The Hokies pulled off a great end to their regular season on Saturday by beating BC for a second straight ACC Championship title. Collectively the offense, defense, and special teams played their most balanced game I have seen this season. The game wasn’t without the usual frustrations and questionable play calling as well as head-shaking realizations that our offense is a joke to be considered a BCS conference champion but there was plenty to be happy about with the defense, Tyrod Taylors endzone reaching footwork, and even our kicking game looked good. It was supposed to be a defensive battle between the two teams and Virginia Tech won the turnover tally by grabbing two INT and a couple fumble recoveries but they also narrowly missed having a couple more INT and BC lucked out on a questionable Darren Evans fumble call and review.

The game itself was one of the most entertaining off-field performances also. Throughout the broadcast the announcers alluded to how wasted the crew and staff had gotten that weekend. At one point they identified a shark as taking the likeness of Paul Maguire, the sideline announcer, and showed embarrassing footage of the camera crew from a hotel karaoke bar. And then… yep… Cory Holt punched Frank Beamer in the face after our 50-yard field goal passed through the uprights. The footage will make Hokie football lore forever but I have to hand it to ESPN for putting together a third quarter montage recap which included the cold clock by Holt and “Paul the Shark’s” parrot throwing tirades aboard his pirate ship.

Raymond James stadium looked desolate on television, as the camera cut to pedophiles in the upper corners of empty sections around the stadium. Astonishingly the venue recorded 53,927 guest tickets being torn that day but we all know that’s bullshit since they claimed 52,000 came out to Jacksonville last year. If you thought that the football game was empty, you should have seen the turnout at the Verizon Center for the Navy/Virginia Tech Basketball game, the first of two games in the BB&T Classic.

Though the Hokies won, they didn’t really make it look very pretty- at least in the first half. They shot poorly as a team early on and missed easy rebound opportunities but were much more cohesive in the second half and Malcolm Delaney led the Hokies with 21 points (including going a perfect 11-of-11 from the line) to beat Navy 79-70. BB&T has really let their tournament go to shit -its not even a tournament anymore- but it was good to be able to watch the team and players like Allen and Vassallo live for a change and also witness Seth Greenberg’s emotions devolve from “well-mannered” to “maniac” over the course of the game. The few Hokie fans that came out were a good support and even got Verizon center echoing “Let’s Go… Hokies” chants to take on the loud brass of the Midshipmen band and the cheering Navy students who were not lucky enough (or without rank) to make it to the Army/Navy game at Lincoln Financial in Philly.

Now the question is how to get down to Miami without spending Verizon center suite prices ($70 bucks for a sink of ice and Bud Selects).