Comcast is getting its sponsorship money’s worth for the Battle of The Commonwealth Cup this year as VT “tolerates” UVA down at Lane Stadium on Saturday. The game is significant to both teams beyond the usual bragging rights between the only two 1A teams in Virginia - UVA, who looks more like a concoction by Dr. Jekyll this season, needs a win to secure bowl eligibility and a win for Virginia Tech means the Hokies will have their unlikely path complete to play in Tampa next week for the ACC Championship.

If you recall UVA looked like the worst team in the ACC, maybe even the country, after losing a miserable game to Duke 31-3 back in Mid-September. Somehow however the Cavaliers bounced back in October by beating Maryland, UNC, GT, and our favorite new friend, ECU. However in November UVA has exhibited a transformation back the other direction  starting with an overtime loss to Miami and leading up to last week’s yawnfest against Clemson. Perhaps the Cavaliers have had their eyes set on the VT game all month? Perhaps they just haven’t been playing to their potential. Or perhaps they ran out of Uncle Groh’s “Special Secret Serum.”

UVA does throw the ball well (for an ACC team) and hardly ever accomplishes anything with the rush -however in their last two games it hasn’t been good to trust the ball in the hands of Virginia’s QB Marc Verica. Verica tossed 6 INT between  against Wake and Clemson (45 and 39 attempts respectively) and I would be surprised if they take as many shots in the air come Saturday with Macho Harris lurking in the secondary. Of course UVA will be stuck picking either Harris or Bud Foster’s (perhaps last regular season) well-disciplined pass rush. UVA protects its young quarterback well, allowing few hits and even fewer sacks on the rookie. Defensively UVA is decent all-around without having any particular weaknesses but also without any really impressive numbers worth sharing.

I think everything goes out the window on Saturday though. Not because its a rivalry, not because UVA has shown sparkles of greatness and also stenches of shit, not even because the Hokies have handled the ‘Hoos well in the past 4 meetings to a tune of 126-45 but because we have no idea what team the Hokies will put out there offensively… The Hokies have only managed to score 3 offensive touchdowns in the past 3 games. We as Hokie fans have once again have found ourselves in a place where we watch our defense starry eyed and hopeful while whispering “pick six, please pick six.” If we need to rely on the “taint” from our defense and forced turnovers and interceptions to score points we can’t guarantee anything, no matter who we are playing. I won’t even mention the “S-word” in this post but we better have a game plan together on how we are going to attack offensively otherwise this has the makings of “Duke II”. I have faith in what our defense has done all year and I expect nothing different on Saturday but we need to have some confidence in our offense if we want our tickets stamped to get to Tampa in December.

Open one up (pour some out for Peter Lalich at Oregon State) and drink it down fast, because its going to be a cold one out there on Saturday. Score Prediction: Virginia Tech 24, Virginia 9