Virginia Tech men's basketball glaring weakness is becoming impossible to ignore

Coming off a loss at Louisville on Saturday afternoon, the Virginia Tech men's basketball team was facing a rather big, but tricky ACC game at home on Tuesday night against Georgia Tech. The Yellow Jackets entered the game at 2-5 in the ACC. At 11-9 overall, this was not a game the Hokies could afford to overlook with Duke visiting Cassell on Saturday afternoon.

Leading Georgia Tech, 65-50, with just over four minutes left in the game, the Hokies cruised to an easy win, right? Not in 2025-26.

Virginia Tech allowed an 11-0 Yellow Jackets run, and they closed within 67-65 with 13 seconds left, but two Ben Hammond free throws and two more Jailen Bedford sealed a six-point win in a game where they couldn't afford to blow another big lead. This is something that can't be ignored, and if they miss the 68-team NCAA Tournament field in March, they won't have to look far as to why.

Virginia Tech nearly blows another late-game lead

Sure, Virginia Tech improved to 16-6 overall and 5-4 in the ACC, but the late-game meltdowns are extremely concerning. Not going to lie. It burned them against Stanford and SMU, and let's not forget the brutal loss at Wake Forest. Yikes. The problem has been in a number of areas. Missed free throws, the inability to get the ball inbounds cleanly, terrible shot selection, or not running any type of offense late in games except for throwing up a 3-pointer is a bad recipe for failure. The Hokies are lucky there wasn't much more time left on the clock, or they might have blown this game.

Ben Hammond led Virginia Tech with 20 points, which included a perfect 5-for-5 from the free throw line and three 3-pointers. Bedford, a UNLV transfer, had 14 points, and freshman Christian Gurdak had 11 points and seven rebounds off the bench. Tobi Lawal had 10 points and five rebounds before fouling out late in the game.

The Hokies have three days off before hosting Duke before a bye, which is needed at this point. As far as the NCAA Tournament goes, this was a game that Virginia Tech couldn't lose with a daunting schedule coming up after their bye.