UCLA and Virginia Tech just fired both of their coaches as they both started 0-3. Virginia Tech lost to Old Dominion last week, and UCLA lost to New Mexico. Both losses were embarrassing to their coaches and the players involved. UCLA fired Head Coach DeShaun Foster, and Virginia Tech fired Brent Pry. Now that both colleges are doing a coaching search, it is important to discuss where both football programs stand at this point. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter who either school hires; if there is no commitment by the college and the athletic department to football, then both programs will struggle going forward.
Virginia Tech Current Situation
Virginia Tech Athletic Director raised concerns about the lack of money for the Virginia Tech Athletic budget back in August. This lack of money includes money to support NIL, which is an area where they are lacking. If you know about Virginia Tech and its football program, they are not lacking support, but in the NIL world, you need to raise more money to support your program. Looking at the College Football landscape today, Virginia Tech has had a hard time raising money for NIL. An example is Miami, an ACC rival, which spent money to add former Georgia quarterback Carson Beck. That’s a type of player Virginia Tech has not been able to add in recruiting or the transfer portal.
At one point in the 2000s and 2010s, Virginia Tech was one of the best programs in college football, led by Head Coach Frank Beamer, but since then, they have fallen on hard times. They have not had more than 10 wins in back-to-back seasons since the 2010 and 2011 seasons. Justin Fuente replaced Beamer in 2016 and won 10 games in his 1st season, but he fell off towards the end of his tenure when he won 5 games in his last two seasons. Brent Pry was hired from Penn State, and in 3 plus seasons, he could never gain any traction as he went 16-24. Virginia Tech has not been able to achieve much success in a long time as a program.
In an interview with Andy Bitter, Whit Babcock admitted that they underestimated the men’s basketball NIL budget so badly that VT was operating at 70% less than Clemson’s NIL budget. pic.twitter.com/mt6TaPhTR5
— Joe Rogers (@VT4L_Joe) March 30, 2025
UCLA Current Situation
UCLA is another program that has had financial issues over the years. The UCLA Athletic Department is facing a deficit of hundreds of millions of dollars. That is part of the reason why they switched conferences to join the Big 10. UCLA has struggled for a long time to draw fans to see them play in the spacious Rose Bowl. Now, the longer they are in the Big Ten, they should be able to generate more money, so for the time being, they have struggled financially as a football program. No matter what, the UCLA fan base seems to check out on this program. The donors have not supported the program for NIL, and it has hurt recruiting for UCLA.
The program in the field has been bad for a long time. Outside of the 2013 and 2014 seasons, when Jim Mora won 10 games back-to-back seasons, UCLA has been a subpar program. Since the 2014 season, they have gone 58-61, spanning 3 head coaches. DeShaun Foster is the latest Head Coach to get fired from the UCLA program. UCLA has struggled to maintain any success as a football program.
Final Thoughts
Both programs look like they are lost at this current time, and they must commit to football to make them successful. The positive is that they are one good hire away from turning around both programs. Look at the recent success at Arizona State and Indiana, with both teams making the playoffs last year. Arizona State made the playoffs in head coach Kenny Dillingham's 2nd season. Indiana made it in Curt Cignetti's 1st season at the helm. Both UCLA and Virginia Tech desperately need to hire the right coaches and then fully commit to the programs to have them be successful.
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