Note: The following appears in the Virginia Tech football digital gameday guide, available HERE.
Virginia Tech and Clemson are ACC rivals today, as the Hokies have been in the league since 2004. But the series goes all the way back to 1900, just the 22nd game in Clemson history and the fifth game in John Heisman’s first season as the Tigers' head coach. Clemson won that game 12-5 on the way to a 6-0 record, the first perfect season in program history.
The Tigers lead the series 24-12-1, including seven wins in a row, all under Head Coach Dabo Swinney. While those seven victories have been memorable, three games against Virginia Tech between 1978-89 stand out to me.
Here is a rundown of those games, two at Memorial Stadium and one at Lane Stadium.
Clemson 38, Virginia Tech 7
Oct. 7, 1978 • Memorial Stadium
The 1978 season was my first at Clemson. The first time you do anything tends to be memorable, and I have many great memories from that year, an 11-1 season that finished with a win over Ohio State in the Gator Bowl and a No. 6 final AP ranking, at the time, the highest final ranking in program history.
The Tigers had a top-20 season in 1977, the first for the program since 1959. With Steve Fuller returning at quarterback and Jerry Butler at wide receiver, Tiger fans had high hopes in 1978. But those hopes were depressed after a 12-0 loss at Georgia in the second game of the year.
After a 31-0 victory over Villanova in the third game, Clemson was 2-1 entering the Virginia Tech game on Oct. 7. It was Clemson’s Homecoming, and this Notre Dame graduate had never seen anything like Clemson’s version. Tigerama on Friday night drew 35,000 fans to Memorial Stadium. Students constructed floats on Bowman Field that blew me away.
It did not take long for that homecoming enthusiasm to spill over onto the field. On the game’s second play, Steve Fuller read the option perfectly and kept the ball for a 75-yard rushing touchdown. A run that distance was not duplicated by a Tiger quarterback until Woodrow Dantzler raced 75 yards for a touchdown at Virginia in 2000.
I was personally thrilled to see that run because we were planning a Heisman Trophy campaign for Fuller. The Georgia game had put that on hold, but his performance in a regionally televised game against the Hokies helped rekindle it. In those days, there were not many games on television, so anything Fuller could do in a televised game would be a big bonus.
Fuller finished the day with 13 carries for 106 yards and two touchdowns, and he completed 9-15 passes for 128 yards. Those types of numbers are commonplace today, but rarely did a quarterback have at least 100 rushing yards and 100 passing yards in the same game in 1978.
The Tigers finished with 282 rushing yards and 138 passing yards, and the defense did its job, holding Bill Dooley’s team to just 182 yards in a 38-7 Clemson victory.
Clemson ran the table for the rest of the season and Fuller continued to play at a high level. He finished tied for sixth in the Heisman Trophy voting with Ted Brown of NC State. Clemson’s final team ranking in the UPI Coaches poll was a tie for No. 6 with Notre Dame. Ties are rare in both categories in the history of college football, but both took place with the Clemson program in 1978.
Clemson 13, Virginia Tech 10
Oct. 4, 1980 • Memorial Stadium
The 1980 Clemson football season was not memorable for greatness, but it was memorable for what it set up for the following season. Head Coach Danny Ford’s second Tiger team finished 6-5, but the season gave a group of young players experience and they improved to the point of winning the national championship in 1981.
One of the victories in 1980 was against Bill Dooley’s Virginia Tech team on Oct. 4. Like the 1978 game, the contest was the fourth game of the season on the first Saturday in October. Like 1978, Clemson was 2-1, with the only loss being a gut-wrenching defeat at Georgia (20-16).
Clemson had averaged just 17 points a game over the first three contests, so Ford decided to start the game off with a bang. He started freshman Ike Williams at halfback and gave him the ball on each of the first two plays.
Williams had been a talented all-around athlete in Gastonia, N.C. On the first play of the game, Homer Jordan pitched the ball to Williams and he was stopped for no gain on a run around the end.
On second down, Jordan again pitched the ball to Williams. This time, Williams threw a long pass downfield to Perry Tuttle, who made the catch for a 55-yard gain to the Virginia Tech 20. I remember thinking this Williams kid is going to be a great all-around player. The 1980 season was the last year of junior-varsity football, and Williams was the top wide receiver for that team, with seven catches for 141 yards.
But tragically, that 55-yard pass was the last play of Williams’ career. In a junior-varsity game later that year, he suffered a career-ending knee injury. When someone asks me about the top, “What could have been” stories of my career at Clemson, Williams is one of the first I think of.
The Tigers went on to score on an Obed Ariri field goal after that play and added a Brendan Crite touchdown later in the half. The Tigers dominated the first 30 minutes, outgaining Virginia Tech 283-92, but they led just 10-0.
Clemson added another Ariri field goal and Virginia Tech scored a touchdown to make the count 13-7 Tigers entering the fourth quarter.
The Hokies seized the momentum on a drive that started with 13:01 remaining in the game. Quarterback Steve Casey drove Dooley’s team to the Clemson seven. On fourth down, he carried for two yards and a first down. After a four-yard pass, Virginia Tech had second and goal at the Clemson one.
Casey kept the ball on second down and third down, but he was stopped by Jeff Davis and others. Davis finished the game with 14 tackles, his average for the year.
That set up fourth and goal from the one. Casey went to the line of scrimmage to call signals, but the crowd in the East end zone rose as one and Casey thought his team could not hear his signals. He looked back at referee Bob Carpenter and had his team retreat to a new huddle, as crowd noise was regulated by officials during that era.
He did the same thing a second and third time. On the fourth time, he again went to the line and looked back to Carpenter. This time Carpenter pointed back at him as if to say, “run the play.” When Casey went back to the line to begin calling signals, one of his offensive lineman jumped and an illegal procedure penalty was called. It moved the ball back to the six. With still six minutes left, Dooley decided to kick a field goal and make it a three-point game.
It was the right decision for Dooley because they got the ball back for two more possessions. On the first, Virginia Tech drove to the Clemson eight. This was the era before overtime and Dooley wanted to go for the win. So on fourth and three from the Clemson eight, Casey threw a pass that was defended by senior Eddie Geathers, and the Tigers took over.
Virginia Tech had one more possession with 37 seconds left. But Casey’s long pass was intercepted at the Clemson seven by Geathers, and the Tigers ran out the clock to claim the victory.
After the game, Dooley was not a happy man.
“I do want to say that the officiating certainly left something to be desired. That’s just not football…that call that went against us on the goal. I’ve had that happen to me before here and it’s just not right.”
When someone asks me about the Clemson home-field advantage in Death Valley, the 1980 Virginia Tech game is the first thing I think of.
Clemson 27, Virginia Tech 7
Sept. 16, 1989 • Lane Stadium
I was in my first year as Clemson’s sports information director in 1989. I had been Bob Bradley’s top assistant from 1978-88 and did the color on the radio network with Jim Phillips from 1982-88. So until 1989 when the game ended, I was in the radio booth, not on the field. But starting in 1989, I was on the field with Head Coach Danny Ford, guiding him through his postgame media responsibilities.
Being on the field immediately after the game gave me a unique perspective as to what goes into a coach’s pregame preparation.
Clemson won the 1989 game at Virginia Tech 27-7. It really should have been a shutout victory, as the Hokies only score came on a 100-yard kickoff return for a touchdown by Larry Fallen. A look to the stats shows that Virginia Tech only gained 243 total yards, 83 rushing and 160 passing on 70 plays. That is only 3.5 yards per play.
It was such a dominant performance that fans might have wondered if the Tigers knew what plays Virginia Tech was going to run before they snapped the ball.
When I walked to midfield with Ford to meet Virginia Tech Head Coach Frank Beamer, I discovered that Clemson really did know what was coming before the ball was snapped.
When Ford and Beamer met at midfield, they first shook hands. Then Ford said something to Beamer and got down on one knee. I had no idea what he was doing.
Ford then put his right hand on the field with his palm flat against the ground. He then put his right hand on the ground with just his finger tips making contact with the turf.
He then told Beamer that one of his offensive linemen was tipping off whether the Hokies would run or pass. Ford had noticed in his personal film study that the Hokies would pass when this particular lineman put his right hand on the ground with just his fingers touching the turf, and the Hokies would run if his right palm was flat on the ground.
That detailed analysis is one of the reasons Ford is in the College Football Hall of Fame.
I do not know that Ford would have passed that knowledge on to a lot of coaches. Ford had been an assistant coach at Virginia Tech before he came to Clemson, and he had a certain affinity for the school. He was also aware that Virginia Tech was not in the ACC and was not on the schedule again in the near future (they did not play again until 1998).
Beamer was in his third year at Virginia Tech in 1989 and had two losing seasons his first two years. So in some circles, he was on the “hot seat.” He made the correction with that lineman and went on to his first winning season (6-4-1) in 1989, including a victory over No. 9 West Virginia. He went on to a long tenure at Virginia Tech and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2018, his first year of eligibility.