SMU led Syracuse by four points with 3:47 left on Halloween, and it had the ball. It punted. Steve Angeli then drove the Orange down the field and hit tight end Noah Meyers for the winning score with 17 seconds to play, handing the Mustangs a 30–27 loss at the JMA Wireless Dome.

How Syracuse got that close matters more for Virginia Tech. The Orange sacked Kevin Jennings four times for 52 yards and held Kendrick Raphael to 51 yards on 14 carries. SMU had allowed eight sacks in its first seven games and never more than two in one game.

Virginia Tech (6–2, 3–2 ACC) gets SMU (6–2, 4–2) next Friday at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN in Dallas. The Hokies have the defensive front to run a version of what Syracuse did. Whether that’s enough depends on what happens when SMU’s defense takes the field.

1. Virginia Tech’s run defense vs. Kendrick Raphael

SMU coach Rhett Lashlee boiled the loss down to two things after the game. “They played a lot of Cover 2, which is a little out of character, and when teams can play Cover 2, and you can’t run the ball, it makes it really hard,” he said.

For Virginia Tech, the second part comes first. If the front can handle Raphael without extra help, the safeties can sit deep against Jennings.

That won’t be easy. Raphael, a Cal transfer, has 692 rushing yards and nine touchdowns. He ran for 197 yards and three scores in SMU’s 41–31 loss at Louisville. Franklin described a 5'11", 200-plus-pound back who breaks tackles and makes people miss, inside a spread offense that does a good job of “making it hard for you to overload the box.”

This is the matchup that plays to Virginia Tech’s strength. The Hokies allow 93.4 rushing yards per game and 3.0 yards per carry, 12th nationally.

Safety Tyson Flowers has a head start on the back end. As a sophomore at Rice in 2023, he made his first career start against SMU. That was the day Jennings came off the bench for one 11-play fourth-quarter drive in relief of an injured Preston Stone.

“I think the thing I remember the most was just him being confident when he was out there,” said Flowers, now a fifth-year safety for the Hokies.

2. Aycen Stevens and Virginia Tech's pass rush vs. SMU’s pass protection

Not all four sacks at Syracuse belonged to the offensive line. Jennings took some while trying to extend plays instead of throwing it away.

The Hokies have the rusher to find out whether that was a one-week lapse. Stevens, a former linebacker recruit who didn’t record a sack in 2025, leads the ACC with eight sacks this season and has 10.5 tackles for loss. As a team, Virginia Tech averages 3.38 sacks per game, sixth nationally.

Stevens didn’t get one at Clemson. Virginia Tech still sacked Clemson four times, including the fourth-down sack that ended the game.

Franklin wants the coverage to make Jennings wait. The plan is to challenge throws so the quarterback “has to hold onto the ball, work through progressions,” and let the two units feed each other, “rush to coverage and coverage to rush.”

Jennings won’t hand Virginia Tech much. He hasn’t thrown an interception in four games and 125 attempts since Sept. 26.

3. SMU’s twists and stunts vs. Virginia Tech’s reshuffled offensive line

Franklin got specific on Monday about SMU’s front. He called the Mustangs big at defensive tackle and experienced at the end. He said they’ve had a lot of success running “twists and stunts up front out of the bear package,” plus “cover zero, six-man pressures.”

Twists and stunts test communication, which makes them a bad draw for a line still sorting itself out. Montavious Cunningham and Brody Meadows are expected back. Left tackle Justin Terry isn’t ready. Franklin said the staff is still deciding whether Cunningham, who has played both tackle and guard, fits best at one or the other. That call could also move Layth Ghannam, a natural guard who has spent the last three games at left tackle.

The end Franklin singled out, with 5.5 sacks, is Marques White, a graduate transfer from UMass who had three sacks against Boston College.

Franklin’s answer to all of it is the run game. “It’s gonna be important to stay ahead of the sticks, stay out of third and longs as much as we possibly can,” he said. “The best way to do that is have an effective run game.”

That’s the part Virginia Tech can’t count on. Jeffrey Overton Jr. ran for 209 yards at Boston College and 26 at Clemson, where the Hokies averaged 1.9 yards per carry and Ethan Grunkemeyer took six sacks.