Put the champagne on ice and the t-shirts back in the box, Miami has little reason to celebrate.
What everyone thought was going to be a championship night for the Hurricanes, turned into a gut-wrenching wake up call that Jim Larranaga's team might be a little overconfident and not prepared for the grueling nature of March Madness.
It makes sense to some degree. Miami isn't used to the national attention they're getting, they're ranked higher this year than ever before, and they just don't have the tournament style ingrained into their culture like fellow ACC members Duke and North Carolina do.
That's still no excuse. The Hurricanes won the free throw battle, the field goal percentage disparity was negligible, as was from beyond the arc, and they got the hometown whistles. It's a bit of a head scratcher on how they let a thirteen point lead just evaporate into thin air to then losing it all on a last minute tip-in by Marcus Georges-Hunt.
"It's tough," Miami's Julian Gamble said. "You expect to win. But when you let a team get confidence and they start making shots, it's tougher and tougher to guard them down the stretch. You have to give them credit, because they hit some really tough shots."
The lucky baskets and explosive plays that have drawn the imitation of LeBron James and D. Wade aren't going in the way they did at the start of the season. Not to mention the gripping help-defense they became famous has gone under witness protection.
Give credit to Georgia Tech though, who really had no dog in the race except pride. They came out swinging despite getting down early, and refused to just play dead.
"I don't think many people thought we had a chance to win this game," said Yellow Jackets head coach Brian Gregory.
That's what this season has been all about: seizing chances at the right moment and taking advantage of them. Georgia Tech grabbed theirs.
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