BLACKSBURG – Following its 13th practice of fall camp on Wednesday, Virginia Tech football met with the media for a press conference. Read below for what head coach Brent Pry, quarterbacks coach Brad Glenn and quarterback Grant Wells had to say.
Head coach Brent Pry
Opening statement:
"The first thing I'd like to say, following practice No. 13, the guys are competing and battling like crazy. It gives you a chance to get better each and every practice. When they bring their hard hat and compete with one another and want to win the period and want to win the drill, we have a lot of that going on right now. We're right in the thick of this thing. There's a lot of adversity going on – execution errors, pushing through things, depth chart battles, injuries to overcome. There is a lot happening. It's what it needs to be. Camp is hard. We're having a trying camp, but that is necessary for where we want to go."
On if he named a starting quarterback following Saturday's scrimmage:
"We are going to name a starter. We met with Grant [Wells] and Jason [Brown] and let them both know that Grant would be our starting quarterback. Jason made it difficult. He had a great summer and a really good camp. I was proud of the way he competed. I feel very fortunate to have a No. 1 like Grant, who has had an exceptional camp and has been very accurate with great ball placement and showed great decision making, and then to have a guy like Jason on the ready when we need him. He just makes plays, is a big body and was much better throwing the football this camp. But moving forward, Grant is our guy."
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Quarterbacks coach Brad Glenn
On when Grant Wells separated himself during the battle with Jason Brown:
"Going back to spring ball, I think there was a pretty wide gap coming out of spring ball, with Grant being ahead of Jason. Then over the summer, we had a little more access to those guys as coaches, and it wasn't anything like Grant coming back to Jason, but Jason made up some ground over the summer. I think that translated early on in fall camp. But at the end of the day, even though Jason was catching him and having a great summer and great camp, Grant was a little bit ahead in everything in all aspects – overall command of the offense, understanding the offense and then quick, intermediate and deep ball accuracy. He was just ahead of him in all of those. But like Coach Pry said, us as a staff and our locker room, we feel good that we have two really good quarterbacks."
On if Grant Wells has been able to open up the playbook with deep-throwing plays:
"No doubt. His No. 1 asset is his deep-ball accuracy. It's nothing really I've taught him. He just came here with a really good feel of throwing a deep ball. When you have got a guy like that, that you have confidence in, you'll take more shots. There's a good rule of thumb that you take two to three shots a quarter. But with him, it may be even more. Then we got some guys on the outside that we're confident in throwing to. They have good chemistry that was built over the summer. So, we feel good about our deep shots."
Quarterback Grant Wells
On if he had an idea what the staff would tell him when he met with them:
"No, I didn't know which way it was going. They told me five minutes before they went into the office, so I didn't have much time to prepare. So, I didn't really have any idea."
On winning a quarterback battle before at Marshall and his emotions this time around:
"It feels similar to the first time. It's a lot different scenario than the first time, with the first time being a little earlier than this. So, this is new going into camp. But I'm excited and happy with how things played out."