Duals offer something fun for fans - namely, the ability to come to Cassel and watch one match after another of the top Hokie starters, plus the added feature of a possible team win. In contrast, its tough for casual fans to get to tournaments, and catching every Hokie match at a tournament is difficult to do even for us fans with experience following tournaments.

But the reality for teams and coaches is that tournament success (at the ACC and NCAA) is what really counts as the measure of a team's success, and it carries over to better recruiting.

If the team goes 20-0 in duals (and that doesn't include a win over a top four program), no one will count the season as a great success if they perform poorly at the ACC and NCAA tournament. But if they do really well at the season-ending tournaments, no one will care much about the dual record.

So getting our guys more experience in the discipline and win-or-go-home nature of tougher tournaments just makes more sense.