Fourth-and-1 at the Clemson 5. Under two minutes left. Down three, with a senior kicker who'd already hit from 47 yards waiting on the sideline.
James Franklin kept his offense on the field. Ethan Grunkemeyer faked the handoff, stood in against pressure, and found a wide-open Luke Reynolds for a 5-yard touchdown with 1:44 to play, and Virginia Tech beat Clemson 20-16 on Saturday night at Memorial Stadium.
It's the Hokies' first win over Clemson since 2007, snapping a seven-game losing streak in the series. It also makes them bowl-eligible at 6-2, 3-2 in the ACC, in Franklin's first season.
Then there's the box score. Clemson outgained Virginia Tech 288-234, sacked Grunkemeyer six times and won the third quarter 146-13 in total yards. The Hokies won anyway because Brent Pry's defense gave Clemson nothing when it counted and Franklin trusted a call that had already worked.
Clemson had the ball three times in the fourth quarter. It ran 15 plays for 48 yards, went 0-for-3 on third down, and scored zero points.
That came right after Tait Reynolds, Clemson's true freshman quarterback, went 7-of-7 for 83 yards in the third. Pry's group adjusted, and the last drive showed it. Troy transfer cornerback Jaquez White, who finished with a game-high 11 tackles, sacked Tait Reynolds for a 7-yard loss. A 26-yard catch by Bryant Wesco Jr. was overturned on replay. Then Penn State transfer Mylachi Williams called game with a sack on fourth-and-9.
Over the full 60 minutes, Clemson went 3-of-14 on third down, and Virginia Tech piled up 13 tackles for loss and four sacks.
A field goal ties it. Franklin wanted the win, and he said afterward that fourth-and-1 was "as good of a situation as we were going to get."
It wasn't a hunch. Both of Grunkemeyer's touchdown passes came off play action to Luke Reynolds, and Franklin said the call had already worked earlier in the night. The junior tight end, who followed Franklin from Penn State, finished with seven catches for 44 yards and both touchdowns.
Six sacks. Zero turnovers.
Grunkemeyer went 20-of-32 for 156 yards and two touchdowns, and his 16 carries for 14 yards undersell what his legs did. College stats count sacks as runs. Take out the six sacks, which cost 30 yards, and he gained 44 yards on 10 carries, including a 7-yard keeper on third-and-4 and two sneaks that moved the chains.
"You can say what you want about Grunk, but you can't question his toughness," Franklin said.
The game was tied 3-3 in the second quarter when Will Heldt's sack left Virginia Tech facing fourth-and-12 at its own 23. The Hokies ran a fake. Luke Reynolds threw to punter Nathan Totten for 8 yards. Four short.
That is a play call that is a head-scratcher, even if Tech was able to convert. Asking a trick play to cover 12 yards from your own territory in a tie game hands a struggling offense a short field for free.
The defense bailed Franklin out. Noah Chambers dropped Tyler Brown for a 2-yard loss, then Eric Mensah and Jason Abbey sacked Tait Reynolds on back-to-back plays, and Clemson punted.
Virginia Tech followed with its best drive of the night: 17 plays, 87 yards and the first Grunkemeyer-to-Luke Reynolds touchdown. It worked out. That doesn't make it a good bet.
Virginia Tech ran 37 times for 70 yards, and the sacks don't explain all of it. Jeffrey Overton Jr. and Marcellous Hawkins Jr. combined for 38 yards on 16 carries. Neither had a run longer than 5 yards.
That's how a team averaging 449.7 yards per game coming in finished with 234, its lowest total of the season. It's also why the Hokies went 5-of-15 on third down. And long third downs against this front meant sacks.
Clemson had a season-high six sacks, two of them from Heldt. Four came in the first half and two more on one third-quarter possession.
Then, in the fourth quarter, none. Virginia Tech ran 23 plays for 86 yards and 10 points without giving up a sack. Figuring out why belongs at the top of the bye-week to-do list, because the first three quarters are the film SMU and Miami will study.
Virginia Tech led 10-3 at half and then vanished. Its first two possessions of the second half went six plays for minus-14 yards. The first started at its own 10 after a chop block on the kickoff return, and two sacks pushed it back to the 1.
Clemson ran 20 plays for 146 yards in the quarter. Tait Reynolds's 16-yard touchdown run gave the Tigers their first lead, and Nolan Hauser's 36-yard field goal with three seconds left made it 16-10.
Virginia Tech is off Oct. 31, then visits SMU on Friday, Nov. 6, at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN.
Franklin found a way to beat Clemson. Now he has two weeks to find Grunkemeyer some protection.
This article was originally published on www.si.com/college/virginiatech as The Good, the Bad and the Ugly From Virginia Tech's 20-16 Win Over Clemson .
