At the start of the fourth quarter Saturday at Wake Forest, Georgia Tech coach Brent Key addressed his team’s defense. He let them know that with the Yellow Jackets beginning the final period looking at a third-and-6, he was going to go for it if his offense was faced with a fourth-down call.
Quarterback Haynes King threw an incomplete pass on third down. Tech now needed six yards for a first down at the Wake Forest 35, and Key made true on his promise by keeping his offense on the field.
“The defense said, ‘Go Coach, we got your back, we got the offense’s back.’” That was the first time this year that I’ve heard this team – not that there’s been negative things said – but that was the first time there was a real rally around each other. I’m almost getting chill bumps thinking about it right now,” Key said. “That’s a major step in a season. That’s a major step in the building of a football team. That was a major point that I feel like for this football team is important.”
Key, speaking Tuesday on the one-year anniversary of becoming the program’s interim coach, is charged with getting his squad to play at the same level they showed they were capable of in a 30-16 win at Wake Forest. The Jackets (2-2) haven’t had a win streak since October, but a victory over visiting Bowling Green at 3:30 p.m. Saturday at Bobby Dodd Stadium would give them just that.
Tech, after starting 0-1 and then 1-2, also could have a winning record going into October should it play another quality 60 minutes Saturday.
“Now we’ve got to be able to put two weeks together with the same mentality,” Key said. “There’s ups and downs in every game, but at the end of the day we were able to win a game in the fourth quarter (at Wake Forest). That says a lot about where we’ve come and the progress we’re making. But the progress you’ve made is only as good as the last game you’ve played. We’ve got to continue to make that progress, and that starts during the week with preparation and the practices.”
Tech last faced Bowling Green (1-3) almost five years to the day and ran the Falcons out of the building to the tune of a 63-17 score. The Jackets had 532 yards of offense, 372 yards on the ground, and scored on all five red-zone trips. The score could have been worse had Tech not missed five field-goal attempts.
That matchup featured Tech coach Paul Johnson in his final season before retirement and one of Bowling Green coach Mike Jinks’ final games before he was fired in October of that year.
This year’s meeting will have a vastly different feel.
Only two Jackets, running back Dontae Smith and defensive back Jaylon King, were on the Tech roster for that 2018 meeting. Key was the offensive line coach at Alabama. Tech was then running its triple-option offense. Bowling Green quarterback Jarret Doege, who threw for 305 yards that day, now is playing in the Canadian Football League.
The 2023 version of the Falcons has managed only 37 points in losses to Liberty, Michigan and Ohio, respectively, and have a win over Eastern Illinois on Sept. 9. Sophomore running back Terion Stewart has 235 yards rushing and three scores, and quarterback Connor Bazelak (46-of-81, 494 yards, three touchdowns, five interceptions) spent three seasons at Missouri and then one at Indiana before enrolling at Bowling Green ahead of this season.
Coach Scot Loeffler, who was an assistant in the ACC from 2013-18, first at Virginia Tech and then Boston College, has a team that has forced seven turnovers and held opponents to 184.2 passing yards per game. But the Falcons are one of the nation’s worst teams at converting third downs and have turned the ball over 12 times.
“Record is no way indicative of any football team, in my opinion, and all you have to do is watch the first half of the Michigan game with this team,” Key said. “You’re talking a 7-6 ballgame over halfway through the second quarter.
“They’ve created a lot of turnovers. They’ve had some untimely turnovers themselves. We’ve got a challenge in front of us.”
Key is 6-6 as Tech’s coach after eight games as the interim coach and four as the program’s full-time coach. And even though there were some notable moments during Key’s early tenure in 2022, Saturday’s win may be looked back upon as a true turning point.
That fourth-down play at Wake Forest that Key referenced turned out to be another King incompletion. The Demon Deacons took over on offense down 11 with 14:50 left in the game. But on the next play from scrimmage, linebacker Andre White hit Wake Forest quarterback Mitch Griffis and forced a fumble. Zeek Biggers recovered on the 26, and Aidan Birr kicked a 27-yard field goal four minutes later.
Put an asterisk by that series as a moment that Key, a former Tech lineman, will remember for a long time.
“I’m happy as you could be,” Key said. “I love every day when I wake up getting a chance to come in here and coach these kids and have a chance to impact these kids’ lives. Got a tremendous staff that I’m able to work with every day and try to put these kids in a position to be successful and, when football’s over, to graduate from Georgia Tech and be successful on Saturdays when we play.”
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