Portal out: Gabriel Arena
With the re-opening of the Transfer Portal following spring practices around the country, players who aren't comfortable with their positions on the depth chart may begin to explore options.
That's the case with Hokies redshirt freshman offensive lineman Gabriel Arena. He entered the Portal today.
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Arena was a 5.5 three-star in the 2023 class out of Harrisburg (Pa.) Bishop McDevitt. His original lead recruiter, Joe Rudolph, departed the program before Arena ever joined it. After redshirting this Fall as a true freshman, Arena didn't see a clear path to the field, and has opted to look to the Portal.
The impact
With Arena's exit, the depth by class looks like this:
| Fr. | So. | Jr. | Sr. |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Web Davidson* |
Xavier Chaplin |
Montavious Cunningham |
Parker Clements |
|
Layth Ghannam |
Johnny Garrett |
Griffin Duggan, W |
Kaden Moore |
|
Hannes Hammer |
Gunner Givens |
Tyler Smedley, W |
Bob Schick |
|
Elijah Haughawout, W |
Lemar Law Jr. |
|
|
|
Grant Karczewski, W |
Brody Meadows |
|
|
|
Aidan Lynch* |
Braelin Moore |
|
|
|
Caleb Nitta, W |
|
|
|
|
Tommy Ricard* |
|
|
|
|
Lance Williams |
The move of two defensive linemen to the offensive side of the ball (even if one of those moves was inevitable in the case of Gunner Givens - if anything he lost two years of development by insisting on defense) showed some of the writing on the wall for guys who were likely on the shady side of the three-deep, like Arena.
Departing the program with no hard feelings and opening scholarship slots for the future of the program is an example of "good attrition," even though it would've been nice to see a long enough Hokie career to actually get a chance to develop.
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