‘I want to be like ...’ A Shane Beamer quote that resonates 30 years later
Shane Beamer’s whole life was in front of him. He was 18 years old, standing inside an empty 8,000-seat football stadium the night before the 1995 Virginia High School Coaches’ Association All-Star football game.
It was the eve to the end of his childhood life. The next night would be his last wearing a Blacksburg High helmet — the last time suiting up as a wide receiver and the last time playing for a football team not coached by his father.
Football practice at Virginia Tech was starting in 25 days. Just over three weeks before “dad” and “coach” blended together.
Frank Beamer was heading into his ninth season as the head coach of Virginia Tech, just beginning to show proof of concept. After winning 24 games in his first six seasons combined, he navigated his way out of the hot seat. Frank led the Hokies to back-to-back bowl berths, including a victory in the 1993 Independence Bowl, kickstarting his run of 23 straight bowl appearances.
Shane Beamer, of course, had seen this course correction in real time, always there holding Frank’s headset cord as he paced the sidelines of Lane Stadium. But any special treatment was ending. Shane knew that. He was going to Virginia Tech to learn from his father, to jumpstart his career in coaching. But he was also going to Virginia Tech to play — whatever that looked like.
Actually, he knew what it looked like. And he knew exactly who to emulate.
“I want to be like William Ferrell,” Beamer told the Roanoke Times in July 1995.
The Beamer-Ferrell connection
Ferrell cannot believe this is happening. That for the second time in a week, he’s talking about a quote from 30 years ago that he didn’t even say.
Not but two days ago was he chatting with a co-worker, only to learn his son just took a college visit to South Carolina. That little mention opened the door for the greatest brag ever.
“And I said to him, ‘You know, a funny little anecdote is they did a story on Shane years ago and he said he wanted to be like me,’ ” Ferrell told The State. “And we laughed.”
That quote has remained in Ferrell’s mind, if only because the 18-year-old who said it went on to be the head coach of an SEC team. Regardless, there’s never been a doubt as to why Beamer singled him out.
Ferrell was a quarterback at Blacksburg High who might have been able to go sling passes for some FCS or Division II school, but he gave that about two seconds of thought. No, he was going to Virginia Tech. Had to.
His father, Eddie, had been the head athletic trainer for Virginia Tech football since 1970, which meant Ferrell’s entire childhood revolved around the Hokies. As a kid, he was around the program every day. The coaches and support staffers became family. Even the guys who drove the equipment trucks to away games would save room for Ferrell and his brother in the cab of the 18-wheeler and take them across the ACC.
“I went to all these places as a kid,” Ferrell said. “When I was coming out of high school, it was intoxicating.”
So he walked on at Virginia Tech, still around his dad and all the players and coaches he’d known for years. He gave up his dream of being a quarterback, switched to wide receiver and made his name on special teams.
He became infatuated with the idea of Beamer Ball — that the Virginia Tech special teams unit was some group of operatives who could concoct a million ways to block a kick. He treated blocking as if his pride and dignity were on the line. He became a pest.
“There’s probably still Miami Hurricanes DBs,” Ferrell said, “that you could go, ‘Who’s the biggest pain in the ass? Like, when the game’s over, they’re still cut blocking you?’ … And they’d be like, ‘The white dude for Virginia Tech.’ ”
Thirty years later, Beamer was standing in a Florida hotel at an annual SEC event, taking guesses at who his 18-year-old self wanted to be. He throws out two names before hearing the right answer, the one he gave back in 1995.
“I said I wanted to be like William Ferrell?” Beamer said, before pausing two seconds to think through it. “I can see why.”
Why Beamer wanted to be like William Ferrell
Within seconds of hearing Ferrell’s name, Beamer’s mind somehow flashed back to a 60-degree, cloudy Saturday afternoon Lane Stadium in November 1993. It was the penultimate game of the regular season, and Virginia Tech needed a win over Syracuse to become bowl eligible for the first time under Frank Beamer.
The Hokies won 45-24 and “William Ferrell blocked a punt in that game,” said Beamer, three and a half decades years later. “That kind of got Virginia Tech in the Independence Bowl and the rest is history.” Virginia Tech’s streak of 27 straight bowl appearances began that day.
That was fresh in Shane Beamer’s mind as he stood on a high school football field in 1995, weeks away from walking on to a Virginia Tech team coached by his father.
It was all going to work out. Heck, William did it.
Beamer, like Ferrell, left Blacksburg High and chose to play Division I football down the street rather than try and be a starter somewhere else. He walked into a building where his dad was a legend with no entitlements. He worked his tail off for years, blocking meaningless plays like he was in a bar fight. Treating special teams as if the entire season came down to whether or not he blocked a kick. And then he got playing time. He became a special-teams force for the Hokies, making an impact for the school he grew up around.
Heck, Beamer wore the No. 25 at Virginia Tech because Frank repped the same number when he was a Hokie. It’s unclear if Shane Beamer knew Ferrell also wore No. 25.
Ferrell forged the path. Beamer followed.
Inside the Florida hotel, Beamer was in a nostalgia trip at the mention of William Ferrell. He shook his head, reciting everything he remembered about the Ferrell family. How Ferrell’s brother, Daniel, had also played quarterback at Blacksburg High, later serving as a graduate assistant at Virginia Tech while Beamer was a player.
How he was the same age — and in many of the same classes — as Ferrell’s sister, Rachael. How Ferrell’s mom, Ann, was his fifth grade teacher at Gilbert Linkous Elementary School.
How patriarch Eddie Ferrell worked for Virginia Tech long before Frank Beamer arrived in Blacksburg. And how Shane Beamer and everyone else at Virginia Tech, gearing up for the 1998 season, learned that Eddie had died by suicide.
How Frank Beamer helped the Ferrells
Daniel Ferrell was on the football field, doing whatever graduate assistants did in 1998, when word began to spread that Eddie was missing. It was a Saturday — exactly one week before the Hokies were set to kick off their season against East Carolina.
“It was just freaking everyone out,” William Ferrell said. “My brother’s still having to go through practice. He’s worried. They’ve got the Virginia Tech police and half the town running around looking for him. It was an awful deal.”
Eddie Ferrell was found dead on Aug. 29, 1998. He was 55 years old.
“There’s so many different emotions that go through you,” William said. “One of which was, in full transparency, like: ‘Damn, Dad. You had to cast this pall over the team right here?’ ”
Daniel quit coaching after that season. He became a special education teacher in Blacksburg, a title he holds to this day. William Ferrell, meanwhile, grieved his father’s death by running. He moved to Texas in 1999 and has returned to his hometown just three times since.
“And it’s embarrassing,” William said. “It’s just — it’s just kind of depressing. Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. It’s that simple.”
Eddie battled depression throughout his kids’ childhood. It was not a secret. William remembers stretches where his father wouldn’t go to a work for weeks at a time. Those were Eddie’s dips, and they were rare. In 30 years, Ferrell remembers only a handful of mental health low points his father endured, the worst of which led to an inpatient hospital stay.
One of the times he left the Hokies’ team was during the 1997 season. Virginia Tech’s team physician told the Roanoke Times that Eddie’s absence was for “exhaustion and depression” — a reminder that mental health was talked about in very different terms almost three decades ago.
There was this idea back then, William said, that all Eddie needed was a break. Needed comfort and security. In those days, any tenured Virginia Tech athletics employee spoke of their desire for a “third floor” gig.
The third floor of the athletics building housed all the “assistant-to-the-assistant-to-the-assistant-athletic-director” jobs. The cushy titles that paid great and seemed to involve little work. And Virginia Tech gave one of those to its football trainer.
“They hooked him up,” William said. “There’s no question (Frank Beamer) had a big hand.”
Eddie was promoted to a third-floor gig on Aug. 4, 1998. His title was “Director of Student Life.” He took his own life less than a month later.
“When Eddie took his life, it hurt us all,” said Mike Gentry, Virginia Tech’s longtime strength and conditioning coach. “It hurt us all pretty bad.”
“Eddie was just the best,” Frank Beamer told The State. “He’d come be in our staff meetings and he’d take jabs at people. He could say it and everyone would laugh. If anyone else said it, they’d get punched in the nose. … We thought a lot of (the Ferrells).”
When Eddie’s death became known, one of the first to arrive at the Ferrells’ house was Frank Beamer. He was there for the family, for Ann. William Ferrell will never forget that. When Eddie’s depression was spiraling, Frank was there. When he needed a new title, Frank was there. When Eddie died, Frank was there.
He thinks about this and then thinks about what his father said when Frank Beamer was first hired at Virginia Tech. Ferrell was young and pissed all his friends from former coach Bill Dooley’s staff were leaving. He asked his dad what the new coach was like.
“I wonder if he’s too good of a man to succeed as a head coach,” Eddie told his son.
William Ferrell never forgot those words. He thought of them when Virginia Tech began rising to prominence. And he thinks of them on Saturdays in the fall, when he looks on the TV and sees Frank Beamer’s son roaming the sidelines, succeeding as a head coach.
How to watch South Carolina vs. Virginia Tech
When: 3 p.m. Sunday
Where: Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia
TV/Stream: ESPN and the ESPN app
Local radio: 107.5 FM in the Columbia area
Line: USC by 7.5
This story was originally published August 28, 2025 at 7:00 AM.
