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Brent Pry officially named Virginia Tech head coach

IMG_0985by:Griffin McVeigh•11/30/21•

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Brent Pry
Former Penn State defensive coordinator Brent Pry during warmups against the Illinois Fighting Illini. (Scott Taetsch/Getty Images)

Vriginia Tech has officially named Penn State defensive coordinator Brent Pry as their next head coach. Pry will be taking over the Hokie program after Justin Fuente was fired late this season.

“We are excited to welcome Coach Pry, Amy, and their family to Virginia Tech and the Blacksburg community,” athletic director Mike Babcock said in a statement. “I’m confident that Hokies everywhere will come together to embrace and support them as we enter this new chapter in the history of Virginia Tech Football.

In his career, Pry has had plenty of experience working as a defensive assistant. He began his coaching career as the outside linebacker and defensive backs coach at East Stroudsburg. From 1995 to 1997, Pry was a graduate assistant at Virginia Tech, serving under defensive coordinator Bud Foster. The Hokies made a bowl game in each of those three seasons. Pry then had a stop at Western Carolina, where he served multiple roles from 1998 to 2001.

In 2002, Pry got his first shot to be a defensive coordinator at Louisiana. he served in that role until 2006, and became the Memphis defensive line coach from 2007 to 2009. Georgia Southern hired Pry as its defensive coordinator in 2010. From 2011 to 2013, Pry was an assistant head coach and co-defensive coordinator at Vanderbilt, and he served that same role at Penn State from 2014 and 2015. In 2016, Pry was named Penn State’s full-time defensive coordinator. He has served in that role ever since. In eight of his last 11 seasons, Pry has helped coach a top-25 total defense.

Pry takes over a Virginia Tech team that went 6-6 this season

Justin Fuente went 43-31 in six seasons as Virginia Tech’s head coach. The Hokies were 5-5 this season at the time of Fuente’s firing. Virginia Tech elected to move on from Fuente after a loss to Syracuse, which capped a three-game losing streak. That losing streak was the third three-game losing streak in the past four years, which is something that former Hokies head coach Frank Beamer only did twice.

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Virginia Tech defensive line coach and defensive recruiting coordinator J.C. Price has served as interim head coach since Fuente’s firing. The Hokies defeated Virginia in Week 13 to earn a sixth win and bowl eligibility.

Following Fuente’s firing, Virginia Tech athletic director Whit Babcock released a statement, where he said that was a change was necessary to reach the level of success he expects.

“We sincerely appreciate the contributions that Coach Fuente made to our football program and the positive impact he made on our student-athletes during his time at Virginia Tech,” athletic director Whit Babcock said. “While it is never easy to make a change, I believe in order for our football program to attain the type of sustained success that is expected at Virginia Tech, the time was right for new leadership of our football program.”