VT's victory over Iowa was a solid win over an Iowa squad that went 25-9 last year and won the Big Ten Conference tournament. This year's Iowa team doesn't boast a lot of talent and won't likely repeat that feat, but nonetheless, a victory over a team from a BCS conference is much more enjoyable than pummeling a directional school (no Western Michigan comments here!) or a small school with "state" in its name.

Six games into the season, the Hokies are 4-2, and at this point, they're looking more like an NIT team than an NCAA team. The Iowa game is in many ways a microcosm of the strengths that will carry VT through the season and the weaknesses that will hold them back.

If you've had your head in football for a while and need a quick start to basketball, here's your guide for the rest of the season.

Plus: The Hokies have depth. For the first time in Seth Greenberg's tenure, Tech has 10-12 guys that Greenberg can put on the floor that all look like they belong there. Last night, Robert Krabbendam was coming off a bout with food poisoning and was only available for spot minutes. Chris Tucker pulled a hamstring in practice -- a "bad pull", Greenberg called it -- and was not available. In the past, losing two post players would gut the inside depth, but in this case, Greenberg had three guys he could go to: Coleman Collins, Cheick Diakite, and freshman Lewis Witcher. The trio combined for 23 points and six rebounds. Not a lights-out night, but in a more telling stat, not one of the three players logged more than 30 minutes.

Eight players played 13 minutes or more, and only two, Zabian Dowdell (36 minutes) and Jamon Gordon (34 minutes) played more than Witcher's 30. If this keeps up, the Hokies won't get worn down as the season progresses, like they have in the past.

Minus: The Hokies can't shoot free throws. 17-of-33 in this game, including 11-of-20 in the last 4+ minutes. So far on the year, Tech is shooting 58.4%% from the free-throw line. Last season, the Hokies finished next to last in the ACC in free throw percentage at 64.5%, and they're on track to do so again, a lack of production that will cost them some games.

The Hokies spent $5,000 on a device called "Noah Select" that was supposed to help with their free throw shooting prowess by providing feedback on the arc of a player's shot, helping to build consistency. So far, no dice. Only three Hokies are shooting over 60% from the line -- that is not a typo -- so the key is to get the right players on the line down the stretch. More on that later.

A hidden free throw shooting gem might be freshman point guard Nigel Munson, who shot about 90% from the line in high school, but Munson has yet to take a free throw this season. Like I said, more on that later.

Plus: Zabian Dowdell is back on the mark. Dowdell didn't shoot great overall last night, hitting 6-of-14 shots, but he did nail 2-of-3 three-pointers and is now 44.4 percent (12-of-27) from behind the arc so far this season. Dowdell shot 42.3% on three-pointers as a sophomore, then saw that percentage plummet to 35.8% last year, so his return to accuracy is a good sign. He currently leads the team in scoring with 16.8 ppg, up from 15.3 last year.

As a team, the three-point shooting stats so far are an improvement, but admittedly, league play hasn't started. Tech's three-point field goals per game have risen from 4.6 last year to 6.3 so far this season, and their percentage is up, too, from 32.2% to 38.0%.

Minus: Tech still can't rebound. The Hokies pummeled Coppin State and West Florida to the tune of a +27 margin in rebounding, but in the last four games, which the Hokies have split, they have run a (-16) deficit and have been outrebounded in three of the four contests. The fourth game was a rebounding tie with Southern Illinois, so Tech hasn't outrebounded another team in four games. Iowa outrebounded Tech 37-31.

Cheick Diakite leads the Hokies in rebounding with 5.2 a game, not an impressive figure for your leading rebounder. (Given that he only averages 17.0 minutes a game, it is impressive on a per-minute basis, but not per game.) Rebounding has been by committee, with the totals from the big men varying wildly. Diakite had 10 rebounds against Coppin State and nine against Southern Illinois, but only one in 19 minutes against Iowa. Coleman Collins had 10 against Coppin State, but only one in the second half against Western Michigan and one against Iowa in 18 minutes.

Plus: Jamon is Jamon, and even better than before. Jamon Gordon once again leads the team in assists and steals, and among the starters, he has added another superlative to his credit: best shooting percentage. Gordon is shooting 55.4%, having made 31 of 56 shots, and here's the kicker: against Iowa, he only shot 4-of-13. Going into last night, he was a torrid 27-of-43, or 62.8%.

Gordon is the glue that holds this team together, both defensively and in terms of protecting the ball. He is going to be missed next year, and that's why the loss of 2006 signee Tyrone Appleton, who didn't qualify and is at junior college, hurts. Appeleton was supposed to be the next Gordon, a tenacious defender and a player with all-around talents referred to as a "good floor game."

Minus: The Hokies don't finish well. In the 2004-2005 season, it seemed that almost everything went right for the cardiac Hokies. Then in 2005-06, close games became poison, as the team lost a whopping 12 games by six points or less.

So far this season, Tech has two losses, by three and five points. Against Western Michigan, the Hokies led 68-67 with 1:22 remaining, then didn't score again and lost 71-68. Against Southern Illinois, VT tied SIU at 64 with 50 seconds left, then coughed up five straight points to lose 69-64.

The reasons why VT drops games late are many and varied, and last night against Iowa, poor performance late in the game reared its ugly head yet again. Tech was firmly in control, up 60-46 with 3:57 remaining, but over the course of the last four minutes, Iowa outscored the Hokies 19-9 to make the Hokies breathe hard at the end of a 69-65 win.

Tech's first mistake, and Greenberg admitted this after the game, was going into stall-ball mode with three minutes left, spreading out and dribbling the shot clock down. That takes time off the clock, but it also takes your team out of the game mentally, and that affects you on the defensive end. After giving up just 46 points in the first 36 minutes, VT surrendered 19 points in the last four minutes.

Tech's second mistake was poor free throw shooting. With two minutes left, Iowa started fouling the Hokies, and down the stretch, Tech made just nine of 16 free throws, including four straight misses at the end. The Hokies did a decent job of getting the ball into the hands of their two best free throw shooters, Dowdell (76.5%) and A.D. Vassallo (78.9%), but Munson was never inserted into the game, despite his high percentage from the line in high school. Vassallo, who made 15 of his first 17 free throws this season, missed two with 16 seconds left to drop him to 15-of-19 on the year.

Be it coaching, execution, or free-throw shooting, the Hokies are in a funk at the end of games that started early last year in a 72-71 loss to Bowling Green and persists to this day.

Plus: The freshmen are good. Lewis Witcher and Nigel Munson can play. Witcher got his first start last night and was third on the team in minutes with 30. He's a good athlete, a solid player offensively, a decent rebounder, and a good defender … for a freshman. Witcher has good hands and a "live body," as Greenberg put it, and he'll get better with time.

Munson is averaging 16 minutes a game, a tidy sum for a team that features Dowdell and Gordon, who have now started 177 games between the two of them. Munson is solid all around, scoring 5.0 points per game and dishing 2.1 assists per game. He also shoots 45.5% (10-of-22) from the field, a completely symmetrical 5-of-11 from both two-point range and three-point range. More impressively, Munson has 12 assists against just 5 turnovers, a 2.4 ratio that any coach would like from a senior, much less a freshman.

Against Iowa, Witcher and Munson did the one thing Greenberg prizes the most: they took care of the basketball. In 38 total minutes, the two freshmen didn't have a single turnover.

Like most freshmen, Witcher and Munson will take their lumps, and they'll hit the wall as the game count reaches 15 and 20 and the in-conference schedule grinds on in January and February. But indications are they'll be good players for the Hokies.

The Hokies are gunning for the NCAA Tournament this year, but the 4-2 start with a loss to Western Michigan isn't the out-of-the-gate momentum Tech wanted. Coleman Collins (7.8 ppg, 4.3 rpg) is subpar, Vassallo is hot and cold, and the free throw shooting and the inability to close out games are all warning signs that an NCAA invitation is going to be a tough ticket.

To make it, Tech needs to get more consistent play from Coleman Collins to go with the production of their guards. Vassallo needs to be more of a consistent outside threat. The freshmen need to continue to play well, and VT needs to continue to use their depth to keep the minutes of their best players around 30 per game (though Gordon and Dowdell will play more). The Hokies need to get better down the stretch, both in coaching and in execution.

Seth Greenberg is still enjoying a honeymoon with Tech fans, because of his likable personality, his commitment to the game, his recruiting prowess, and the big splash Tech made in the ACC in 2004-05. Greenberg has a chance to strengthen his reputation with an NCAA invitation, something Tech hasn't had since 1996. But if the Hokies continue to show the same weaknesses, and they continue to mill around the .500 mark, which has been Greenberg's career record in his last ten seasons at South Florida and VT (153 wins, 144 losses), then doubts will start to creep in about whether or not Greenberg is the long-term solution at Tech.

It's too early to make that call, of course, just like it's too early to make the call on how this season is going to go. Basketball seasons are a marathon, not a sprint, and you can't pass judgment on a season until it's over. But if you saw the Iowa game last night, either in person or on ESPNU, then you saw everything good and everything bad about Virginia Tech basketball, wrapped up in a two-hour package.