Virginia Tech’s transfer class is already shaping the conversation in Blacksburg, and fall camp has started to clarify which newcomers are pushing their way toward real roles.
The biggest attention naturally lands on quarterback. The Hokies are banking on Ethan Grunkemeyer, Bryce Baker, Kelden Ryan or three-star true freshman Troy Huhn to lift the ceiling at the position in 2026, but Grunkemeyer has separated himself early.
The Penn State transfer has taken the first-team reps in camp, and he’s the only quarterback in the room with college game experience, outside of the April 18 spring game. Grunkemeyer threw for 1,339 yards with eight touchdowns and four interceptions at Penn State in 2025, and Virginia Tech is counting on him to steady the position while also giving it more upside than the Hokies have had in recent memory.
Just as important, there’s actual depth behind him if things go sideways.
At receiver, two transfer names keep coming up alongside Que’Sean Brown: Tyseer Denmark and Marlion Jackson. Denmark followed head coach James Franklin from Penn State to Blacksburg, though his two seasons of action there produced just 45 receiving yards.
Jackson comes in with a more productive recent season after putting up 370 receiving yards and two touchdowns at Louisiana Tech in 2025. He now has 753 receiving yards in his career, and if he earns a starting spot with Greene and Brown, there’s a path to a big season.
Brown, for his part, is also in position to make a serious run at being Virginia Tech’s top receiver after a 2025 season at the Blue Devils that included 846 receiving yards and five touchdowns.
The offensive line has its own transfer storyline, with Justin Terry standing out. Terry and Oklahoma transfer Logan Howland were both limited in spring because of injuries and missed the spring game, but once fall camp opened, it was Terry who handled first-team reps during Virginia Tech’s first media-open practice. He played 129 total snaps at Ohio State in 2025, and he was at West Virginia the year before under current Hokies offensive line coach Matt Moore.
Defensively, the transfer who has drawn the most notice is Troy cornerback Jaquez White. Virginia Tech already expected White to compete for a starting job - he ranked No. 13 among all cornerbacks in overall defensive grade on Pro Football Focus with an 87.4 mark - but the jump from the Group of Five to the Power Four always brings questions. Those questions got louder after White tore his MCL and partially tore his ACL in the spring, an injury that kept him out for about six to eight weeks.
So far in fall camp, though, White has started to quiet the concerns. He still isn’t fully cleared, but he said at Media Day on Sunday that he expects to be soon.
“I thought it was over with,” White said. “All the work I put in, I thought it just went down the drain.
All I could do is just cry... It was just hard.
All I could do was just tell God thank you for giving me the opportunity to get to this point.”
Virginia Tech opens the season on Saturday, Sept. 5, at 7:30 p.m. ET against VMI on the ACC Network. It will be the first meeting between the schools since the 1984 season.
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There was also movement in the backfield, where Marcellous Hawkins worked with the first team at running back, a small but meaningful sign as the Hokies keep sorting through roles. Elsewhere, the day brought a few absences from the field, including Emmett Laws and Gabe Williams, leaving more to watch as camp continues to separate players from the pack. [Read more 🡒]