Georgia Tech dropped a home game to Pittsburgh Thursday night, 34-20. When the head coaches met at midfield to shake hands following the final horn, something unexpected happened. Geoff Collins seemingly brushed off Pat Narduzzi without as much of a head nod or eye contact before jerking his hand away as he walked off.

Afterward the game, Coach Narduzzi took a trip down Petty Avenue to celebrate the road win and take a little jab back at Collins for the icy handshake.

And I’m not going to lie….I don’t hate it. In fact, I love it.

The interaction was quickly picked up on and of course it was addressed in the post game interviews. On tape in live time, it definitely looks like Collins offered a cold shake and walked away without looking back. His explanation/excuse of the encounter makes it look even worse and was not very well thought out by the GT head coach, IMO.

“There were some things throughout the game that got chippy, and I was just making sure that I wanted to get to my guys (to the band),” Collins said according to the AJC. “So if I came across any type of way, I really had no intention of that. I’m just so focused on our team, so focused on making sure that we go and celebrate with our band that does so much for us and for our program.”

Celebrate with our band? Interesting word choice.

Now according to Narduzzi, there was more to it and words were actually exchanged as reported by the AJC:

“I just said, ‘Hey, you’ve got a great team,’ and he said, ‘Baloney,’ I guess in nice words, and walked off,” Narduzzi said. “I don’t know. I thought it was a good game.”

Five seconds. It takes five seconds to say “good game, let’s chat later, I’m heading over to the end zone with the team”. But when you have no intention of talking or shaking hands, more times than not it IS exactly what it looks like.

I sent out this tweet below after the game. I’ll admit I was being intentionally sarcastic and maybe even slightly facetious but at the end of the day, the ACC needs a little something to create some buzz. If that means a brewing dispute between Pittsburgh and Georgia Tech then so be it.

Might still be a while before the ACC can bet on Clemson/Florida State rivalry being worth watching again. Norte Dame isn’t joining as football member “full time” so the conference has to take whatever it can get when it comes to excitement around league games.

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