Virginia Tech put up a valiant effort at #22 Pitt, but fell 62-57 in double overtime on Saturday afternoon. Both teams combined to go 1-of-19 from the field in the overtime sessions, but ultimately the Panthers made the one field goal and finished off the Hokies from the free throw line.
Tech dropped their 10th straight game and have now lost 12 of their last 13. They sit at 8-15 overall and 1-10 in league play. The Panthers are now 20-4, with an 8-3 record in the ACC.
Tech had a chance to win this game in regulation. 33.3% free throw shooter Joey van Zegeren made two free throws late in the game to put his team up 48-44, but Jarell Eddie made a critical mistake on the other end of the court: he fouled a three-point shooter with the Hokies up by four. James Robinson converted the four-point play with 33 seconds left, and the game went to overtime.
The Hokies couldn’t make a field goal in the overtime periods, going 0-for-13. Pitt wasn’t much better at 1-for-6, but Lamar Patterson did make a shot to put his team up 54-52. That was the eventual game-winner. Patterson leads Pitt in scoring and is an ACC Player of the Year contender, but that was his only field goal of the day against the Hokies.
Jarell Eddie paced Tech with 15 points. He was 5-of-15 from the field and 5-of-12 from three-point range. Joey van Zegeren and Devin Wilson each added 10 points. Freshman forward Trevor Thompson had eight points and six rebounds. Cadarian Raines came off the bench to score eight points and grab 11 rebounds. Nine of his boards came on the offensive end.
The Hokies stayed in this game because of their prowess on the offensive glass. They outrebounded a physical Pitt team 43-28 and had a 17-6 advantage on the offensive end. However, they turned the ball over 20 times and were -9 in turnover margin, and that number doomed them to defeat.
Tech returns to action next Saturday at 6pm when they host the Miami Hurricanes. The game will be televised by RSN. Check your local listings.
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Curse me for becoming optimistic. I actually watched most of this game. Tuned it in on ESPN3, seeing that the Hokies were actually in it. I have to admit I spent the next hour thinking to myself “OK, here comes the big Pitt run and we’ll lose by 20″…but we stayed in it and even had the lead for much of the 2nd half.
Then, up by 2 with 40 or so seconds left, I got downright optimistic. JVZ actually BANKED IN the first free throw of a 1 and 1. Then all netted the 2nd. Up by 4 with 40 ish seconds left? Halleluiah!
Then, in typical Hokie Hoops fashion, we found yet another new and interesting way to lose a game. Curse me for being an optimist, even for a moment.
Best defensive effort in a number of games & rebounding really surprised me. Keep working. Could be a surprise by tournament time if everybody is healthy & give effort of today’s game. GO HOKIES!
Well I’ll say it. Coaching is key. With 20 or 30 seconds to go we should have a play or plays drawn up to get a shot off, We should be shooting the ball with about 5 or 6 seconds left. We don’t even get a shot off, you don’t shoot then there is no chance to win, this happens quite frequently to us.
Great effort by these kids, my heart goes out to them. Once again, at critical times, we appeared to have no set play…just let a player dribble into trouble and turn it over. Or worse let the shot clock run out. This team has been playing short handed but they also should be winning a few.
We do have set plays drawn up by JJ. I sit behind the bench at home games and can see what JJ has written on his marker board. However, we just don’t have talented enough players to execute those plays to get our man open. We rarely, if ever, set a good enough screen that the ball handler has an open shot on the back side and rarely, if ever, does the pick man do a pick-and-roll to get open in case the defender beats the screen. The best drawn plays will always fail when your players don’t know how to execute them. And to us fans it just looks like JJ is saying “Pass the ball around until PItt gives you an open shot…and if the shot clock gets low, just throw the ball at the general basket area.”
Critical mistakes by Eddie at the end of regulation (foul on 3 point shot and turnover with 2.7 seconds left) doomed the Hokies. I like Eddie, but a senior can’t make those kinds of mistakes down the stretch.
Coach? Where are you? Is that really a mistake a senior should be doing, especially this late in the year?
If our coach, any of them, needs to remind a senior to not foul a three point shooter or a shooter period we have a problem. JE made several critical mistakes down the stretch. It’s time for some of the blame go on the players.
So because a senior makes a dumb play, it’s somehow the coach’s fault?
Please.
I think it’s a pretty safe bet that Eddie knows it’s not smart to foul a guy taking a 3-point shot when you’re ahead by 4 with 30 seconds to play. He simply made a bad decision in the heat of the moment.
VT put in a strong effort today on the road against a ranked team and damn near pulled out a win despite being without two of our top players (Barksdale and Smith) and having a couple of others at less than 100%. The defensive effort today with the 2-3 zone was excellent. Today definitely represents improvement after the last four blowout losses.
Yet some here and elsewhere apparently just can’t resist the chance to bash Coach Johnson.
The bottom line is that VT simply needs better players with more complete basketball skill sets. They’re on the way.
In the AAC maybe, in the ACC don’t kid yourself. $$$ gets the right coaching staff, which recruits better players, which equals more success on court.
Stud I am with you 100%.
I liked the way JJ coached today, he was very active on the sidelines and had a good game plan. The team gave great effort but were beat by a better team. I hope the team continues to play this hard, definitely a step forward.
+1
This is a mistake that professionals make.