CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Virginia Tech faithful need a team they can embrace. And not just any team.
For all the Hokies’ success in sports such as track, wrestling and softball, those programs don’t engage the masses. That responsibility rests with football and basketball, and, barring a Women’s Final Four sequel, the hoops burden falls more to Mike Young and the men’s squad.
Think about it. Football hasn’t won more than eight games since 2017, fired fourth-year coach Brent Pry last month and has commenced a disjointed search that has no designated leader and marginalizes athletic director Whit Babcock.
Similarly, since winning the 2022 ACC Tournament, men’s basketball hasn’t sniffed the NCAA Tournament and is 51-49 overall, 26-34 in the conference.
Yes, Tech’s Board of Visitors recently approved a four-year, $229.2 million lifeline for athletics, which, in theory, should elevate the entire department. But fans don’t scream themselves hoarse at Lane Stadium and Cassell Coliseum over money.
They invest their time and resources, while sacrificing their vocal cords, for wins. And that’s where the 2025-26 Hokies could prove cathartic.
“I’ve got a really good team,” Young said Tuesday at the ACC’s preseason media soirée. “… I’m not much on bravado. I’m an undersell-overserve person. But my excitement is brimming with this team.”
They’re no sure thing, mind you. For the first time in Young’s 24 seasons as a head coach, and perhaps for the first time in school history, the roster includes nary a player entering his third year with the program.
Indeed, of Tech’s 13 scholarship athletes, only four return for their second season in Blacksburg. The other nine are newcomers.
West Virginia transfer forward Amani Hansberry and Greek hybrid Neoklis Avdalas project as starters, along with veterans Ben Hammond, Tyler Johnson and Tobi Lawal. German center Antonio Dorn, UNLV transfer Jailen Bedford, Delaware guard Izaiah Pasha and returnee Jaden Schutt provide considerable depth — Young said Dorn is ineligible for the season opener against Charleston Southern because of an extra game he played overseas.
“We have really good depth,” Young said. “We have good positional size. We’ve got good skill people. … We’re going to be a much-improved defensive team, a much-improved rebounding team. We can get back to playing the way I want to play offensively with great ball movement and spacing.”
The 6-foot-8 Lawal embodies the Hokies’ talent upgrade. He transferred to Virginia Tech from VCU prior to last season and, in Young’s words, “was thrust into a role … that he wasn’t prepared for and wasn’t fair to him.”
That role was as an alpha, the leading scorer and rebounder on a team that finished 13-19, the program’s worst record in a decade. As expected, Lawal’s raw athleticism produced highlights aplenty, but Young is right: He’s not quite skilled enough to be the go-to scoring option.
“The role he will have this year will be significant,” Young said. “He’s a dynamic player. But we can tone him down this year. I’m not asking him to make some of the plays I had to ask him to make a year ago. He’s more ready for that role this year, but he’s also got better players around him.”
No deficiency crippled the Hokies more than turnovers last season. They ranked 336th nationally in turnover rate at 20.1%, and Lawal and Hammond were among the worst offenders.
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Avdalas, capable at 6-9 of playing point guard, and Hansberry, whom Young considers an “elite” ballhandler, figure to enhance this group’s ball security.
“He hates turnovers,” Hansberry said of Young.
Young said he’ll “jump on the back of a trash truck” or do something else (besides coaching) if the turnovers continue.
“It absolutely drove me to drink — not literally,” he said. “Well, sometimes. I couldn’t get my arms around it. That was a very disturbing trend this time last year, and it’s an encouraging trend this year.”
Tech travels to Lebanon Valley College, alma mater of assistant coach J.D. Byers, for a scrimmage Saturday against Seton Hall. A week later, they’ll stage a home exhibition against Duquesne, followed by the opener Nov. 3.
Hokies fans want to believe in this team. They need to believe. But how many times in the past five years have their basketball and football hopes been dashed?
This time feels different, if only because it’s difficult to imagine a coach of Young’s experience badly misjudging a team’s potential.
“Not just him,” Lawal said of Young’s optimism. “Me and the other coaches too because … in practice sometimes they get carried away watching us play for a while because it’s fun to watch, because everyone is playing well …
“You can really get lost in just watching us play and having fun, to be honest, because it’s a battlefield out there and we’re competing every day, going at each other.”
Young distilled the difference in this team from a year ago into one simple concept.
“Just talent,” he said. “Now we’re not the ’96 Bulls, but I’ve got really good players.”
David Teel, david.teel@virginiamedia.com
