BY DARRYL SLATER
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

BLACKSBURG – Two of Virginia Tech’s offensive linemen, right tackle Blake DeChristopher and backup guard Greg Nosal, wrestled at the team’s hotel in Atlanta last month before the Hokies played Georgia Tech. At one point, Nosal pinned DeChristopher, who brushed it off by joking that he wasn’t worried because he only had 280 pounds on top of him.

Nosal, a third-year sophomore, might not look like a typical offensive lineman. After Monday’s practice, he walked off the field wearing a form-fitting, long-sleeved workout shirt that hugged more muscle than flab. He is small by no means, standing 6-6 – three inches taller than senior left guard Sergio Render and four inches taller than sophomore right guard Jaymes Brooks. But he is 30 pounds lighter than Render and 20 pounds lighter than Brooks.

Bryan Stinespring tells Nosal he looks like he is trying out for the swimming team. Brooks said he tells Nosal that “he looks like a male model, a plus-sized male model. He’s got a little six-pack going.”

But Nosal, a former tight end, is learning to play with a lineman’s meanness. He has relieved the starting guards this season, playing 190 snaps, compared to 416 for Brooks and 495 for Render. Nosal’s contributions are letting line coach Curt Newsome achieve his goal of resting his first-stringers more.

Nosal is playing well enough that Newsome plans to increase his snaps for Saturday’s game at Maryland, by rotating him in at left and right guard. Most of his action this season has come at right guard.

“To me, he’s just like a starter,” Brooks said. “It’s no drop-off from when I’m in there to when he’s in there.”

Nosal is surprising Newsome with his aggressiveness. “That’s what I worried about the whole time,” Newsome said. “That was his issue. I knew he was athletic enough, but I didn’t know if he’d put his nose in there. He’s doing that.”

Nosal arrived at Tech in 2007 as a 240-pound tight end. He moved to offensive tackle the next spring, with some hesitation, though he would come to realize the truth in words he had heard from Duane Brown and Ed Wang, older Tech players who switched from tight end to tackle: “It’s the fastest way to get on the field.”

He just had to make himself look and play more like a lineman. Like Brown and Wang, he packed on pounds. He also lifted more in the weight room, increasing his bench press from 305 pounds as a freshman to 435 this year. Then there was the mental adjustment.

“No one really likes hitting people,” Nosal said. “It’s not a natural thing, but you get used to it. I used to think of myself as a finesse player. I thought I was just a wide receiver playing tight end. Moving to offensive line, I’ve really had to take on the persona of an offensive lineman, be tough and mean and really be physical when you’re blocking.”

Newsome noticed Nosal’s progress this past spring, when he moved from tackle to left guard because Render was sitting out after having shoulder surgery. “He looked like he belonged once he got in there,” Newsome said. “I thought it would be a long process. It hadn’t taken near as long as I thought it would.”

Hoping Nosal could be an important backup, Newsome monitored him closely during drills, watching for any timidness. “I’ve really just tried not to let him get away with anything that was not real physical,” Newsome said.

Nosal now finds himself relishing chances to hit somebody. In Tech’s loss last month to North Carolina, he pulled off the line, to the right, and spotted linebacker Kevin Reddick. “Don’t miss,” Nosal told himself before he dove at Reddick’s legs, clearing the way for tailback Ryan Williams’ 20-yard touchdown run. But the play was called back because of a holding penalty on DeChristopher.

Next season, with Render gone, Nosal probably will start. First, he wants to gain weight and keep it on. He weighed 295 at the beginning of preseason practices but has dropped about 15 pounds since. His goal: 305, which ought to make him unmistakably a lineman. “I don’t want to be sloppy,” he said. “But I feel like if I got up to 305, I could still carry it pretty well.”

Virginia Tech’s backup guard has helped the Hokies offensive line this season while learning to play like a lineman.