Peeling Back the Layers

Sub Station II is back in business.

No, not really, but pretend it is and you're hungry between classes for the perfect sandwich.

No matter your number, the base of meat plus bread is the starting point. I'd take a plain old Philly cheesesteak. French is going to load up on all-the-meats. Joe's going No. 5 with American on white. From there, to create the perfect sandwich, you need to add layers. Because it's the cheese (or lack thereof, hi French), the veggies, the sauces and seasonings that truly make a sandwich unique, all blended together seamlessly to stimulate the taste buds of the beholder.

In the same way, layers have been the catalyst for the Virginia Tech running game. In Thursday night's 42-21 win over Boston College, the Hokies ran for 9.2 yards per play, their highest in a single game since 2021. Bhaysul Tuten set the school's single-game record for rushing yards with a Jeanty-ian performance, tallying 266 yards on only 18 carries.

The root of this culinary masterpiece — one of them, anyways — is the split zone read. Like our sandwich, it's taken precious time to perfect as new layers have been sprinkled in.

Building off the Base

Layering is a concept as simple as it sounds: adding wrinkles and twists to build off a base concept. You can take one formation and then present multiple looks out of it.

Split zone is one of Tech's bread-and-butter concepts: an offset tight end whams across the formation to block the backside defender, opposite the zone blocking. Tech has run split zone a decent amount, especially in the red zone, but to keep defenses on their toes, offensive coordinator Tyler Bowen has built off that base by adding layers.

Below, Virginia Tech is running a base form of split zone, with orbit motion pre-snap as eye candy to give defenses something extra to account for.