Virginia Tech’s new starting linebackers, sophomores Jake Johnson and Barquell Rivers, often watch film of the guys who came before them in Blacksburg—Xavier Adibi, Vince Hall, Jamel Smith, Ben Taylor.

“To watch their tendencies,” Rivers said. “To try to get ours up to their level.”

Rivers is playing Hall’s old position (mike), while Johnson is at Adibi’s old spot (backer).

Before I get to tomorrow’s story about this new linebacker duo, a quick thought: Johnson is the only new starter on this defense who has never started ... if that makes sense. Rivers has one career start (last season’s Orange Bowl). Senior defensive end Nekos Brown has two, including the Orange Bowl. Junior field cornerback Rashad Carmichael has one (last season’s opener against East Carolina).

Now, on to the story ...

BY DARRYL SLATER
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

BLACKSBURG – Sometime Friday night, Jake Johnson plans to make his last phone calls – to his mom, dad, maybe a couple high school coaches. Then on Saturday, he will turn off his cell phone and “not worry about anything in the outside world,” he said. He will pass the hours until he is sitting in Virginia Tech’s locker room at the Georgia Dome, wearing his maroon No. 36 jersey and white pants.

In the moments before Johnson starts his first college game, he will flip through his playbook one more time, reminding himself of his assignments for the offensive formations Alabama might use.

He will fire up the 85-song iPod pregame playlist he has been perfecting since spring and shuffle through an energizing combination of rap and rock music: 50 Cent, Metallica, Hollywood Undead.

He will mix a couple scoops of the energy powder N.O.-XPLODE with water and guzzle it, as he has done since high school, and before he lifts weights, because he said it helps him focus.

“After that, I’ll be ready to just go,” he said.

When Johnson, a sophomore, lines up for his first play against the Crimson Tide, he will form the latest link in Tech’s proud history of linebackers – a group that includes All-Americans such as Xavier Adibi, Ben Taylor and Jamel Smith.

Though the Hokies’ defense, with seven starters returning from last season, could be as successful as previous editions, Tech faces questions about inexperience at linebacker for the first time since 2004, when Adibi and Vince Hall played as redshirt freshmen, and Hall started.

Sophomore Barquell Rivers joins Johnson as a new starting linebacker. Last season, Tech also had two new starters, Brett Warren and Purnell Sturdivant, but they were fifth-year seniors. Saturday’s stage—Tech is ranked seventh, Alabama fifth—allows little adjustment time for Johnson and Rivers, who has started one game, last season’s Orange Bowl.

Rivers plans to offer Johnson some pregame advice to go with his music and energy powder. “Just picture it like a big old scrimmage,” Rivers said he might tell Johnson. “Don’t try to look into the crowd. The crowd can’t play for you. Just go out there and do your job.”

Johnson said his pass-coverage skills have improved since spring practices and he is breaking on passes with more certainty. “In the spring, I was just kind of dropping back [into coverage], not really knowing what I was doing,” he said.

But the Hokies have tinkered this month with a nickel package that involves pulling Johnson in likely passing situations and moving free safety Kam Chancellor to whip linebacker, while whip Cody Grimm slides to Johnson’s spot.

The package calls for the top two rovers, Davon Morgan (Varina High) and Dorian Porch, to play next to each other, because both have played free safety. Most teams use an extra cornerback in nickel situations. The Hokies haven’t used much nickel in recent seasons, said defensive backs coach Torrian Gray, but “we feel we’ve got a unique group of guys that we can maybe tinker with it this year.”

Rivers, in his third season at Tech, has a year advantage on Johnson, who played on special teams last season as a true freshman. Rivers’ progress has shown in his ability to react faster to his “key reads” – when he watches the offensive linemen block to determine whether the play will be a run or pass.

“A lot times now, I’m meeting the running back in the hole,” he said. “When I first got here, I used to meet him three or four yards deep [past the line of scrimmage].”

While Johnson and Rivers developed as much as they could before this week, they were surrounded by reminders the standards they will try to meet. Smith is one of Tech’s graduate assistants. Hall returned to Blacksburg last month and spoke with the new starting linebackers. And in the room at the Merryman Center where Tech’s linebackers meet, a list of the position’s All-Americans is displayed on the wall.

“We haven’t really talked about it, but it’s in the back of our heads,” Johnson said of his predecessors’ accomplishments “It’s a lot to live up to.”

Can they live up to their predecessors’ accomplishments?