Virginia Tech dropped another road game on Tuesday night at Syracuse, losing 84-71.
The Hokies (15-13, 7-10) have lost six of their last eight games and are 1-9 away from Cassell Coliseum. Against the Orange (19-10, 10-8), they struggled in the first half and let the game get away from them.
‘Cuse shot 61 percent (19-of-31) in the first 20 minutes while limiting Tech to a 39 percent clip (11-of-28). Its defense led to offense as it got out in transition and scored 11 fastbreak points.
It all went downhill for Tech in the final 11 minutes of the half. At that point, it was 13-all. The Orange outscored the Hokies 32-14 over the stretch that followed and pushed the margin to 45-27 at the break.
To Tech’s credit, it fought back in the second half and outscored Syracuse by five, 44-39, while shooting 57 percent (20-of-35). But ‘Cuse was 52 percent (15-of-29) and kept Tech at bay; the closest the Hokies drew was seven with 7:27 remaining. They cut the lead to single digits and were trailing by just eight with 3:42 left but couldn’t complete the comeback.
Judah Mintz led Syracuse with 29 points on 10-of-17 shooting. He was a perfect 8-of-8 from the free throw line while adding six assists, three rebounds and three steals. Whenever the Orange needed a basket, he came up clutch.
Mintz was surrounded by three double-figure scorers in J.J. Starling (13 points), Maliq Brown (12) and Quadir Copeland (12). That trio combined for 16 rebounds and 11 assists, too, with just four turnovers.
Sean Pedulla paced Virginia Tech with 18 points on 7-of-13 shooting while adding four assists, four boards and two steals. Lynn Kidd added 16 points, made eight of his nine attempts and grabbed eight rebounds.
Hunter Cattoor scored 12 and had four assists while Mylyjael Poteat chipped in 11 — he was 5-of-6 — and six.
For the game, the Orange was 57 percent (34-of-60) from the field and 12-of-12 from the foul line. The Hokies were 31-of-63 (49%) and only attempted three free throws.
The Hokies missed 14 of their 20 3-point attempts as well. The only player to shoot 50 percent or better was Pedulla (2-of-4). Cattoor, MJ Collins and Tyler Nickel were a combined 4-of-15.
‘Cuse also outrebounded Tech by four, 31-27.
Virginia Tech has only won on the road once this season: at NC State on Jan. 20. It has three ACC regular-season games remaining: vs. Wake Forest on Saturday, at Louisville (March 5) and vs. Notre Dame (March 9).
Box Score: Syracuse 84, Virginia Tech 71
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I know I’m in the minority, but, I do think VTs players are talented enough to have at least 5 more wins on their resume. It’s getting that talent working together like a fine tuned machine both mentally and physically. That isn’t happening. And many times fundamentals go by the wayside. This is mental toughness…cliche but true. You have to hate to lose soooo much that you put every bit of energy into playing the game the right way…with intense fundamentals to start.
Another pathetic performance. This bb team lacks in so many areas starting with coaching. Recruiting is the issue with Tech bb. Coaching is also an issue. Not excited about this team now and moving forward until major changes are made by the AD. Living and dying by the 3 point shot is a failure. Enough is enough for me. Hate saying this but I honestly believe major changes are needed but I’m sure it won’t happen unless Coach decides to go ahead and retire.
living by the 3 isn’t the issue, its the trend across all levels of basketball….the issue is, we don’t have a good shooting team and have limited floor spacing…Kidd, Collins, Poteat and at times Beran, all of them can’t space the floor and shoot consistently from 3 which crushes the offense and minimizes the spacing which further impacts Pedulla/Hunter/Nickel….and to your point, its a talent issue and a big one at that…its year 5 in the MY era
Kind of feel the same. It’s year 5, and it isn’t improving. No excitement except for 1 recruit coming in
This teams infamy is crappy D. Lots of it on the road.
Turnovers are equally contributing to the badness.
What a challenging situation.
A limited team with a number of seniors leaving. You almost have to give Mike Young a couple years to see what he can rebuild before making a change.
couple years huh? its year 5, why are we rebuilding in year 5???
In the age of NIL and the Transfer Portal, every year becomes a rebuilding year and college coaches need to re-recruit existing players. A true nightmare.
Why? He has 5 years & 4-5 transfers starting for other Div 1 programs!!
Is “anybody” excited about the future of Men’s BB? After 5 years it’s time for a change or learn to be content being a 0.500 program. The contrast to the women’s program is stark!!
Cuse have quicker feet, quick first step blew by our guys every time. So I say to myself: why not go zone and make them shoot jump shots? Oh wait, CMY deplores using a zone for some reason (why?). Well, then he better recruit guys with quicker feet. Meantime his boys gonna get beat, simple as that.
Yeah, I’m tending to think more and more that CMY is a bit too wedded to his “system”. Whenever I hear the announcers talk about how you beat VT, that always say “When you play a team like VT that runs a specific system you need to break up that system to win”. And everyone is doing it.
Stubborn streak is killing VT Men’s BB.
“made only three free throws, and Syracuse took and made a dozen.”
Don’t confuse the discussion with the facts! 🙂
Most folks aren’t watching many other games to put the VT (Men’s and Women’s) games in the perspective of what’s happening in today’s arenas around the country.. .
A) the ACC is hyper-competitive; B) Road wins are hard to come by. We’re 6-2 in the Cassell. We should not have lost @ home to Miami (6-12) nor @ ND (6-11).
I thought the old saw was Defense Travels.
Didn’t see any of the energy and connectedness last night that they had against UVa.
Even at 13-13, didn’t seem like a team that was going to play harder than the other guys.
Sadly we couldnt buy a basket last night. Kudos to Pedulla and Kidd for bringing us close in2nd half.
Kudos to Courtland for good sportsmanship in helping up his opponent when both fell. Classy move.
Adrian Autry is a classy guy.
I am not sure this is what Whitt had in mind when he hired Coach Young.
He 100% did. Don’t get the shock and awe here. Career 500 coach. He is a great guy though who is a wonderful ambassador for the program and great person. He is not a strong recruiter however and his winning % is what it is.
Am i the only Hokie that hates that flight to Syracuse fancy pants regional airport? UGH.
Syracuse has nothing on that Concord New Hampshire airport and thats saying something. At least we got that keep your heads up Hokies Albany not too far away ask Kitley and Amoore.
Two free throws! Are you kidding me? Bad basketball and bad coaching!
Apologies, it was three.
Looks like we are on our way back to JJ (James Johnson) territory.
Really sad, pathetic, adolescent post.
Agreed.
I’m assuming you were in of ur dead periods when JJ was coaching VT basketball. Just saying.
Another rough game on the road. We lost by 13 in the end, and that difference is almost totally explained by the fact that we took and made only three free throws, and Syracuse took and made a dozen. It will be a relief to get back to Cassell Coliseum, and try to knock off Wake Forest.
That’s what happens when you aren’t aggressive and rely on mostly jumpers. The more aggressive team is typically the one that will get to the line more.
We took a lot of shots in or near the paint.