Coral Gables, Florida. — Regardless of your favorite movie, play, TV show or novel, those glimpses into another life are ultimately scripted. It’s moments like Friday night at Hard Rock Stadium where scripts can’t be written. Although it looked like David would take down Goliath, No. 7 Miami ultimately had the upper hand.

“We didn’t just come here to play close,” head coach Brent Pry said when discussing his team’s risky play calling, which included a double end-around touchdown and a controversial fake field goal that was ultimately called.

The Hokies were in a favorable position inside the Hurricanes’ red zone with just under six minutes left in the third quarter, up 10 and trying to push the lead to 17 when Harrison St. Germain was swamped with a run that shrunk the lead. momentum towards Miami.

While this will ultimately be one of the talking points of the evening, it’s important to explain in detail why the Hokies were even in a position to extend a once unthinkable lead.

Tech came out of the blocks firing and on an early Cameron Ward fumble, Kyron Drones found a wide open Benji Gosnell, who strolled into the end zone with no one within a country’s radius of him.

Mario Cristobal’s Miami squad didn’t hesitate and capitalized with back-to-back touchdowns, sandwiching a Drones interception.

When the game started to look like it was going to get out of hand midway through the first, the Hokies showed real backbone. Sophomore safety Mose Phillips III swooped in just outside the Tech endzone and pried the ball intended for Xavier Restrepo out of the air before setting up the Hokies for an eventual Bhayshul Tuten 55-yard touchdown run.

The Maroon and Orange held their ground defensively in their next assignment: stopping Ward. Next came the double end-around play, which resulted in Lane being escorted into the end zone, giving the Blacksburg squad a well-deserved 21-14 lead.

A 57-yard John Love field goal pushed Tech’s lead to double digits before Miami kicker Andres Borregales cut the deficit to seven heading into halftime.

After another Love kick and a Caleb Spencer interception that put the Hokies in top position, Virginia Tech made the questionable fake field goal. Many will debate whether Love should have been sent out for another possession; Pry later stated that after weeks of practicing the fake field goal, the Hurricanes gave Tech a look that the Hokie staff was comfortable with.

With the score 27-17 in Virginia Tech’s favor, Miami dominated their next three drives, scoring three smooth touchdowns that highlighted Ward’s exceptional play. Although Drones was forced to make a Heisman-level pass to Ayden Greene in the end zone to temporarily halt the Ducks’ momentum, Cristobal’s squad eventually regained the lead with 1:57 remaining.

This was it; it was make or break. Unlike the books and shows we watch on repeat, where you know who will come out on top, no one knew what would come next among the bed of stars above. What was on the table was a coach, Pry, who had a real chance to solidify a historic victory in Hokie football history, and it all rested on the shoulders of the Houston, Texas-born Drones.

Jaylin Lane, Stephen Gosnell, Bhayshul Tuten and Da’Quan Felton relieved some of that earth-heavy pressure on the second-year Hokie quarterback with catches that pushed the team to the Miami 30. However, it would always come down to hail. Mary to cap off a spectacular night of this rivalry, which was simmering with tension and continually increasing the pressure on the Hokies to break the hearts of the vaunted Hurricanes.

With three seconds left to play, Drones used his powerful arm to throw a ball into a horde of players from both sides, all clawing at the pigskin, hoping to stake their claim and put an end to the madness of the night. Initially, Miami picked itself off the canvas with ball in hand and paraded it around the field as the floodlights flickered, marking a fifth win of the series. Just before the eyes turned to the zebra-striped umpires, who indicated that in the midst of the madness, Hokie, Da’Quan Felton had secured the winning catch, marking a night to remember for Tech faithful for years to come.

“I ran over and said, ‘How did you rule it?’ He said touchdown.” stammered a red Pry at his post-match press conference. Yet the ACC crew then took what felt like years of agonizing minutes before you could hear a pin drop, just seconds before announcing that Felton had not completed the catch, sending those at Hard Rock into a rage with their signature U-shaped hand motion erupt. of happiness as the Hokies’ heads fell, after once believing they had killed the giant.