Hokies Men's Basketball Victorious In Chaotic Triple-Overtime Throwdown vs. Virginia

BLACKSBURG, Va. — For the first time in nearly five years, Virginia Tech men's basketball entered into a contest that went into triple overtime. For the fourth time this season, the Hokies captured an overtime win, continuing its unblemished streak in the 2025-26 campaign. For the first time since Jan. 10, 2024 against then-No. 21 Clemson, Virginia Tech supplanted a ranked opponent. For the 11th time in his tenure with the Hokies, head coach Mike Young claimed a victory against an AP top-25 opponent.

All these statistics lead to one conclusion: on Wednesday afternoon, Virginia Tech men's basketball delivered its signature win of the 2025-26 campaign, triumphing over Virginia, 95-85, in a triple-overtime throwdown that will likely live in the annals of Hokie history for years to come.

2025 went out with a 𝘽𝘼𝙉𝙂 🎇#OurState x @SmithfieldBrand pic.twitter.com/yoM2Oqp9HE
— Virginia Tech Men's Basketball (@HokiesMBB) December 31, 2025

Anchored by a 30-point outburst from sophomore guard Ben Hammond, the Hokies now improve to 12-2 and enter their stretch against the ACC's median squads with a win in their conference opener. Perhaps more importantly, the Hokies did something that not many schools have done this season: beat a ranked team as an unranked squad. And Hammond was key to that charge, contributing five rebounds, five assists and no turnovers in 42 minutes of work.

"He was exceptional," said Virginia Tech head coach Mike Young. "... It was both ends of the floor. He created havoc for the Cavaliers down there with a couple of things... Ben Hammond was the best player on the floor today. How could you dispute that? Really proud of Ben."

It wasn't for a lack of trying from Virginia; however, the Cavaliers' early-game shooting struggles enabled Virginia Tech to stay in the contest despite going through its own attrition. Virginia Tech struggled from the field in the opening frame, knocking just nine of its 33 shots from the field, a 27.3% clip. However, the Cavaliers weren't much better, recording a 9-for-31 (29%) line. Consequently, Virginia Tech trailed by one, 24-23, in a first-half where the Hokies and Virginia combined for 47 points.

In the second half, the engines fired for both units. Virginia Tech improved its shooting splits to 10-for-24, but more importantly, it boosted its free throw attempts from three up to 14. Virginia, meanwhile, knocked down 13 of its 28 shots, but its 4-for-15 tally from deep enabled the Hokies to stay competitive late into the contest. Despite 12 points from Malik Thomas and nine from Belgium forward Thijs de Ridder, the Hokies countered with eight from Hammond and seven from forward Amani Hansberry.

With just over three minutes left to go and the Cavaliers holding a 51-49, Virginia center Johann Grünloh fouled Hammond, who promptly went to the line and sunk both his free throws to knot the contest at 51. 41 seconds of game time later, Gurdak cashed in, rebounding a miss off a Neoklis Avdalas and putting the ball in. 26 seconds afterwards, De Ridder accepted the ball in the paint after Devin Tillis clanked a trey and converted in the paint to deadlock the game at 53. After Avdalas missed a trey, De Ridder cashed in a layup in the paint to give Virginia the lead with 63 seconds remaining.

However, the Hokies did not bow down. Though Avdalas missed another shot, not getting a layup on the left block to fall, center Christian Gurdak was there, securing the board and notching another game-tying bucket. After Tillis' jumper was blocked by Avdalas with five ticks on the clock, Hammond got a look at the buzzer.

No good. Thus: overtime. In the first extra period, neither squad pulled away by more than a possession. Once again, Virginia pulled ahead late, with De Ridder notching another layup in the paint to up his total to 20. However, with the proverbial bell ringing, Gurdak once again answered the call. Receiving pressure near the right elbow, Hammond scythed the ball to his left, right to an open Gurdak, who slammed it home to knot the game at 68 with four seconds left to play.

"I just saw Chris open," Hammond remarked.

Thus, the second overtime. This time, it was Virginia Tech that pulled away late, with the Cavaliers forced to resort to fouls after Hammond snagged the ball away with 14 seconds to play. After Hammond hit each of his ensuing four free throws, the score sat as such with four seconds remaining in overtime No. 2: Virginia Tech 77, Virginia 73.

However, in a game as chaotic as this one, the Cavaliers weren't done yet, with Thomas canning a triple off the feed from guard Dallin Hall. Hammond was subsequently fouled and on his ensuing trip to the charity stripe, he missed the first. No matter; after all, Hammond made the second.

Not so fast, however. With two seconds left, Thomas clanked a jumper that deflected out towards the left block. Then, with the ticks rapidly approaching zero, Mallory pounced on the ball, delivering the game-tying tip-in right as time expired, stunning almost all inside Cassell Coliseum.

After a quick review, the judgement was official: Mallory's shot was deemed valid and as such, the Hokies and Cavaliers were inconceivably headed to a triple-overtime, the first such occasion in Commonwealth Clash history across Virginia Tech basketball as a whole.

"It was pretty crazy," Hammond said of Mallory's shot. "[He] was my man. I was supposed to be going to get that rebound. I was one of those guys that thought we were up three. So, it was pretty bad, me going back to the bench for another overtime, but I was able to lock back in. My teammates had my back and were telling me just to forget about it and that they need me to go through this third overtime."

In the third overtime, it was Hammond who took over. The sophomore guard, who logged 20 points in the three overtime periods and 10 in the third and final extra frame, was a force, slashing into the lane on a multitude of occasions. Consequently, that forced Virginia to key onto him, often to their detriment with Gurdak and Hansberry imposing their will on the interior.

With 1:28 on the clock, Hammond cashed in on the paint to raise his total to 26 points. After a pair of free throws from Avdalas, who ended the contest with 17 points, Hammond struck again, notching a putback off an Avdalas missed layup. to raise the Hokies' lead to a 92-83 advantage with 41 seconds left to play.

And as it turned out, that play represented the dagger. Hammond finished with a pair of free throws to close the contest out, raising his total to a career-high 30. Gurdak delivered the team's final point, also notching a career-high in points with 17.

"It's everything that I expected him to be playing with him in high school," Hammond said of Gurdak. "He's a big-time player, playing for a big-time team. He's going to make big-time plays at big-time moment. So, I feel like he's just doing what Christian Gurdak is born to do."

In the wake of Lawal and Dorn's continued absences, Gurdak once again picked up their load — and once again, he delivered. The true freshman center, making just his second start in his 14th collegiate contest, logged the aforementioned 17 points, including an obscene career-high 19 rebounds. Young was incredulous about the output, remarking, "Are you kidding me?" about Gurdak's tally and calling the young big a "smart player".

"That kid's super smart, Christian," Young said. "He's super smart and he's unselfish and he is all about doing what our team needs to win. And that's a pretty good formula for an 18-year-old playing his 13th college game in an unbelievable atmosphere here in the Cassell. He's a great person, a great kid to coach and was really, really good today."

Through 14 games, Gurdak has logged 6.5 points and five rebounds a night as his role has continued to blossom, with injuries necessitating his being in the starting lineup. During postgame media availability, Gurdak remarked that his team was inspired by their offensive rebounding capabilities and that Virginia's proclivity for offensive boards far outweighed its touch on the defensive glass.

"Looking at them on film, they're a good offense rebounding team, but I think, so are we," Gurdak said. "And we knew they were better offensive rebounding than rebounding on the defensive side. So, I knew I was gonna be able to crash the glass hard and really attack them and just kind of outwork them."

Gurdak was not the only big to make his presence felt Wednesday. Despite a 5-for-16 shooting night that included a stretch of 2-for-12, Hansberry imposed himself alongside Gurdak, finishing with 17 points and 15 rebounds to go with two blocks.

"Exceptional," Young remarked when asked what his evaluation of Gurdak and Hansberry was. "And that's a load. They're deeper than we are. Coach Odom is playing Tillis some at the four and that was a little heartburn. Tillis is a good player, but De Ridder and Grünloh are good. And here comes 33 [Ugonna Oyenso]. They're both capable. 17 [Grünloh] and 33 [Onyenso] are both capable of stepping out and shoot.

"It's not what they do great. But they didn't get one of those tonight. We were going to hold on and make them make a couple. But we're thin as nickel soup right now. We're going to be whole here pretty soon though, fellas. We're going to be whole here pretty soon and that will make us better."

Despite the contest falling during Virginia Tech’s academic winter break, the atmosphere inside Cassell Coliseum rarely, if ever, dipped. An announced crowd of 8,925 packed the Commonwealth Clash, turning the night into a raucous affair, with the noise swelling and sustaining down the stretch as the Hokies closed it out. Despite surrendering a late lead in the second overtime and allowing Virginia to force a third extra frame, Virginia Tech refused to yield. They bent — but they never broke.

"Everyone was like, ‘We’re not losing this game.’"Gurdak said. "We didn’t come back after we should have probably won in that second overtime and be like, 'Aw, man,' because they had all of the momentum. So, we weren’t down. We were like, 'We’ve got to match the energy and play even harder,' and we weren’t going to lose that game."

An undeniable impact on the contest was Virginia's Jacari White being out with a left wrist injury, sustained from a poster on a Dayton defender earlier this month. But the math and the facts are undeniable and lead to the same outcome/conclusion: Virginia Tech men's basketball anchored down the stretch and delivered the kind of marquee win that could propel them to March. The Hokies now sit No. 62 on KenPom after the victory and enter a stretch where they play two squads designated as Quad 1 on Pomeroy's metrics — Wake Forest (No. 61) and SMU (No. 41). The Hokies also draw two Quad 2 foes in Notre Dame (No. 58) and Syracuse (No. 80), with California and Stanford composing the remainder of the Hokies' next six outings.

The more impressive mark comes in the wake of the Hokies missing several key contributors. Sans Lawal, Dorn and Johnson, Virginia Tech delivered and secured a resume-boosting victory that lends itself well to the matchups yet to come.

The Hokies' next challenge comes on the road; the team travels down to Winston-Salem, North Carolina to take on Wake Forest on Jan. 3; the contest starts at 12 p.m. ET on the ACC Network. Should Virginia Tech win, it will be the Hokies' seventh straight victory, a far cry from last year. Though Young remarked that he has great admiration for Virginia's outfit, he is confident in his, as well.

"We are Virginia Tech," Young said. "That's what we do. All right. Great admiration for them. But damnit, I got a good basketball team, too. All right. And I'm not going to shy away from that."

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