By Noah Hickman
Courtesy: Brad Penner/USA Today Sports
Just about every NCAA basketball tournament has a team that seemingly comes out of nowhere and takes the world by surprise.
For those who only fill out the brackets, your first instinct probably is something along the lines of 'Virginia Tech is an 11 seed, they won't do much damage.'
Well, context matters which is why I am here to offer some to you.
The veteran Hokies have a solid record of 23-12 but have won 13 out of its last 15 games.
On Saturday, they beat Duke in the ACC championship 82-67.
A team that is the best college hoops team of the century and who could have been a No. 1 seeded team in the tournament had they beaten the Hokies.
It took Virginia Tech four games in four days to win its first ACC Championship.
They are also the worst-seeded team to ever win an ACC tournament.
However, it would be hard to say they are the worst team to ever win an NCAA tournament.
The Hokies are a versatile team that can beat you in several ways.
Whether that be from the perimeter, spreading the defenses out or attacking the basket, they have proved to be a lethal offensive force as of late.
The Hokies are 3rd in three-point field goal percentage, shooting 39.28% from behind the arc. Only Colgate and South Dakota State are better.
The leading scorers on the team are the two starting big men: seniors Keve Aluma and Justyn Mutts who average 15.8 and 10.1 points per game respectively.
As indicated, there is not one individual who can bring the house down, but Aluma is the best player on the team.
Even when he was struggling for the first 15 minutes against Duke, junior guard Hunter Cattoor kept the game a tug-of-war battle.
He had 17 points before Aluma scored his first two. Cattoor finished with a much-needed career-high 31 points.
Aluma was afforded the luxury to find his footing later in the game as he finished with 19 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists.
If it weren't for Cattoor putting on a Klay Thompson like performance, Aluma probably would have forced some unnecessary shots up and therefore struggling immensely.
Instead, this season has shown for the Hokies, when the going gets tough, the tough get going and when somebody is struggling, lift them up by putting on a great performance yourself.
When I look at teams that could make a March Madness run, I look for two things in particular: 1. Is the team on a hot streak? 2. Has the team shown obvious signs of perseverance?
Virginia Tech fits the description for both as they had to overcome a 2-7 conference record (10-10 overall) start and as I mentioned above, have won 13 out of its last 15.
The game that sent them to 2-7 was particularly devastating as they were tied with the Miami Hurricanes at 75 apiece.
Miami took a time out with 1.8 seconds to go in hopes the inbound passer could throw the ball about a half of the court; that did not happen.
Hurricanes' senior guard Charlie Moore caught the ball at 3/4 court and sprinted to half-court to chuck up a shot.
He just beat the shot clock and banked the shot in off the glass. Miami won 78-75 on the Hokies home court.
That moment very well could have deflated the Hokies and they just could have said that 'no matter what we do, things aren't going our way.'
Instead, it seemed to have the opposite effect. They turned on the jets and decided to keep being relentless no matter what.
It takes a special kind of team to overcome slow starts and tough moments.
I have mentioned this a bunch of times to my friends, especially the ones at Marshall University, but I remember when the Washington Nationals were 19-31 and they decided that they were going to "go 1-0 everyday."
That formula worked and they won the World Series.
Believe it or not, I see parallels between the 2019 Nationals and this Hokies team.
The main ones being they are perseverant; they are hot and they never give up on the field or on one another in the locker room.
It would be awesome if they somehow miraculously won it all.
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