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For the third straight year, the debate continues. What should Virginia Tech do to try and improve their offense? Should any changes be made at all? Does Tech focus on defense too much, and should they try and be more balanced? In this week's TSLMail, we'll compare Tech's offensive and defensive ranking with eight of the nation's top programs.

When deciding which programs to include, I chose the last four National Title winners, plus four other top-notch teams. That includes Oklahoma, who is playing for the championship this year.

First of all, let's bite the bullet and look at the offensive rankings. These numbers are the average of each team's total offense ranking over the past five seasons, 2004-08.

Ouch. Not only are the Hokies in last place amongst this group, but it's not even close. Ohio State is the second worst offensive team of this group, and they still are over 25 spots ahead of Tech on average.

However, the table dispels the myth that many of the nation's top programs have a top 10 offense and a top 10 defense. Many Tech fans have the perception that if the Hokies had a top 10 offense to go along with their top 10 defense, the program would be unstoppable. As you can see, not even USC has averaged a Top 10 offense over the past five seasons.

Now, let's move on to defenses.

LSU finished third in the nation in total defense for four straight years, but in 2008 they only rank 36th. Meanwhile, Tech has been ranked in the top five in total defense for four of the five years, and so far this year rank 7th. The Hokies are the only team on this list to finish in the top 10 in total defense for five straight years. As expected, The Big 12 schools are the worst defensive teams on the list.

The next table contains information on the ranking differential between offense and defense for each school.

Virginia Tech is no different from most of these other top schools, in that the defensive rankings are higher than the offensive rankings. Only USC and Texas have, on average, a higher ranked offense than defense. And for the Trojans, it's very close.

However, you'll also notice that Virginia Tech is the least balanced school on this list. Georgia, Penn State, Ohio State and Virginia Tech have the four most unbalanced ranking differentials over the past five years. What do they have in common? They haven't won a National Championship in that span.

Meanwhile, four of the five most balanced teams on the list have won a National Championship in the last five years. If Oklahoma beats Florida on January 8, all five of the most balanced teams will have a National Championship in the past five seasons.

It might seem silly to be talking Virginia Tech and National Championship in the same article. However, it was the Tech administration who put the empty trophy case in the Merryman Center, thereby setting the expectations of the Hokie fanbase. The table above clearly illustrates that it takes balance to win a National Championship.

One of the reasons bowl travel is down and excitement over the ACC Championship is at a dull roar is because Tech fans don't see Frank Beamer taking the steps improve his offense and make his team more balanced. It was Beamer and the football program who set the expectations by installing the empty trophy case, and it's only natural that fans are upset when they don't think the Hokies are doing all they can to achieve that goal.