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It’s that time of year. August brings the “Dog Days” of Summer, Fall football practice, and a new and sometimes variable roster of players for the season’s big effort. The new review will include a look at the new coaching staff since that changed, too. But first, we’ll start with some relative stability, the Defensive Line.

If you look at the general arc of the Pry seasons (can’t really call it an era, folks, it just seemed to be more of a place holder situation) the one thing that you see is that Brent Pry still managed to get some real quality players up on the defensive line. Some of that was the reality that J.C. Price (who has moved on to 2026 Football Roster – East Tennessee State University ETSU after the Franklin hire – still a bit perplexed as to why Pry didn’t lobby harder to keep Price…) put together some respectable defensive lines.

What remains pretty clear, is that in the 2025 season, with multiple (and frustrating) one score losses, Pry’s revamped defense was not the primary cause of the blown season. Let’s be realistic. This is college football, and the era of the low scoring defensive struggles dominated by the ground game nibbling at yardage and burning clock is largely over. Defense at this level is difficult, and any defense that can keep the opposing team below 28-30 points is decent enough to win football games. It’s the offense that needs to keep up.

The 2025 season was a prime example of that where the defense kept the Hokies in games, but the offense couldn’t manage to get the ball into the endzone (or even past the opposition’s outer redzone). With the very unusual re-hiring of Pry, this time as the full-time Defensive Coordinator and Linebacker coach (we’ll talk about filling that hole in a future review) the prospect of having a relatively good defense for the 2026 season is, again, anchored on producing a 2-deep defensive line that can penetrate into the A-Gap, limit the run, and contain running quarterbacks without help from the linebacking corps.

Who’s Running the Show in the Defensive Trenches?

Before we jump into the full player roster, let’s look at the revamped defensive line coaching staff to see if there are a few clues as to how things might be a bit different this season.

Defensive Coordinator – Brent Pry

We’ll refrain from the links for this one because we know Coach Pry. The amount of raw courage that the man has to come back to Blacksburg as just the DC and Linebacker coach is pretty bracing. We know that he’s great friends with James Franklin, but we also know that he managed to hold together a reasonable defense in a period of time where Tech’s entire football program was struggling to make any sort of headway anywhere on the field. Pry’s “Peter Principle” moment happened and as things turned out, Coach Franklin went right back to his old Penn State DC to come back home and keep the Tech defensive momentum going.

We’ll see how this very unusual move works out and wish Coach Pry all the best with it. The Hokie football program’s return to upper tier status really depends on a full return of Tech’s defensive excellence.

Defensive Line Coach – Sean Spencer

Sean Spencer – Virginia Tech Athletics

Okay, if you read the job titles you also see “Run Game Coordinator”. That one might need some deep explanation from the staff, somewhere in some QandA just for interest. There are some obvious interesting points that could place an assistant coach on both sides of the line of scrimmage, so we’ll see how it works out.

What we do see from his resume is a 2-year stint at Defensive Line Coach for Texas A&M, and a long trip from Vandy to State College, PA with James Franklin and a stint in the NFL with the Giants. What we are likely to see is some really aggressive defensive line play, with big players. Coach Spencer comes from a “big line” traditional mentality which is a break from Bud Foster’s lighter, faster defensive line concepts. That really fits with what Pry was doing in his depth chart evolution.

A New Defensive Line Assistant – Derrick Tangelo

Derrick Tangelo – Virginia Tech Athletics

Tangelo is joining the staff for his first assistant coaching job. He played is college ball at Duke, so he’s been to Lane, and comes to the program with a couple of short stints in pro football with his last stop in the Canadian Football League. It’s going to be interesting to see a teammate of Fub Peebles show up on the Hokie sidelines.

New and Interesting Analyst Assistants

The latest infusion of cash into the program, and in a massive change in staff configuration, has provided for some interesting infusions of analytics into the mix. In past years, these sorts of positions were held by Graduate Assistants, and very junior coaching staff hires with little contact with the players. Franklin’s staff shakeup has changed the configuration and added some interesting wrinkles to the analytical staff.

Josh Conklin – Virginia Tech Athletics

Conklin brings major head and assistant coaching experience from the FCS level to Tech. It will be interesting to see how his experience moves him along in the coaching tree. Analysts are often in place holding positions while they transition to different levels of the profession or end their active careers and look to make some pressure changes without leaving the profession.

Brian Crist – Virginia Tech Athletics

Crist is actually really coming home. He grew up in Blacksburg but drove off to Hamden-Sydney for his degree. He did start his coaching career, here, in 1994 under Coach Beamer just like Pry did. He also did some serious coaching time at the FCS level.

There is a character note in the defensive staff and that’s football experience with only two main coaches in the trenches. The analytical staff seems to be in senior transitional roles with solid experience at the FCS level. Crist’s position looks like an interesting innovation for the Hokies. An offensive analyst dedicated to studying and defeating the opposing offenses.

The combination might be very interesting when it comes to dealing with the need to challenge and contain mobile Read-Option quarterbacks and adjust to the occasional pocket passer. Most defenses are good at one and not particularly great at the other. In the world of modern college football, it’s still better to be first rate at the Read-Option stops. We’ll see how that all plays out this season with the new look Hokies.

Now Let’s Look at the Players

The following table is sorted by class. The positions are known for some players and derived by other players’ size and past stats. Of course, they also change as conditioning, and college level weight programs increase muscle mass. Please note the legend in the chart for comments on the playing potential. There are quite a few unknowns in this list, especially for the true freshmen, redshirt freshmen, sophomores, and redshirts at that level, too.

The Starting Situation

Let’s take a look at the players most likely to take the field with Depth Chart ratings of #1 and #2 at their positions. The basics are that these players had significant time on the field last season either at Tech or from their origin point.

Kemari Copeland – DT

The clear leader of this squad is returning defensive tackle Kemari Copeland. Not only is he fielding the most experience on the field for the Hokies, but he’s also been recognized for serious post season watch lists. He also was named to the All-ACC preseason team. Copeland is a definite starter and will probably play the majority of most games as a #1 in the Depth Chart.

Eric Mensah – DT

Mensah has made his way home from Ohio State. The Mountain View defensive line star spent two seasons at Ohio State with his first ending up wearing a redshirt after playing in the allowed four games. Last season Mensah sat out with a serious bout of injuries. If he can stay healthy, he has the size and quickness to make it to the playing section of the Depth chart. We haven’t seen how the new coaching staff will handle the rotation but it would not be surprising to see a healthy Mensah on the field regularly.

Elhadj Fall – DT

Fall is a near definite starter for the Hokies. The transfer from Georgia Southern made an impression with the Hokies in 2025, with 25 tackles, 2.5 sacks, and 3.5 TFLs. He also managed to block a field goal against Georgia Tech while playing Special Teams. Fall’s position on the Depth chart will put him regularly on the field this season, and he stands a really good chance of starting more than a few games.

Samuel Okunlola – DE

Okunlola is a transfer from both Nardo’s Pittsburgh Panthers, and Prime Time’s Colorado Buffaloes. He’s listed as both an Edge Rusher and a Defensive End (Which depending on the defensive structure of the team can be just the blindside end.) He was injured last season after playing a single game but played consistently in his sophomore season with the Buffs in 2024. With the competition for DE positions being wide open for the Hokies, look for Okunlola, if healthy, to show up on the Depth Chart in the #1 or #2 slots.

Jason Abbey – DE

Abbey is one of those quiet built at home Hokies from the recruiting class of 2023. Last season he played in 11 games, netted 18 tackles with 2 sacks and 2 1/2 TFLs to his credit. He also started a game. As a redshirt Junior look for Abbey to get to one of those #1/#2 slots in the depth chart for the season. He’s had two very good building years under Pry; there’s no reason to think that he’ll be taking the next step.

Aycen Stevens – DE

Stevens ended up being very much a surprise the last two seasons with significant playing time and racking up double digit tackles in 2026. Look for this 6’5” 260-pound Edge Rusher to take the next step up in the depth and stats charts. The 1s and 2s in the Depth Chart get a real workout in Pry’s defensive configurations, so look to see him on the field regularly. He has a legitimate shot at making it to start regularly.

Youth and Squad Depth

The remainder of the Defensive Line positions are going to fall to the basics of the competition from Spring and “Fall” (Summer, really) practice. There are several transfers and a long list of redshirt freshmen and sophomores who will be completing for positions on the depth chart. There will also be the practice squad guys who work hard to provide quality opposition for practices between games. Everyone marked with a hyphen in the chart is a player with unknown qualities and potential because of either their newness to the system, or their quiet behind the scenes status. Look for some of the redshirt freshmen to begin to make appearances, get field time, and jockey for positions in next season’s depth chart. Look for the sophomores to push hard to get noticed for critical #2 and #3 positions in the internal depth positions.

There are always surprises and the depth chart and roster of September is rarely the paper that is pushed for UVA week. The defensive line for 2026 has been described by a few folks as “Kamari Copeland and some guys”. This season the competition for those depth positions is going to be hot and important.

The Injury Bug Report

There are always injuries to report, none are wanted, but they do bear on how the team is built for the opening and even the season. Current reports are that Emmett Laws – Defensive Tackle, Hokie recruiting class of 2024, is out for the season with an injury. We’ll be checking on his status as best as can be determined (remember health issues are kept confidential unless the player releases the information) but notes on X point at a season ending event.

Next up for me, it’ll be the weak link of the last few seasons, the Linebackers.

GO HOKIES!!!!

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