Two years ago, after being eliminated in the ACC Tournament, veteran head coach Mike Young said that he was going to accept an NIT bid after his team fell short of an NCAA Tournament appearance. After beating Richmond at home in the first round, the Hokies fell in the second round at Ohio State.
It wasn't surprising that Young accepted the bid, but it was an early exit for the Hokies. This season, Virginia Tech had high hopes when the season began and expected to be in the NCAA Tournament. After going 11-2 through their non-conference schedule, the Hokies stumbled to an 8-10 finish in the ACC and finished 12th in the conference. That forced them to play in the first round of the conference tournament on Tuesday.
Somehow, despite their struggles, they were still very much on the bubble. A win over Wake Forest may have been enough. Instead, minus Amani Hansberry, they dropped a 95-89 overtime decision to the Demon Deacons. They had a chance to win the game with a Jailen Bedford putback as time expired, but it rimmed out. Oh, so close.
On Friday, the Virginia Tech men's basketball X account posted a message that the Hokies were going to turn down an NIT bid and their season was over. It didn't sit well with fans, and one former Virginia Tech great appeared to call out the players on social media.
Former Virginia Tech legend Malcolm Delaney calls out the 2025-26 Hokies in declining an NIT bid
Delaney took to social media to apparently call out the players.
"Remember sr year after getting snubbed and our sr class going into office telling him we wanted to pass on the NIT. He didn’t force us to do anything but told us that we put on too much work as a class to walk away like that and it was a group of guys following us ready to take over the keys and it was bigger than us. As much as I didn’t want to play we found a way to. Can’t say I loved it but it was bigger than us. College basketball is more about the players not the programs now,'' Delaney wrote on X.
David Cunningham of Tech Sideline reported on Friday that the sources told Tech Sideline that the players voted on Friday to not play in the NIT.
The current state of college sports and college basketball is different now than it was back when Delaney starred in Blacksburg. When Young talked at his postgame press conference after the loss to Wake Forest on Tuesday night, it sounded like the Hokies had at least one more game left. As it turns out, the player apparently didn't want to continue the season, and it's over. It ends one of the most disappointing seasons in a while.