CHESTNUT HILL - Well, none of us saw this coming.
In a game that felt like it was played in a high school gym on Tuesday night, BC got an ugly 54-36 win over Virginia Tech.
Clinging to slim hopes of an ACC tournament berth, BC moves to 11-15 overall and 3-12 in the ACC with five games left. The Eagles are currently two wins out of a spot with three of the remaining five games (Stanford, Cal and Pitt) on the road.
While the 36 points given up is certainly impressive - in fact, it was the lowest total given up for the program since moving to the ACC - the Hokies also contributed quite a bit, shooting a horrendous 29% (15-51) including 3-19 (15.9%) from three.
The Eagles weren't much better from three, going 3-18, but did shoot 45% from the field while forcing 17 turnovers.
"It's really hard to do that (defensively) and I didn't even recognize we were doing it, we were just trying to win the possession," Earl Grant said. "We knew the game was going to be tough. I really respect Mike Young. He recruited me in 1996. He was recruiting me at Wofford as an assistant. So, I've known him. I respect him and know how hard it is to play against him.
"We've had battles. So, to do that was really not an easy thing, but I thought our players were connected. We've been hardened. We've been through a lot. Young guys are growing up. We went out. We didn't turn it over (11 turnovers) and we took good shots. We weren't giving up easy baskets and we rebounded the first miss.
"So, I just saw them grow up in front of me a little bit tonight. We gotta try to build on it. It's hard to do what we did."
While Conte looked and sounded like a high school gym, the first half score was quite similar to one you may have seen at a Massachusetts high school this week.
BC led just 26-11 after the first 20 minutes, with V-Tech going an absurd 5-25 from the field with a nine-minute scoring drought at one point. The Eagles went 1-10 from three early and shot 41% (12-29) from the field. The Hokies committed 11 of their turnovers in the first half as well.
Virginia Tech never really threatened BC in the second half, allowing BC to mostly put it on cruise control in the final 10 minutes or so.
As he has been, Donald Hand Jr. led the way with 16 points, two rebounds and an assist. Chad Venning and Jayden Hastings each added eight points, with Venning grabbing four boards and Hastings pulling down five. Roger McFarlane (6 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists), Elijah Strong (6 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists) and Fred Payne (4 points, 3 assists, 3 rebounds) all chipped in as well.
The Eagles host Georgia Tech for the penultimate home game on Saturday at 2 p.m.
The ACC tournament is still a long shot, but at least the Eagles were able to take a small step forward on Wednesday, showing they could take advantage of a team when given the opportunity.
"We talked about it this morning, don't give up," Grant added. "You're going to get a reward, There's no way you can show up every day and work like this...it's principle. You show up and work hard, give good effort and have a good attitude, something's going to break through at some point. Hopefully, we're in the process of breaking through.
"It's hard. We've got to show up again the next day and work and get ready for the next one. Try to celebrate this one for about...it's already midnight almost, so we'll celebrate for a few hours and then get ready to prepare for the next opponent."
