Pittsburgh came to Charlotte as the 14th seed and has won two straight games by the exact same score — 7-4, both as the road team. Tuesday they beat Wake Forest. Friday they beat Florida State. Wake Forest was an at-large bubble program. Florida State was a 72.5 percent favorite in our pre-game model.

The Tar Heels and Yellow Jackets are supposed to be the story of this tournament. They still may be. Right now Pittsburgh is harder to look away from.

Georgia Tech and North Carolina do what they're built for

Georgia Tech is the best offensive team in Division I baseball. That is not a compliment — it's a statistic. The Yellow Jackets lead all D1 programs in batting average (.358), on-base percentage (.469), slugging (.630), and runs per game (10.7). On Thursday, they beat Virginia 16-10 in the quarterfinals. That score would feel alarming from almost any other program. From Georgia Tech, it's a Tuesday.

North Carolina handled Virginia Tech 10-4 on Friday. The Tar Heels have been one of the two best teams in the ACC all season, moving through the bracket without chaos — taking quality wins without needing drama to close them out.

Those two share a semifinal bracket. That game is set.

Charlotte has been loud all week

Before the quarterfinals ran, Duke beat NC State 21-12 in the first round. Virginia Tech put up 17 runs against Notre Dame in the second round — Ethan Ball hit two home runs, Hudson Lutterman drove in four. The ACC tournament has played loud baseball from Tuesday's opening pitch. Georgia Tech winning a quarterfinal 16-10 lands somewhere in the middle of the week's scoring leaderboard.

What Pittsburgh is doing

The identical scores are not a quirk. They reflect how Pittsburgh has played both games. They've gone on the road in this tournament and ended two at-large programs' seasons in the process. Wake Forest's at-large argument ended on Tuesday. Florida State's comfortable bracket position ended on Friday.

Pittsburgh is in the semifinals. The Seminoles were the No. 3 seed. They were heavily favored. None of it mattered.

The Panthers face Georgia Tech in the semis — a program that averages 10.7 runs per game and put up 16 on Thursday. That matchup, on paper, goes one way. Pittsburgh has spent this week demonstrating that they are not playing on paper.