Virginia Tech plans to fire coach Brent Pry on Sunday, sources told ESPN’s Pete Thamel. Pry is set to be owed more than $6 million in buyout.
The move comes a day after a home loss to 45-26 to Old Dominion, a game that saw the Hokies get booed loudly while heading into 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.
The hot-seat talk bubbled up around Pry in November of last season in Blacksburg, 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.
But as 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 NFL’s Arizona Cardinals — and a staff that included former longtime Hokies defensive coordinator Bud Foster as an advisor/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 that 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 squad ODU.
“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.”
Pry began this season halfway through his contract and Virginia Tech was not in the best position to eat a seven-figure buyout. So, this decision likely came after much discussion about the direction of the program, both on and off the field.
Virginia Tech will host Wofford next Saturday, before beginning ACC play the following week at NC State.
