Virginia fans stormed the field Saturday night, deliriously celebrating with a football team which upset No. 12 Georgia Tech. Few of them knew how their unranked and unheralded team could upend a Yellow Jackets squad which had averaged 535.5 yards and 46.5 points a game. Even fewer realized that they owed the win in part to the Cavaliers' placeholder.
Flash back to two weeks ago when, as coach Mike London recalled, senior holder Jacob Hodges came up to him and said, "Coach, I can stimulate Georgia Tech's offense with the reads and footwork."
A former team manager turned walk-on, Hodges previous career highlight came last year when he threw a touchdown pass on a fake field goal. Hodges teammates call him "Rudy 2," alluding to Hollywood's version of a football player who defied the odds. Hodges, however, wanted to be more than a feel-good story. Currently a scout team quarterback, he claimed he could imitate Georgia Tech's junior quarterback Tevin Washington and its triple-option offense which ranked second nationally in total yards.
"Now [Hodges] can't simulate he's Tevin Washington by any stretch," London said. "But as far as the techniques of the footwork and things like that - the timing or freeze option, belly option and the reverse out, dive option - he's got time with those things which is really important and he did a really nice job doing that."
Hodges played three season as quarterback at Mountain View High School in Halifax, Va. While there, Hodges left his legacy more as prolific passer than rusher, setting records for most touchdown passes, completions and passing yards in a game, but he still asserted that he had enough experience with the triple option to run the offense effectively.
"We ran it a little bit my sophomore and senior year but exclusively my junior year we were running the wishbone and the triple option," Hodges said. "I was confident that I could do the steps right, make the reads, do whatever they asked. I went in and watched tape just to make sure I was doing the right things, and it was very helpful to have been through it before."
Hodges' stimulations worked. Virginia limited Georgia Tech to only 296 yards, just more than half the amount it averaged entering the contest. Washington completed just two passes all game, a total equal to the number of interceptions he threw. Virginia's defense swarmed the Yellow Jackets at the line of scrimmage, notching five tackles for a loss and pressuring Washington throughout the game.
"Jacob was really unbelievable all week on the scout team," junior linebacker Steve Greer said. "He ran the quarterback and he came in and watched film and worked with [defensive coordinator Jim] Reid to get the steps down of the quarterback which is huge because ... he gave us unbelievable looks for the past two weeks."
Virginia played Georgia Tech after its bye week, and the defense knew it had to put in extra work to stand a chance against Georgia Tech. Stopping the triple option is not just challenging in terms of assignment detail, but also demanding athletically because of Georgia Tech's blocking techniques. Consequently, the scout team was a bit more physical against the Cavalier defense.
"Our scout team has been trained on what they do to the best of their ability," junior defensive end Bill Shautz said. "[We've] been going a bunch against the cut blocks; clearly they cut block most of the time. We usually don't do that at all during the work week because we're trying to keep our legs healthy, our knees intact, but this week we [had] to, we [had] to prepare for that."
Senior cornerback Chase Minnifield turned that extra preparation into five tackles and an interception, and after the game, said, "I don't know if we get this outcome without the bye week."
London said his team's increased preparation during the bye week translated into Saturday's "signature moment" for the squad. He knows one win cannot necessarily change a team, but he also hopes it can inspire his players to repeat the feat.
"I know that in that locker room, they finally get the feeling of when you compete and you prepare and you do what you have to do, that feeling right there is a whole lot better than the other feelings," London said. "Hopefully that's kind of the tipping point for, 'Let's do it again, let's prepare again, let's execute again."
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