ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE FOOTBALL KICKOFF

July 21, 2021

Justin Fuente

Virginia Tech Hokies

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: We welcome Virginia Tech. We will start with our head coach, Justin Fuente. We'll take questions.

Q. In a league of great running games, Virginia Tech ranked first last year. You don't have Khalil Herbert back this year, but you do have Braxton Burmeister. What does he mean to your running game, and what do you look for from your offensive line and backs?

JUSTIN FUENTE: You're right, it will be difficult to replace Khalil. He was the source of so many big plays. I'm not sure in my coaching career if I've ever had a season with that many big, long runs.

But in regards to Braxton, Braxton is -- he'll probably get mad at me for saying this, but he's probably one of the top three or four athletes on the entire team. He'd say one or two, but I'm going to say three or four. He has played, played as a young player, played some last year.

He's got a chance to be really, really explosive. We need to continue to find a way to share that load, though, out of the tailback room. Braxton is an accomplished thrower of the ball as well. I feel better about that part of it than I have in some time.

But we're going to need to find a way. I don't know that Braxton is going to be the answer to the production that we lost from the tailback position. We're going to have to have Jalen Holston, we're going to have to have Raheem Blackshear, we're going to have to have some young guys that I think have some real, real talent step in there and be able to contribute as well.

Q. Coach Hamilton had a disjointed first year as a coordinator with COVID and the injuries. How big a stride do you expect that unit to make? What areas do you think he's developed as a coach?

JUSTIN FUENTE: I think if we've learned anything, it's that practice is actually important. We, like everybody else, were deprived of spring ball. Our fall camp, once the students hit town, deteriorated into survival mode really quickly.

We had no foundation. I think that's what we've gone back to throughout the 15 practices in the spring. I like the changes we've made and the additions we've brought in to our staff, both from a recruiting standpoint and from a schematic standpoint and knowledge standpoint.

I think having Jon Tenuta in there to be the elder statesman has been a beneficial thing throughout the spring. I'm awfully happy that he's with us.

But the thing that ultimately hurt us in a succinct way is we could not create an identity because we had no foundation. I think we're well on our way to establishing that foundation and creating our identity.

Q. Assessing your five seasons at Virginia Tech, some change now as you step forward here, how would you assess that as you step into your sixth?

JUSTIN FUENTE: Well, it's certainly been interesting. Each job and deal is different and unique. After our first two years, I had a very honest, really good conversation with Whit, our athletic director, talked to him. We won 19 games in two years. I said, Whit, you didn't bring me here for these past two years, you brought me here for what we're about to go through. We were not in good shape. We were in the process of building facilities. We had some issues on our roster that were going to take time to get through. We've now completed many of those facilities. We're now adding, expanding our support staff for our players and recruiting. Now starting to get into having an older team.

I really felt great a year ago about exactly where we were and what we were doing and the status of our football team, a variety of factors have affected that. But I still feel the same way. I'm really excited to see this football team play and kick this season off.

Q. Have you given yourself much time to think about how you'll feel, how you'll react to hearing "Enter Sandman" with a full complement of fans at Lane Stadium on September 3rd?

JUSTIN FUENTE: Certainly. Home games in Lane Stadium are special and unique. Our fans are the best fans in all of America. Our fans show up to the game not to be entertained but to participate, to help our football team win the ballgame. They've been deprived of that opportunity.

But it's more than a game. It's a social event. People show up several days early and begin tailgating, preparing. There's friends and family members they haven't seen that they're all going to be back together for the very first time. I anticipate it will be a special night, an emotional night, something that we'll remember for a long time.

Q. Name, image and likeness, obviously something that every team is navigating through now, each conference and each state. How do you look at name, image and likeness? What are you trying to say to the student-athletes to guide them a little bit and have leadership?

JUSTIN FUENTE: Certainly it's uncharted waters. I think there's a lot of good that can come from this. I think there's a lot of bad that can come from this action too, if we're not careful. Our mission with our young people is to help them capitalize on whatever special skills or talents they may have in a way that we're allowed to help them. Certainly we're restricted dramatically about how involved we can get.

There are some people with those special talents. I don't think anybody feels negatively about their opportunity to go capitalize on that. I just don't want us to lose sight of what's important. I don't want us to lose sight of the long-term game here with our young people. That's their education.

Doesn't mean that we can't have a good time along the way and guys and gals can't make some money along the way, but I don't want it to take away from our long-term mission, which is the education of these young people.

We've tried to bring the focus in on that and help them. We have the software and the systems, all that sort of stuff, to help them with their social media accounts. We're in a pretty cool position. We are the number one sports brand in the state of Virginia, the Commonwealth of Virginia. We have 250,000 alumni that are anxious to help and engage our players in ways that are legal now that can benefit them hopefully in the long term.

Q. You talked about excitement of "Enter Sandman" on September 3rd. You played North Carolina. What are your thoughts about this kind of emerging rivalry?

JUSTIN FUENTE: Well, when I got into the league, if I'm not mistaken, I'm pretty sure they were the reigning Coastal Division champions. It's a game that's surrounded by proximity, something that we've embraced since we arrived. I know Frank and them embraced it, too.

We have the rivalry with Virginia, then there's also something there with North Carolina that should be acknowledged. They've always had great athletes. They always have. They've done a fine job down there. We enjoy playing that game. It's usually a hotly contested, usually pretty well-played football game that brings out the competitive juices in all of us.

Q. Speaking about the NIL stuff, have you given any thought to the dynamic in the locker room of if some guys are earning money, other guys aren't, how that might manifest itself?

JUSTIN FUENTE: Absolutely I've given thought to it. It's a dangerous part of it. There's all sorts of scenarios. You all can imagine what they are, from guys earning money that aren't playing or guys that "I should be playing and I'm not." All sorts of -- the litany of that.

It's difficult. It's difficult to be a coach now. It's more difficult than it was 10 years ago. This is another hurdle that we've got to find a way to continue to address, to help keep guys together and understand how it actually works.

So, yeah, it's a huge piece of it.

Q. Do you approach the benchmarks of the program this year differently given all of the atypical scenarios that we went through last year?

JUSTIN FUENTE: Yeah, well, I mean, I think we were just holding on last year. Our mission was to find a way to play last year. I mean, we went through that early in the year. I felt like we did everything humanly possible for us to play. Across the country, there's probably people across the country that, as the year went on, did everything they could to not play. That was just how we approached it. We got to find a way to get this season in.

Our kids did that. They showed incredible resiliency through the entire process. Most of our focus was about how can we patch this thing together so we can have available guys so we can go play.

Certainly, hopefully, as we move forward, that will not be the case this year. This is a case where we can focus on the more fundamental things of team and give ourselves an opportunity to win.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.