Sean Pedulla scored a season-high 25 points to help Virginia Tech beat Florida State 82-60 in the Atlantic Coast Conference regular-season finale for both teams on Saturday in Blacksburg, Va.
Pedulla started 6-6 from the field and finished 8-12, including 6-8 on 3-pointers. Hunter Cattoor scored all 14 of his points in the second half and added four assists on Senior Day, while Grant Basile added 13 points and pulled down 8 rebounds.
The Hokies (18-13, 8-12 ACC) won consecutive games for the first time since late January and secured the No. 11 seed in the ACC Tournament in Greensboro, N.C. They’ll face Notre Dame in the first round on Tuesday.
Caleb Mills led the Seminoles (9-22, 7-13) with 14 points, while Darin Green Jr. and Matthew Cleveland each chipped in 10.
Florida State’s 22 regular-season losses are a program record, surpassing the 2000-01 team’s 9-21 campaign. The Seminoles enter the conference tournament as the No. 12 seed and will battle Georgia Tech on Tuesday.
Mills scored the first five points of the second half to bring Florida State within 39-35 after the Seminoles trailed by as many as 17 in the first period.
Mills added another layup to keep Florida State within striking distance at 41-37 until the Hokies surged ahead to put the game out of reach.
Pedulla’s fifth 3-pointer and Justyn Mutts’ layup provided five crucial points before M.J. Collins’ triple replenished Tech’s double-digit lead at the 15:45 mark. Basile followed up with a dunk and Pedulla added six more points to polish off an 11-0 burst that pushed the Hokie lead to 57-39 with 12 1/2 minutes remaining.
Collins’ 3-pointer gave Tech its largest lead at 82-54 with 1:59 to play.
The Hokies tied their season-high with 16 3-pointers and racked up 21 assists compared to Florida State’s 10.
Virginia Tech finished 8-for-9 from the free throw line, while the Seminoles didn’t get to the line until the 1:45 mark in the second half and went 0-2 on the afternoon.
The Hokies fed on the energy of their Senior Day crowd and raced out to a 14-0 lead within the game’s first six minutes as Florida State missed its first nine shots.
The Seminoles finally scored on Mills’s 3-pointer at the 14:09 mark and pulled within 21-12 but couldn’t quell the hot-shooting Hokies, who made 14-18 (78 percent) from the field throughout the game’s first 16:16.
Tech scored just two more points the rest of the half as the Seminoles crept back into it, pulling to within 39-30 on Jalen Warley’s jumper just before the halftime buzzer.
–Field Level Media
