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A new head coach will be patrolling the sidelines for the Virginia Military Institute football team this fall.
But there are connections and continuity for the Keydets as Danny Rocco’s tenure begins on Saturday afternoon with a home matchup against Davidson.
Rocco replaced Scott Wachenheim, who resigned last November after guiding VMI for eight seasons. A veteran with four decades of experience coaching college football, Rocco has spent 16 years as a head coach in the Football Championship Subdivision, posting a 121-65 record during stints at Liberty, Richmond and Delaware.
The new VMI mentor has direct connections to his two predecessors: Wachenheim had previously served as Rocco’s offensive coordinator at Liberty, while Sparky Woods – who coached the Keydets from 2008-2014 – became the assistant head coach at Richmond after leaving Lexington.
From his time at Liberty, Richmond and Virginia – where he served on Al Groh’s coaching staff from 2001-2005 – Rocco has multiple family ties to the commonwealth. His children, David and Amy, grew up in the region; Rocco’s brother Frank is currently the head coach at Liberty Christian Academy in Lynchburg, and another sibling lives in Charlottesville.
“I had a basic, genuine appreciation for the Institute and what they represent, what they stood for,” Rocco said. “I just had enough familiarity with the area, the region, the Institute, the school, the football.”
Rocco spent the 2022 season as a defensive analyst for Penn State, and he says he enjoyed his time with the Nittany Lions. But his desire to return to the head coaching ranks led him to accept the position with the Keydets back in December.
It isn’t the first time that Jim Miller, VMI’s director of intercollegiate athletics, has hired Rocco. While serving as the athletic director at Richmond, Miller pulled Rocco away from Liberty to become the Spiders’ head coach.
“All of those things kind of bound up in one made it make sense” to take the VMI job, Rocco said.
How good will the Keydets be this fall? Rocco pointed out that the senior class has seen both ends of the spectrum: during their pandemic-delayed freshman season in the spring of 2021, Wachenheim led VMI to its first Southern Conference title since 1977 and its first-ever FCS playoff appearance, while the Keydets struggled through an injury-plagued campaign last fall and finished 1-10.
Rocco believes that the Class of 2024 can build off of those disparate results during their final season on post.
“There are guys in this senior class that have experienced both the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat,” he said. “I have said for years that the one does not exist without the other. When you have experienced both of them, you have a real taste of what life is all about.”
There’s plenty of returning talent for Rocco and his staff to work with. Offensive lineman Tyriq Poindexter, linebacker Evan Eller, cornerback Alex Oliver and punter Jack Culbreath all earned Preseason All-Southern Conference honors.
Other playmakers like Christian Dunn and Josh Knapp return on the defensive side. VMI also brings back several skill position guys on offense, including quarterback Collin Ironside, running backs Rashad Raymond and Hunter Rice, wide receivers Chance Knox and Isaiah Lemmond and tight end Aidan Twombly.
One key challenge remains for any coach at VMI: the transfer portal and its impact on Southern Conference football. Many of the Keydets’ opponents within the league have numerous graduate transfers, often from larger Division I programs. The extra year of eligibility for student-athletes due to COVID-19 adds another layer.
But Rocco prefers to view that situation through a different lens. “These [VMI] alumni come back, and they talk to our players – and they meet our rookies and our rats – they know these guys are going on the same journey that they were on. … There’s nobody out there on the football field that graduated from another school, that’s coming here to play their last year,” the coach said. “There’s something good about that. It’s honorable. … The challenges are real, but I think that the trade-off is also real.”
And at age 63, Rocco says that “a new challenge was something that I was looking forward to” as he enters what he calls “the last quarter” of his coaching career.
“This experience – being at a school like this, the military environment – is uniquely different,” he said. “To be honest, I was pretty motivated to dive in, and do something I had never done before.
“Sometimes I say when making decisions, if it makes sense intellectually, and if it makes sense emotionally and spiritually, then it’s the right thing to do,” he added.
VMI will kick off its season on Saturday with a home game against Davidson at 1:30 p.m. at Foster Stadium in Lexington.
