With two slumping Atlantic Coast Conference teams in a midweek battle, the best news for both teams might be that someone has to get a win when Virginia Tech faces Florida State on Wednesday in Tallahassee, Fla.
Florida State (13-7, 4-5 ACC) has lost its last two games despite superb efforts from forward Jamir Watkins. The senior forward has combined to score 38 points and grab 16 rebounds in those two losses, typical production for a season in which he averages 18.6 points per game. Unfortunately, his reliability has been the exception for the Seminoles.
“The biggest challenge all year for us has been consistency,” Florida State coach Leonard Hamilton said last week. “If you watched this last couple of home games, you would have thought that we would come out and play a different game, but we didn’t. … We’ve got to find a way to develop a little more consistency and passion.”
With a 78-71 loss at Stanford on Saturday, Florida State fell to 1-5 on the road, but the Seminoles are 8-2 on the season at home, which should bode well for the Virginia Tech matchup.
Meanwhile, Virginia Tech (8-12, 3-6) has dropped its last three games, most recently a 72-57 defeat at home to Clemson. The Hokies have struggled offensively throughout the season, averaging just 69.5 points per game, barely inside the top 300 in Division I. In its three-game skid, Virginia Tech has failed to top 64 points or shoot 41 percent in any of those losses.
“We’re getting to the stretch of all these games when it’s winning time and you’ve got to continue to play good basketball,” Hokies coach Mike Young said. “They’ve got the right intentions, but not getting a timely shot down or a defensive mistake from one person seems to bite us in the rear end.”
Virginia Tech is led by forward Toibu Lawal with 12.6 points per game. Lawal (then a freshman) and Florida State’s Watkins (then a sophomore) were teammates at VCU in 2022-23.
–Field Level Media
