Coming off a bye week, Boston College was in Blacksburg, VA on Thursday night for their Week 8 matchup with Virginia Tech.
The last time BC was in action, it was in Week 6 in Charlottesville, VA, where the Eagles lost 24-14 to the Virginia Cavaliers.
Another trip to the Commonwealth of Virginia saw another loss for Boston College, as they fell to the Hokies 42-21, dropping their record to 4-3 on the year.
After Virginia Tech scored on their first possession of the ballgame to go up 7-0, BC would go on to fumble on their next two consecutive drives. The Hokies recovered both fumbles, and each ensuing possession led to trips to the end zone.
Virginia Tech was up 21-0 with 12:40 left in the second quarter, and they were making it look easy.
When asked how deflating back-to-back turnovers were for his team, first-year head coach Bill O’Brien said, “Yeah, it’s terrible, it’s awful. When you do that it’s just - you know, we’ve done that in all of our losses. So we have to figure out how to correct it.
“You can’t turn the ball over and win. There’s no correlation between winning and turnovers. There’s nothing more important than possession of the ball. So we have to figure that out. We work it everyday in practice, but it’s obviously not translating to the games.”
Another Tech touchdown late in the second quarter made it 28-0 heading into halftime, and BC was faced with yet another deficit at the half - something the Eagles have now dealt with in four of their last five games.
To BC’s credit, they opened the second half with 21-unanswered points, aided by two turnovers by Virginia Tech that resulted in touchdown drives for the Eagles. Boston College put themselves in a position to be back in the ballgame, as they trailed 28-21 with 2:55 left in the third quarter.
But Virginia Tech’s running game was too much to handle in the fourth quarter, as Hokies running back Bhayshul Tuten took over the ballgame with two fourth quarter touchdowns of his own, including a 61-yard house call that cemented the 42-21 victory for the home team.
Tuten was dominant the entire game in a way we rarely see in today’s college football landscape, rushing for 266 yards and 3 touchdowns. He made his impact felt early on, with an 83-yard highlight reel touchdown run in the second quarter that made it clear he was going to be a problem all night for the Eagles. He also added a receiving touchdown to his total on his lone catch of the game.
That’s 4 touchdowns and 286 yards of total offense for the senior back.
On the strength of Tuten, Virginia Tech ended the game with 368 yards rushing as a team.
“Yeah, they ran the ball really well,” said O’Brien. “We had trouble stopping the run, give them credit. They did a good job. You know, we were out of our gaps, and we were out of our gaps probably because of them. They knocked us out of our gaps, and we didn’t tackle well.
“I thought I had the team ready to go tonight, but I obviously didn’t. So I’ve got to figure out how to get the team ready to go, because we’re better than that. But I’ve got to do a better job coaching the team.”
Boston College, now 1-2 in conference, continues their ACC schedule in Week 9 with a Friday night game at home against Louisville (4-2).
The Cardinals will be the toughest team BC has faced at Alumni Stadium this season, as they’ve spent five different weeks ranked in the AP Top 25, seeing a ranking as high as 15th ahead of Week 5.
Currently unranked, they will host #6 Miami (6-0) on Saturday.