Virginia Tech Basketball Opens 2026 With Three Buzzer Beater Losses You Have To See To Believe
A painful rerun in Hokie Land.
You may not have been able to draw up a more perfect ending to 2025 for the men's basketball team at Virginia Tech. Not only did the Hokies close out the opening portion of the campaign with a record of 12-2, but took down rival Virginia in overtime on New Year's Eve to begin ACC play at 1-0, but then, the calendar flipped.
The Hokies have lost three of their four games to begin 2026, and not only have the three losses come from a combined five points, but they've also been direct punches to the gut.
The term ‘heartbreaking loss’ is overused in the world of sports, but not in the case of Virginia Tech hoops in the year 2026.
The Hokies' first conference loss came on January 3 on the road against Wake Forest. Things were tied at 76-76 with six seconds left in regulation before Wake's Nate Calmese hit a heavily contested, step-back three that would hold up to be the game winner.
Four days later, Virginia Tech welcomed Stanford to town and looked likely to cruise to victory, leading the Cardinal by 12 points with just 2:18 left in the game. Things ended 69-68 in favor of Stanford, courtesy of Ebuka Okorie, who hit a Steph Curry range three with three ticks left on the clock.
To Virginia Tech's credit, it got the horrible taste out of its mouth by taking down Cal 78-75 three days after Stanford ripped the team's guts out.
Unfortunately, things got back to the heartbreak programming in Hokie Land as the team took on SMU in Dallas on Wednesday, and the loss to the Mustangs is one of those that can linger with a team throughout the remainder of a season.
With a whopping two seconds left on the clock, Virginia Tech led things 76-74, but then Boopie Miller decided to toss up a prayer from half court.
Plenty of teams will lose on last-second shots across college basketball in 2026, but for the Hokies to lose in that fashion, with one of the game winners coming from half court, three times over the course of 11 days, is truly astonishing stuff.