There was no more thrilling finish to a Virginia Tech football game last fall than the West Virginia opener at FedEx Field, a 31-24 white-knuckler in which the Hokies’ defense stood tall in the final seconds as the Mountaineers took several shots at the end zone.

All I was thinking throughout that final drive was: Don’t go into overtime. I’ve got a deadline to hit.

Well, that and how the heck am I going to distill this fantastic, frantic finish into a story, one I would have to send within minutes of the game ending, for the next day’s paper?

It dawned on me how much of the game I’d truly missed, whether it was trying to pound out halftime notes that would be irrelevant by the time they hit your doorstep the next morning or even on the final drive, when I’d glance up from my computer after furiously hacking away at my story only to see the tail end of a play.

I had a thought that I think most journalists have had in that situation: What are we doing? Is this really going to produce a good story? Is there any depth or analysis here? Are we servicing our readers by giving them a running, quote-less recap of a game they most likely watched in its entirety on TV?

The answer is no.

And it wasn’t an isolated incident. That’s not to say every story is like that, but it creeps into your work. Sometimes deadlines are so preposterous that you wonder why you’re even at an event in the first place. Quality, oftentimes, is secondary. Depth is frequently sacrificed for speed. It’s the nature of the beast.

It’s why I was so intrigued when The Athletic contacted me about joining its team last month. Today, I’m proud to say I will be bringing my Virginia Tech coverage to a company steeped in old-school journalism traditions and storytelling but with a 21st-century delivery system, one unbound from the pesky limitations and demands of a print product.

If you already subscribe, you know what The Athletic brings to the table. If you don’t, here’s what you get: honest reporting, in-depth features, focused analysis, in-the-know commentary, reader-friendly mailbags and stories that might take a little more time to develop, all on a website that’s clean and easy to navigate.

It’s what you’ve grown accustomed to from my work on the Virginia Tech beat at The Roanoke Times and The Virginian-Pilot, and I’ll continue to do it for The Athletic, liberated from some of the smaller, annoying things that bog down the process of bringing you the coverage you deserve.

Here at The Athletic, the goal is clear: Write great stories about Virginia Tech that will challenge and intrigue readers who appreciate that kind of stuff. Hokie Nation is a smart, engaged fan base that craves that and can sniff out material that doesn’t meet that standard.

That means no clickbait. No hot takes. No pop-up ads. No video. (And no video playing on top of another video that you didn’t even click on in the first place. Gosh, that’s infuriating.)

When I first joined the Virginia Tech media corps in 2011, I made a major request of the fan base: Give me a chance. I know I had big shoes to fill on the beat replacing Kyle Tucker, who was a bulldog reporter and had an online prowess way ahead of the curve for traditional media outlets, and Randy King, whose folksy charm and prose paired perfectly with Hokies coverage. (Sadly, I’ve never worked “tips the Toledos” into a story about a player’s weight.)

Over the past seven years, you accepted me, and the results have been great. I’ve grown into the beat and you’ve followed along in impressive numbers, either by clicking on my stories or following me on the Twitter account I alone have owned and operated.

Now, I’m asking for you to give The Athletic a chance. New subscribers can sign up today, getting my Virginia Tech coverage and everything else The Athletic offers for 40 percent off the normal subscription price. That comes to only $2.99 a month, or one-third the cost of a Rail at TOTS.

I’ve truly enjoyed my seven years covering Virginia Tech, getting a true sense of Hokies fans’ passion for football after Danny Coale was robbed of a winning catch in the 2012 Sugar Bowl against Michigan. I’ve chronicled the school sending off a legend in Frank Beamer, entering a new era under Justin Fuente and confronting the challenges of trying to compete with the kings of the sport despite a relatively modest budget.

I look forward to continuing to do that and hope you’ll come along for the ride.

(Photo by Michael Shroyer / Getty Images)