Monday night, with the end of the college football season nearly six weeks in the rear-view mirror, the spotlight continued to shine on Tech’s amazing freshman quarterback, Michael Vick, as Vick won the ESPY for College Football Player of the Year.

With each accolade that gets poured down on the incredible Vick, his legend, which is already worthy of an entire four-year career, gets larger and deeper. What Vick has done for Virginia Tech football in just five and a half months, since he first trotted onto the field September 4^th against JMU, can’t be measured, and the beauty of it all for Virginia Tech and its fans is that Vick’s ride with the Hokies is far from over.

The ESPY’s opened with a video montage of images from the year in sports, and then show host Jimmy Smits introduced the 1999 ESPY winners. As he introduced them, they walked out on stage and stood shoulder to shoulder, and by the time the introductions were done, Vick was standing on stage with athletes like Andre Agassi, Kurt Warner, Lance Armstrong, Mia Hamm, and Tiger Woods.

It was another moment in time that leaves long-time followers of Hokie football shaking their heads in wonder.

Vick beat out Wisconsin’s Ron Dayne and Georgia Tech’s Joe Hamilton for the award, and the concept of a freshman winning the award over seniors, including the Heisman Trophy winner, is a testament to Michael Vick’s awesome potential. Vick is now positioned squarely at the head of the class for next year’s Heisman Trophy race. If he has the type of season that he’s capable of having when surrounded by a veteran offense, then it’s his award to lose.

It will indeed be quite a journey to see what the next few years hold for Michael Vick and Virginia Tech. He has told the coaches that he will stay at Virginia Tech for at least two more years, but when the professionals start throwing money at the young man after next year’s season, it’s hard to guess what will happen. (For the record, college football players can declare for the draft after their sophomore seasons.)

Perhaps Virginia Tech will get lucky. Perhaps Vick will win the Heisman next year, and maybe the year after that, and then maybe, just maybe, the challenge of being the first three-time winner in the history of the Heisman Trophy will be enough to bring him back for his senior season. Well, not likely, but Hokie fans can dream, can’t they?

Then again, Michael Vick may never have another season like the one he just had, and he may never again be the focus of so much attention and so many awards. You never know. But one thing is clear: this season alone has already made him a Hokie legend.

Buried on the back page behind Vick’s front page headlines is some very good news for the Hokies. It has been officially announced that Tech will host a BCA preseason football game in Lane Stadium. The game will be broadcast on ESPN2.

That’s all we know at this point. The rest of the information – the opponent, the day, and the time – have not been filled in yet.

The opponent will likely be Georgia Tech, as was widely reported last week. The day will be Saturday, August 26^th, or Sunday, August 27^th. As for the time, if the game is on Saturday, then I hope it will be at night, since it will be the dog days of summer. But if the game is on Sunday, an early start like noon or one o’clock will suit traveling Hokie fans who have to get back for work on Monday.

For the full story, see the Hokiesportsinfo.com press release.

HokieCentral has new message boards in place, so update your bookmarks. The new boards are what I call HTML-based instead of CGI-based, which means that each time you click on a message, the server will send you an HTML page containing the message instead of constructing the message using a CGI script every time.

Don’t understand? It’s not important. All you need to know is that your existing user name and password will still work for all of HC’s boards, but the new boards are located in different locations, so please update your bookmarks. Note that HC’s home page has been changed to reflect the addresses of the new boards.

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