passing, with two touchdowns. He was sacked six times.
The Hokies have had some third-quarter struggles throughout the season, being outscored 38-21 by FBS opponents throughout the season. Those troubles struck the Hokies again tonight versus a Clemson team that came out of the locker room firing on all cylinders.
They quickly moved down field and added three, cutting the Virginia Tech lead to four.
The Hokies would respond with a three-and-out, giving Clemson the ball at their own 35.
Clemson was far from finished, putting together a six-play, 65-yard drive to quickly move down the field and take their first lead of the game. The drive was finished up by a 16-yard Tait Reynolds rushing touchdown.
Reynolds would finish the game with 14 carries for 87 yards on his non-sack carries. He also completed 20-of-26 passes for 153 yards.
Clemson wasn't finish with their third-quarter dominance, though.
The Hokies would go three-and-out again, finishing with -9 yards over their first two drives of the half.
Clemson got the ball back and dominantly moved down the field, but stalled out in the red zone before calling on Nolan Hauser again. He sunk a 36-yard kick to give Clemson a 16-10 lead with all the momentum on their side. However, the Hokies did not fold amidst the Clemson surge.
"Just stay in it, man. It’s never over until there are zeros on the clock. We just stayed in it. We trusted the offense, trusted special teams, trusted whatever the coach called, and we got it done. We just stayed in it," Kenny Woseley Jr said.
The Hokies held on and kept the Tigers within one score, though, and that made all the difference.
The Hokies responded by moving the ball down the field into field goal range, where John Love finished an eight-play, 46-yard drive with a 47-yard field goal, bringing Tech within three. It all started with Tech's longest play of the night, a 27-yard catch and run on a screen for Que'Sean Brown. The Duke transfer was Tech's best offensive player with five catches for a game-high 69 yards plus two carries for 22 yards.
Both teams then traded punts, and the Hokies needed a late stop to give their offense another chance.
Time and time again, Brent Pry's defense stepped up and put Tech's offense back on the field.
The Hokies took advantage of the opportunity and moved the ball down the field in its most efficient drive of the game, tallying 69 yards over 11 plays.
They stalled in the red zone, though.
A false start set up first-and-15, then a four-yard rush to make it second-and-11. A jet sweep to Que'Sean Brown moved it to third-and-one, putting the Hokies in prime position at the five-yard line.
Offensive coordinator Ty Howle opted to put the ball in the hands of Ethan Grunkemeyer, who looked for Ja'Ricous Hairston, but could not find him, setting up a crucial fourth-and-1 with just under two minutes to play.
Instead of running it, Howle put the ball back in the hands of Grunkemeyer, and he found Luke Reynolds wide open in the back of the end zone, giving Virginia Tech the lead with 1:44 remaining.
"I kind of threw it and didn’t really see what happened," Grunkemeyer said. "I heard the crowd. I didn’t really know what was going on too much, but I got up and saw him with the ball. Obviously, that’s a great feeling."
Many were surprised by how wide open Reynolds ended up being despite his prominence in Tech's offense.
"Yeah, that was a little surprising," Que'Sean Brown said about how open Reynolds was. "Because, come on now, you can’t leave that man open."
This game wasn't over yet though as Clemson got the ball back with just over 100 seconds remaining and one timeout.
Clemson moved the ball from their own 20 to the 48 in just three plays. Brent Pry's defense was bending. But it never broke.
The very next play, Jaquez White came screaming in on a cornerback blitz, brining down Tait Reynolds and setting up second-and-17.
Clemson was able to quickly get it back and set up a third-and-nine, though.
On that third down, Reynolds looked left and had Bryant Wesco down the sideline. Wesco went up, caught the ball and got a foot down, but the ball popped out at the last second out of bounds, giving Clemson one more chance on fourth-and-nine.
Quickly the pocket collapsed, and Mylachi Williams got home and made the game-sealing sack, the fourth of the night and 13th tackle for loss that Tech had in this game. It was fitting for Williams to deliver the final sack on a night where the Hokies' defense did a great job generating negative offensive plays including from backup defensive linemen who had three of the four sacks.
"Our depth is really starting to show on the defensive line. We continue to be able to get people off schedule with tackles for loss and some sacks," Franklin said.
Virginia Tech didn't have its best stuff on offense tonight against a stout Clemson defense, but they found ways to put together enough quality drives to get the job done. Add in a very good defensive performance against a struggling Clemson offense plus some solid special teams play overall and it was arguably the best performance of VT's season to date.
The Hokies are now 6-2 and bowl eligible after only eight games, the earliest they've achieved that in a season since 2017. James Franklin's VT rebuild is already ahead of schedule with the Hokies' road win at Clemson in primetime on ESPN being a serious statement about Tech's positive trajectory under Franklin.
