RALEIGH, N.C. — The score was simply astonishing.
The Virginia Tech men’s basketball team beat North Carolina State 47-24 on Saturday at PNC Arena.
That’s right. The Hokies held the Wolfpack — the No. 23-ranked team in the nation — to 24 points.
For the entire game.
“It still doesn’t seem real,” said Tech guard Nickeil Alexander-Walker, who had 11 points, two blocks and three steals in 40 minutes. “Our coaches are freaking out.
“It was one of those days for them where they couldn’t make [shots] and we just kept getting stops. And we just kept getting more confident and growing more powerful.”
The 12th-ranked Hokies (18-3, 7-2) held an opponent to less than 25 points for the first time since a 105-24 win over Washington and Lee in 1959.
“The tenacity and the fight that our guys played with was remarkable,” Hokies coach Buzz Williams said.
It was a performance worthy of a reward.
“Four-hour drive home. I think we may stop and get some ice cream,” Williams said. “So four and a half.”
State (16-6, 4-5), which entered the game averaging 84.4 points, scored the fewest points by a ranked team since college basketball adopted the shot clock in 1985.
“We knew that they’re a team that can really put up points when they pick it up, so we wanted to keep them out of rhythm as much as possible,” said Tech’s Kerry Blackshear, who had 13 points and 13 rebounds.
The Hokies, playing without injured point guard Justin Robinson, shot just 35.6 percent from the field.
But the Wolfpack shot only 16.7 percent from the field (9 of 54) — the lowest percentage by any team in ACC history.
“I thought [the game] was really pretty,” Williams said. “I know beauty’s in the eye of the beholder.
“We shot double what they shot. And so I guess it’s just kind of like art. It just depends on what you want to buy.”
Williams said Saturday that Robinson, who injured his left foot in Wednesday’s win at Miami, is out indefinitely.
Robinson, who is averaging 14.4 points and 5.5 assists, had a protective boot on his foot Saturday.
The Hokies also were without injured forward P.J. Horne for the fourth straight game. They are down to seven healthy scholarship players, including freshman Jonathan Kobongo, who played five minutes Saturday after playing only two minutes in January.
“We all stepped up,” Alexander-Walker said. “If we continue to do that, we’ll be all right.”
With Robinson sidelined, the Hokies wanted to slow the pace of Saturday’s game. State had no fast-break points; Tech had five.
“It was the only chance we had, kind of football-style time of possession — how can we shorten the game?” Williams said. “Their average possession going into today was 16.5 seconds, … really fast. We could not get into that type of game.”
The Hokies turned the ball over 12 times. But State scored just two points off those turnovers.
The Wolfpack was 2 of 28 from 3-point range (7.1 percent) and scored only eight points in the paint.
“Our defensive principle was at our best,” Alexander-Walker said. “We knew that missing J-Rob, … Virginia Tech [as a team] was going to have to guard N.C. State, … all of us guarding them and their actions and trying to finish it with a rebound.
“We wanted to make sure that if they’re going to take a shot, you’re not going to get into the paint first.”
Tech led 5-2 with only 9:08 left in the first half. State was 1 of 17 from the field at that point.
State trailed 20-14 at halftime after shooting 19.4 percent from the field in the first half.
The Wolfpack shot only 13.0 percent (3 of 23) in the second half.
“I don’t know if I’ve ever been a part of a game where none of our guys played well,” State coach Kevin Keatts said. “When you look at these numbers, they’re mind-boggling.”
State cut the lead to 22-19 with 18:35 left, but the Hokies went on a 25-3 run to build a 47-22 cushion with 3:11 to go.
Tech began the run with 11 straight points, including nine from Blackshear, to open up a 33-19 lead with 14:05 left.
State’s 24 points were the fewest scored by any Division I team this decade. It was State’s lowest output since a 1968 game.
“The shots we missed in the first half were more us. We got great looks,” Keatts said. “In the second half, I’d give their defense a little more credit. They were able to close down driving lanes.”
State guard Braxton Beverly was 0 of 12 from the field.
Tech’s Wabissa Bede had nine points and four steals in 40 minutes.
The teams’ combined score of 71 points was the lowest in any ACC game in the shot-clock era.
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