No. 19 Duke’s scintillating comeback erased nearly all of the Blue Devils’ faults in a poor start at No. 20 Virginia Tech on Tuesday night.
Alas, Duke’s poor shooting during a key stretch of the second half led to its first ACC loss.
Tyrece Radford scored 18 points and Keve Aluma added 17 as the Hokies, which led by 18 points in the first half, held off Duke’s rally to beat the Blue Devils, 74-67, at Cassell Coliseum.
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Freshman Jeremy Roach scored a game-high 22 points for Duke (5-3, 3-1 ACC) while Matthew Hurt scored 20 points.
The Blue Devils cut Virginia Tech’s deficit to a single point in the second half, but poor shooting down the stretch did them in. Duke shot 40% in the game, including 35.3% in the second half.
Virginia Tech (10-2, 4-1 ACC) never trailed in keeping Duke winless in three games against ranked teams this season.
After trailing by as many as 18 points in the first half and cutting Virginia Tech’s lead to 46-34 at halftime, Duke roared out of the halftime locker room with sharp shooting and aggressive defense.
The Blue Devils made 8 of their first 12 shots after halftime with Hurt’s 3-pointer with 13:12 to play leaving the Hokies with a 56-55 lead.
The Blue Devils cooled off, missing their next seven shots in a row, allowing the Hokies to push their lead out to seven points when Jalen Cone hit a 3-pointer for a 64-57 Virginia Tech lead with 8:37 to play.
With Duke in the midst of hitting just 3 of 16 shots over a 10-minute stretch, the Hokies took a 68-59 lead when Aluma scored in the lane with 6:09 to play.
