Virginia Tech football played its second ACC game in a row on the road and fell at Pitt on Saturday, but key players stepped up and came away with some noteworthy statistics.
Stats with Salas
Big Night in the Air
Two receivers and a tight end had career nights for the Hokies, including Da'Wain Lofton (2 catches, 47 yards), Kaleb Smith (9 catches, 152 yards) and Dae'Quan Wright (5 catches, 47 yards).
Lofton hauled in the longest pass of his career, catching a 43-yarder in the end zone from quarterback Grant Wells. Smith tallied his career high in both catches (9) and yards (152) and he becomes the first Hokie in 10 games to rack up over 100 receiving yards in a game since Tré Turner did so at Georgia Tech on Oct. 30, 2021. Wright finished with career highs in both catches (5) and yards (47), too.
Couple Firsts on D
Defensive lineman Jayden McDonald tallied the first sack of his career, doing so at the start of the fourth quarter, which led to a fourth and 20 that would end up being a blocked punt. On that play, P.J. Prioleau came off fast on the left side and dove and blocked the punt, with Nyke Johnson falling on it in the end zone for the touchdown. It marked Prioleau's first-ever punt block and Johnson's first-ever touchdown. The blocked punt was the Hokies' first since Tré Turner blocked a punt against Virginia in Lane Stadium on Nov. 23, 2018 and Jovonn Quillen recovered the punt in the end zone for a touchdown. Linebacker Keonta Jenkins caught an interception off a tipped pass, marking his first interception as a Hokie.
Causing Havoc
Tech's defense has shown signs of making quarterbacks uncomfortable this season, with there being three games this year of quarterbacks throwing under 56 percent for completions. Saturday, Pitt quarterback Kedon Slovis was 15-of-28 in the air for a 53.6 percentage, marking the second-lowest completion percentage of any quarterback Tech has faced this season. A key reason for that was the Hokies were in his face a good amount while making throws under duress, racking up a season-high six quarterback hurries.
Good Things Come to an End
As the saying goes, things don't last forever, so you have to appreciate them in the moment. With that, two streaks for Tech came to an end Saturday. One of them was the Hokies owning the nation's longest streak of consecutive PATs made dating back to Oct. 20, 2016 against Miami. Following Tech's first touchdown at Pitt Saturday, the point-after attempt was blocked to make the achievement snap at 248 in a row. The other streak that snapped was William Ross' made field goals streak, which ended at eight after he pushed one left on a 36-yarder in the fourth quarter. Ross was the first Hokie to make his first eight field goals to start a season since Jed Dunlevy connected on his first nine in 2007.
Scorigami
The 45-29 final score was the fourth scorigami of the season. Scorigami is the art of building final scores that have never happened before. More on scorigami.