Road conference wins are gold, and Virginia Tech's men's basketball team held off Markus Burton and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish 65-63 in South Bend, Indiana Saturday to win their third straight ACC game away from Cassell Coliseum.
Aesthetically speaking, the game was not a thing of beauty. Two of the nation's better three-point shooting teams started a combined 0-for-14 from beyond the arc and finished the game 9-for-48 (18.8%). They also committed 30 turnovers, 13 for Tech and 17 for Notre Dame. But the Hokies hung around all afternoon, leaning on solid defense and balanced scoring to stay within striking distance.
Both teams started the game sluggishly with their offensive flow and shooting. The Hokies took quite a bit longer to break out of it than Notre Dame. Tech began the game 2-for-15 from the field with four turnovers in the first ten minutes. The Irish pushed their lead to 14 points with 10:18 remaining in the first half and threatened to blow the game open.
An early turning point came at the 9:09 mark when officials called a technical foul on Irish guard Julian Roper II for some extracurricular activity during a loose ball scrum on the floor. Jaden Schutt made both technical free throws, followed by a Tyler Johnson short hook and a Schutt layup that capped a mini-run for the Hokies. Tech used defense, paired with a bit better shooting, to cut Notre Dame's lead to one, 27-26 after a Tyler Johnson three with 2:40 left. Tech wilted a bit in the waning minutes of the half and the Irish took a 33-26 lead into the break.
Tech's fortunes didn't look great early in the second half, as they picked up five fouls in the first three-and-a-half minutes, including guard Ben Hammond's fourth. Hammond's foul trouble and a still-not-100% foot put him on the bench in lieu of Brandon Rechsteiner for the rest of the game.
As hard as they tried, Tech couldn't really solve Burton's scoring, but he left the game for several minutes due to a cut over his eye and Tech kept hammering away at the Irish lead. Tobi Lawal's follow dunk with 3:06 left in the game gave Tech its first lead since a Lawal dunk 41 seconds into the contest. Ben Burnham followed with a big three at the two-minute mark to push the lead to four.
From there, Rechsteiner, who struggled from the field all day, made seven of eight free throws to seal the game and give Tech a big win. Lawal led Tech with 15 points and 10 rebounds. Rechsteiner had 12 and Burnham had 10 for Tech. Burton paced the Irish with 23.
With the victory, the Hokies moved to 6-7 in the ACC, good for eighth in the league as of this writing. Notre Dame dropped to 4-8 in the league. Tech has a much-needed mid-week break before hosting Virginia next Saturday at 2 pm ET.