NEW YORK – On the second Saturday night time in a row, Duke didn’t make coach Okay.’s win.
This time Virginia Tech was taking part in a spoiler on the celebration.
Hunter Cator scored a profession excessive of 31 factors and the seventh seed received the Atlantic Coast Convention Championship for the primary time, defeating Duke 82-67 to disclaim Mike Krzyzewski a league title in his last season.
Virginia Tech (23-12) got here to Brooklyn in want of a run for the NCAA Championship, then stared at elimination on Wednesday when Darius Maddox hit a three-pointer on the bell to beat Clemson in time beyond regulation.
Virginia Tech coach Mike Younger mentioned hockey gamers had been “luckier than hell” after that recreation.
After hitting the Duke how did you’re feeling?
“It is gratifying,” Younger mentioned.
The Hokies turned the second ACC group to say the crown with 4 wins in 4 days and the lowest-ranked group to win probably the most prestigious convention event in school basketball.
He’s additionally the fourth ACC Staff Champion to win the title by beating the highest three.
The Hokies will obtain an automated bid for the NCAA Championship for the primary time in 43 years, tied for the fourth time amongst automated bidders in Division I historical past, in keeping with analysis from ESPN Stats & Info. The Virginia Tech Convention’s final—and solely—championship got here in 1979, when hockey was on the Metro Convention.
Duke misplaced the Coach Okay last at Cameron Indoor to rival North Carolina every week in the past, derailing the victory celebration within the Males’s Division I Basketball Match.
The first and seventh seed Blue Devils (28-6) had one other probability to attain nicely and add at the least another trophy to the retired Corridor of Famer’s case. Once more it was to not be.
“I inform them on a regular basis, ‘Don’t be concerned about me,'” Krzyzewski mentioned. “Even within the second of defeat I wish to be with them. How will we use it? How will we get higher?
He added, “Final weekend the entire phrase was speaking [my retirement]. So it was a really powerful weekend. What we tried to do was remove every little thing. These are younger individuals. I cherished coaching them. I believe we could be good at [NCAA] Competitors. I used to be optimistic with them after that.”
When Justin Motts landed his hand on Duke’s new star Paulo Banchero with 2:26 left within the second half, Virginia Tech superior 76-64 and outnumbered hockey followers rose with a roar.
“The subsequent useless ball we went to the pool and it was like, ‘We are able to style it,'” Storm Murphy mentioned. We are able to style it now.”
Virginia Tech’s first ACC Championship since becoming a member of the convention in 2004 has concluded.
Quickly, Metallica’s “Enter Sandman,” the Hawkeyes’ unofficial battle tune, blasted all through the Barclays Heart, and Virginia Tech followers sang as if it was the fourth quarter at Lane Stadium in Blacksburg, Virginia. The 15-point win was hockey’s greatest victory over Duke in a sequence first contested in 1912, in keeping with ESPN Stats & Info analysis.
Banchero scored 20 factors for Duke, who shot 4 for 20 out of a 3-point vary and allowed Hockey to make 50% of their pictures.
Younger led his groups to 5 Southern Convention championship titles in 17 seasons at Wofford. It solely took him three seasons to get his first recreation with Virginia Tech and he did so with a roster full of men he recruited to play at his old skool.
Murphy and Keve Aluma (19 factors, 10 rebounds, 7 assists) are each transfers from Wofford and Cattoor who had been as a result of go to highschool earlier than Younger took a job at Virginia Tech.
In the meantime, Krzyzewski was denied his sixteenth ACC title in his forty second season.
Barclays Heart is much from Cameron, actually and figuratively, however Duke followers did their greatest to make it seem like a recreation on the Blue Devils.
Nonetheless, nothing was straightforward for Duke this week in Brooklyn.
Duke had no first-half lead in any of the video games on the Barclays Heart.
On Saturday night time, down 3 times in half, Duke began the second half with a sloppy lap on assault after which ditched a driving nook.
Krzyzewski referred to as a 35-second timeout from the beginning of the primary half and surrendered to his group, getting off his chair to point out the motion he wished to see from his gamers.
Reprimanding didn’t have the specified consequence. Cattoor waved his sixth after which stole on the opposite finish and was an previous three-point play with a driving move.
That hockey put 55-45 lower than 5 minutes into the inning.
The Duke didn’t bend, however each time the Blue Devils utilized strain, hockey responded.
“I knew it was going to be a lovely factor once they obtained collectively,” Younger mentioned of the Hokies, who went 13-2 down the ACC motion stretch to make their manner out of the bubble. “I did not suppose it might culminate on this, however we can’t convey it again.”
The Related Press contributed to this report.
