Hokies fire coach Brent Pry after starting 0-3 play
Virginia Tech has fired coach Brent Pry on Sunday, a day after a
45-26 home loss to
Old Dominion in which the Hokies were booed loudly while heading to the locker room for halftime.
Saturday's loss dropped Virginia Tech to 0-3 on the season and 16-24 through four seasons under Pry. He is set to be owed more than $6 million in his buyout.
"Blacksburg will always hold a special place in our hearts," Pry said in a statement. "We leave with wonderful memories and lifelong friendships, and we will forever be cheering for the Hokies."
In a statement, school president Tim Sands said the change was "necessary" due to on-field results described as "not acceptable."
The hot-seat talk bubbled up around Pry in November last season, and if the Hokies had lost to
Virginia to end the season, a change may have been made at that point. But Virginia Tech defeated Virginia, and Pry's second consecutive 6-6 regular season landed him in a bowl game.
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Although the offseason included personnel changes, the talk around Pry's status didn't fade. He entered Year 4 with a new defensive coordinator -- Sam Siefkes, a former linebackers coach with the
Arizona Cardinals -- and a staff that included former longtime Hokies defensive coordinator Bud Foster as an adviser/analyst.
It did not work in the early going. Though the Hokies played hard in a season-opening loss to
South Carolina, they were pushed around by another SEC team,
Vanderbilt, in Virginia Tech's home opener a week later. The Commodores scored 34 consecutive points to close out a 44-20 win in which they trailed by 10 points at halftime.
That loss, however, proved to be just an opening act to Saturday's stunning loss to in-state foe Old Dominion.
"Clearly, it starts with me," Pry said after the loss to the Monarchs. "Coaches, players, everybody is accountable here. We've got to get back to the basics and find a way to be closer to the team we can be."
Offensive coordinator Philip Montgomery will serve as interim coach, while Sands pointed to a need to "develop a financial, organizational and leadership plan that will rapidly position [the program] to be competitive with the best" in the ACC.
"The new framework for college sports will be fully established for next season, so this is the time to make a major move," Sands said.
Virginia Tech hosts
Wofford on Saturday before beginning ACC play the following week at
NC State.
This is Virginia Tech's first 0-3 start since the first year of Frank Beamer's 29-year run that put the Hokies on the map nationally, notably with a trip to the national championship game behind star freshman quarterback Michael Vick in 1999 among Beamer's 23 bowl appearances.
Beamer's run ended in 2015 and the Hokies played for the ACC title a year later, but otherwise the program has struggled for traction and hasn't cracked the AP Top 25 in four years.
The school hired Pry in 2021 after eight seasons as the defensive coordinator at
Penn State. He signed a six-year, $27.5 million contract at the time of his hiring and was making $4.75 million this season.
Athletic director Whit Babcock hired Pry in part to follow Beamer's philosophy of recruiting in-state prospects, a strategy that worked well during Beamer's long and successful run. But only three of the Hokies' starting 22 players in the Vanderbilt game were from Virginia. Overall, just six of the starters were high school players recruited by Pry, with the remainders arriving as transfers.
Virginia Tech went 1-12 under Pry in games decided by one possession, while the Hokies haven't beaten a Power 4 team in a nonconference game since 2017 -- a run of 15 consecutive losses.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Virginia Tech has fired coach Brent Pry. The move comes a day after the Hokies lost at home to in-state foe Old Dominion to fall to 0-3 on the season.
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