Virginia Tech vs. East Carolina, 9/1/07

The first game of the year, ESPN Gameday in town, and all sorts of media attention for the Hokies first football game since the April 16 shootings. While the team played like they had feet of concrete (and they played as I predicted, a bit dazed), they came away with a win, which is more than Michigan can say.

With a Noon game, and wanting to see ESPN College Gameday (which started at 10:00 am), it was an early breakfast tailgate of egg sandwiches, bacon, hash browns, and pastries.

The crowd for Gameday wasn't as large as in the past, but I think that mostly had to do with the fact that they had one small gate open to the soccer practice field (above), and the lines were long trying to get in after 10:00 am. They also made me throw away my bottle of water...for Gameday!

Right before Gameday started the team showed up for their traditional walk. Here you can see Coach Beamer and the captains starting their trek to the locker room.

We have the same seats as the past 2 years. There are some new folks to our left, so we won't have the same family with the 5-year old going to/from the bathroom every 10 minutes. But still no one gets into the game.

The pregame ceremony featured the joint efforts of the Highty Tighties and the Marching Virginians.

After the National Anthem there was a flyover of two F-15 jets. (Not a great picture, but the one I tried to take when they were closer didn't come out...they kind of move really fast.)

The team takes the field!

The final score...it wasn't pretty, and if we need to improve A LOT if we even want to make the game against LSU close next Saturday.

After the game we hit Mike's Grill for some great pizza, then walked ovr to the Drill Field to take in the April 16 Memorial. There was a long line of folks waiting to walk by the 32 Hokie Stones, each engraved with the name of one of the fallen. Along with flowers, people have left trinkets: A game program, a Live Strong bracelet, a turkey leg. After the game Beamer asked his players if they would leave the game ball at the Memorial, which they did that night.