The wonder wasn’t that Georgia Tech lost. The wonder was that the Jackets had, inside the final 90 seconds, a chance to win (or at least tie). Virginia Tech did as little as you can do and still beat a quality opponent – which the Jackets are, most games if not this game – on the road. Georgia Tech did almost nothing at all.

Paul Johnson’s stylized rushing offense was outgained by Paul Johnson’s not-nearly-as-stylish passing game, and therein hangs a tale. “We’re not going to throw the ball 20 or 25 times and win many games,” Johnson said. “That’s not us.”

But now we ask: With these Jackets, what exactly is “us”? For five seasons we could count on Tech to run the ball well, to pass it not so well and to defend barely at all. Through four games, Johnson’s sixth Tech team has inverted reality. The Jackets now throw about as well as they run, and they play defense better than they play offense.

“We’re not very good with the option,” Johnson said. “In fact, we’re terrible.”

We can go no further without mentioning the penalties: The Jackets were flagged for nine – Virginia Tech incurred 10, ineptitude running rampant this night – and six of the nine were false starts. Generally speaking, the home offense should never start falsely, for the basic reasons that (a.) it’s at home and (b.) it presumably knows the snap count. Said Johnson: “On one drive we had two receivers on the back side of the play jump. Our right guard (Shaq Mason) jumped two or three times.”

Three times, actually, which leads us to ask: Is Tech bad at the option, or is it just bad at getting to the point where it can actually try to run the option?

Said quarterback Vad Lee: “I’ve got to command the huddle better and maybe those offside penalties won’t happen.”

This failure went higher than the starting quarterback. This wretched performance falls on Johnson. He designed this system. He recruited these players. He didn’t have them primed for this prime-time tilt, and near the end he nearly blew the game by himself.

Eight-plus minutes left, the Jackets down 17-10, fourth-and-2 at their 33: This is the place in a Tech game when we wits in the press box nod to one another and say, “Paul probably wants to go for this.” Only Johnson did more than want. HE WENT FOR IT. Knowing full well that failure would put Virginia Tech in position to kick the field goal that would ice the game, HE WENT FOR IT.

David Sims was stopped at the line. The Hokies had the ball and surely the game. But they managed to mess up the biggest gift this side of the Hope Diamond. Cody Journell, who had beaten the Jackets in Blacksburg on Labor Day 2012, missed a 26-yarder.

“It was probably not a smart decision,” Johnson said. “In hindsight, it was probably pretty dumb. It worked out, but … ”

For that outrageous choice alone, Georgia Tech deserved to lose. (What coach puts his defense in that position with that much time remaining?) Beggaring belief, the Jackets got the ball twice more with a chance to win or tie. The first possession ended inside the final five minutes, when Johnson – apparently having realized just what he’d almost done – chose to punt on fourth-and-4 at his 26. The second was snuffed by an interception on fourth-and-13. The team that deserved to lose lost.

“I feel like we’re a lot better than that,” Lee said, gesturing toward the field, “than what we just showed.”

But are they really? The first two games – against Elon and Duke – were walkovers. On Saturday the Jackets fell behind North Carolina 13-0 and 20-7 before Roof’s defense gathered itself and allowed the offense to steady. This time Tech fumbled on its first possession and threw an interception on the second, and after 18 ½ minutes the Hokies had all the points they’d need.

Georgia Tech, which prides itself on its offense, was outgained 276 yards to 273 by Virginia Tech, which seems to have given up trying to do anything but punt and play D. Asked about his defense, Johnson wasn’t effusive. “I think we did OK,” he said, and then: “Their quarterback was 19 of 25 (passing) and he came in under 50 percent, so that’s not very good.”

Then this grudging admission: “We held them to 17 points. That ought to be enough to win.”

It wasn’t. Johnson’s stylized offense got stuck on 10. And whose fault is that?

Said Lee: “Coach Johnson has been around a long time. If he said we’re terrible at it, we’re terrible at it.”

But what if the option never works? For a Paul Johnson team, is there a Plan B? And how confident is he that these Jackets will eventually learn to run the ball?

“I’m confident we’re going to get better at it,” Johnson said. “We’re either going to get better at it or we’re going to have other people playing.”