BLACKSBURG, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – Separated by 140 miles, Virginia Tech’s Lane Stadium and James Madison’s Bridgeforth Stadium launched new eras of Commonwealth college football Saturday.

Four hours after Billy Napier began his tenure as JMU’s coach with a 20-13 win over Liberty, James Franklin kicked off his time as Virginia Tech’s big whistle with a 73-3 walloping of VMI.

“At the end of the day, we did what we were supposed to,” Franklin said after the blowout of the comically-overmatched Keydets. “We executed in all three phases. We did it for four quarters.”

The two men, both former bosses at major football factories – Franklin at Penn State and Napier at Florida – face the challenge of expectations in a Commonwealth where the three other FBS coaches have all been in their posts for at least four seasons. At UVA, Tony Elliott has the Cavaliers coming off a program-record 11 wins and an ACC championship game appearance. 

In Blacksburg, Franklin is being asked to return the Hokies to their former levels of glory. That’s what a sellout crowd, clad in orange, turned out to see him start on Saturday night at Lane.

In Harrisonburg, Napier needs to keep the Dukes, coming off an appearance in the College Football Playoff, at the top of the Group of Six.

Their football operating budgets are separated by more than $30 million, the bank tipping in favor of the Hokies.

Still, JMU has the edge over most of its Group of Six competitors, while Tech faces a gap compared with many of its Power Conference peers. 

JMU has continued winning despite coaches leaving because of its level of support and financial investment. And while that hasn’t been enough to keep the likes of Curt Cignetti or Bob Chesney around Harrisonburg very long, it has kept the Dukes among the elite programs at their level.

At VT, Franklin enjoys no such leg up on the Hokies’ ACC competition, something he made abundantly clear during remarks to the school’s board of visitors last month.

Virginia Tech longs to get back to the kind of sustained success it enjoyed under Frank Beamer, who won 10 or more games 13 times from 1995-2011. If Franklin does that in Blacksburg, Tech may erect a statue of him in the same plaza where one stands honoring Beamer.

Around the Commonwealth, Old Dominion’s Ricky Rahne is the dean of FBS coaches, now in his sixth season with the Monarchs. At UVA, Elliott is in Year 5 and Liberty’s Jamey Chadwell is in his fourth season.

After Beamer led the program for 29 years, Franklin is Tech’s third coach in the last six years, a reflection of both Beamer’s remarkable longevity and the money-driven seismic changes in college athletics. 

After the win, Franklin said he hoped Beamer, his longtime defensive coordinator, Bud Foster, and Hokies fans, were pleased with the team’s opening performance.

“I hope they watched the game today and said, ‘That’s how Virginia Tech football is supposed to look,’” Franklin said.

On a picturesque night, the Hokies wasted no time making sure Saturday was more celebration than competition, jumping out to a 21-0 first-quarter lead. 

By game’s end, Tech held a 619-83 advantage in yards, had racked up 18 tackles for loss and scored ten touchdowns.

Earlier in the day, in Harrisonburg, the Napier era launched with a far more competitive 20-13 win over in-state rival Liberty in front of 25,035. 

Despite rain on his parade – a literal thunderstorm that delayed the start by 20 minutes and left most of the fans waiting in line to enter as the game kicked off – JMU gave Napier an encouraging debut in the purple and gold.

The Dukes built a 17-6 halftime lead, scoring on all three of their first-half possessions. A second-half offensive lull kept things interesting until the end, but JMU’s defense hit hard and tightened up in the red zone to ultimately hold off the Flames.

“There’s a lot of areas for improvement,” Napier said. “You think about why we won the game? We rushed for 173 yards. Held them to 2.4 a carry. They rushed the ball 38 times. And that was the goal, to stop the run. We got red-zone stops. We forced field goals.”

The Dukes figure to be favored again next week when they host Wagner, before the schedule presents more challenging matchups, starting with a pair of road games at San Diego State and Old Dominion.

“We’re going to have to be better than that to go where we want to go. We have much bigger challenges in front of us,” Napier said. “We did a lot of things well but there’s a ton of room for improvement.”

Still, Saturday – in both Harrisonburg and Blacksburg – fans got the first of what they hope are many wins from their new coaches.