Did Pitt just burst Wake Forest’s NCAA Tournament bubble? Sure feels that way

Wake Forest probably, more than probably, needed a win on Thursday, but so did, if you believe the bracket pundits, Pitt.

They should have both been safe a while ago, but this is where we are in college basketball in 2024.

Pitt got the win, holding on after the Deacs cut a 19-point second-half lead to three to post an 81-69 final tally in their ACC Tournament quarterfinal game on Thursday.

That means Pitt (22-10) can think ahead to Selection Sunday with some confidence. Might make the game with North Carolina, an easy 92-67 winner over Florida State in the afternoon session’s opening game, a little more interesting.

Pitt won’t be playing with the pressure of needing a win to get to the next stage. You can play a little looser that way.

Wake (20-13) is done with its resume for an at-large NCAA Tournament bid.

If one isn’t forthcoming, it won’t be today’s loss, but rather, the three-game losing streak – to non-bubble teams Notre Dame, Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech – that will do them in.

“Yeah, we’ve got more to play for. It’ll be with an N. It won’t be the CIT or the CBI. I know that, if those even exist anymore. It’ll be the NCAA or the NIT,” said Wake Forest coach Steve Forbes, who has been close, but no cigar, the last three years.

The Deacs’ 2022 bubble burst with an 82-77 second-round loss to Boston College that sent them to the NIT.

The 2023 season came down to a quarterfinal game with league co-champ Miami, which defeated Wake 74-72 to end the Demon Deacons’ season.

Forbes seems to be holding out hope that the selection committee will give Wake some leeway for having played its first seven games of the season without center Efton Reid, going a meh 4-3 in that stretch before getting him into the lineup.

“How much they weigh that, it’ll be talked about because I think it’s pretty obvious that one of the committee members already said a couple days ago that they were going to look at the young man from Indiana State who was ill or didn’t play in a couple games they played in,” Forbes said.

“We have a good team, and I firmly believe, and everybody that’s watched us play all year long, we get in the tournament, we can win,” Forbes said. “It’s not going to be charity now. Nobody is going to want to play us if we get in there. It’ll be like if it’s the NIT, too. We’ll probably be at home, which will be a hard place for somebody to come win, in my opinion.”