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Inside the box score: No. 14 FSU beats No. 15 Virginia Tech in physical game

The seniors leave the Tuck on a great note.

By Michael Rogner
NCAA Basketball: Virginia Tech at Florida State Glenn Beil-USA TODAY Sports
  1. FSU won the 3-point lottery. Virginia Tech made five of its first eight 3-point attempts to take an early double-digit lead in the first half. For the rest of the game, the Hokies made just 3-19 (16%). If you watch the film, you’ll notice nearly all of those 19 attempts were either uncontested or lightly contested. That’s not a knock on FSU—that’s just how 3-pointers work. Great 3-point defense is not allowing an attempt. The most-contested of those 19 was the one from Ahmed Hill with 14 seconds left in regulation, where he had David Nichols in his grill but knocked it down anyway to sent the game to overtime. On the other side of the court, FSU had its own 5-8 3-point run to start the 2nd half. These were largely the same shots FSU was missing in the first half, which the announcers kept calling bad shots. To be fair, Florida State took some bad shots in each half. Most were late in the clock, which kind of has something to do with the defense—FSU isn’t the only team in the world that forces bad shots. However, the majority were players stepping into an open three early in a half-court set, which can rarely be considered a bad shot, especially against a team 2nd in the conference at forcing turnovers.
  2. The win pushed FSU’s record to 12-5 in ACC play. It’s the fourth time in program history the Seminoles have won 12 conference games. Pat Kennedy and Leonard Hamilton did it versus a 16-game schedule, and Ham has now down it twice with an 18-game schedule. If the ’Noles beat Wake Saturday, they’ll win 13 for the first time ever (although at a lower winning % than the 12-4 squads). This is the final season for that 18-game schedule, as next year the ACC implements another of their favorite really bad ideas: a 20-game conference schedule.
  3. It’s hard to gauge how important Terance Mann is to this Seminole team (although FSU fans will most certainly realize next year), as he doesn’t score a ton of points. His 14 points against VT pushed him past Xavier Rathan-Mayes and Ron Hale into 24th place all time. With a good game against the Demon Deacons, he’ll pass Ron King and XRM’s dad, Tharon Mayes. Mann also recently joined Doug Edwards and Bobby Sura as the only ’Noles in history with 1,100+ points, 600+ rebounds, 200+ assists, and 100+ steals. With two more wins, he and Christ Koumadje will tie for the winningest class in FSU history.
  4. Against a team that forces the 2nd most turnovers in ACC play, FSU turned it over on just 10% of their possessions. The previous season-low for Virginia Tech was 15.2% of possessions. It was the 2nd fewest turnovers for Florida State in a game this season.
  5. FSU won 73-64 in a 67 possession contest. Regulation consisted of just 58 possessions, a pace which would make Tony Bennett proud. Virginia Tech is the 2nd-slowest team in the ACC, and the Hokies were able to control the tempo throughout, limiting Florida State to just one fast break bucket. However, playing at your desired tempo and winning are two different things. VT scored just 0.95 points per possession, which was lower than both its games versus Virginia, and the 4th lowest for the Hokies this season. The OT win was FSU’s 2nd in conference play this season, and Coach Hamilton has won his last nine ACC overtime games (dating back to 2008).

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