There were still four seconds left on the clock and Tony Bennett had seen enough.

Virginia’s basketball coach had already started walking down the FedExForum sideline toward Penny Hardaway, wanting nothing more than to leave the scene of the beatdown Memphis had just put on his team. But the extra time allowed for an extended handshake, a brief conversation and an acknowledgement of what he had just watched.

“I just said. ‘You guys, tonight, you’re for real,’ ” Bennett revealed. “You’re athletic, you’re tough, you had them well-prepared. I said, ‘We got work to do.’ He was being a nice coach and saying, ‘You’ll be fine.’ But it was just saying your athleticism is real. Your spacing is real. Your tenacity is real.”

Oh yes, these Tigers are for real, alright. They look to be as good as any Memphis team since the John Calipari era. That might have been true with or without the 77-54 bludgeoning they handed Virginia on Tuesday night, but the manner in which this blowout went down should make imaginations run wild all over Memphis.

The question no longer is whether this will be a good Memphis basketball team, or Hardaway’s best Memphis team. It’s becoming clear at this point the answer is a resounding yes to both queries. Just ask Virginia as it sorts through the carnage these Tigers wrought on the way back to Charlottesville.

Instead, this is now about how far Memphis (9-2) will go. It will take until March to know the answer, but there’s mounting evidence to suggest the Tigers haven’t been this close to being considered one of college basketball’s elite in 15 years.

Memphis is in the midst of storming through one of the most arduous nonconference schedules in the country and just won back-to-back-to-back regular season games against ranked opponents for the first time in program history.

But forget about the rankings and start wondering about the run. Sweet 16. Elite Eight. Final Four. It all seems plausible after how the past three games went.

“We have the energy back in the city. We have the energy back in the building,” Hardaway said. “Just knowing that we haven’t scratched the surface yet and we’re going to get better, this is feeling really good."

And yet this latest triumph, the first matchup featuring two ranked teams in Memphis since 2014, left you with a feeling unlike any the Tigers have conjured under Hardaway.

The second half, in particular, was a clinic on how to overwhelm an opponent. The Tigers were maniacally disruptive on defense, forcing Virginia to turn the ball over 18 times for the game and scoring 27 points off those giveaways. When Memphis did have to play halfcourt offense, it got the kind of open, easy looks Bennett’s teams have rarely allowed over the years. Virginia had nobody who could guard Memphis star David Jones, and the Tigers bounced back from an ugly 3-point shooting performance in their win over Clemson to hit nine Tuesday.

It got so bad, as the Memphis lead ballooned after halftime, that Bennett was forced to abandon his trademark pack line defense altogether for a zone in the latter stages of the game. That’s right – probably the best defensive coach in the country couldn’t even play his defense.

Beating Virginia by 23 is one thing. Doing so by scoring 77 points, “it just doesn’t happen,” Hardaway said. Or at least it doesn’t happen often.

This was tied for the most points Virginia had allowed a team to score since February 2021. It was giving up just 53 points per game this season. Memphis had more than that with 12 minutes remaining.

That’s what made Bennett’s postgame remarks all the more remarkable. After wearing down Clemson a few days earlier with its pace and athleticism, Memphis had Virginia on its heels almost immediately and hardly gave an inch after halftime.

“We couldn’t even dribble, pass, make a simple play and that kind of snowballed,” Bennett said.

“We were rattled defensively,” he said later. “They kind of had us guessing.”

“This won’t be a fun film to watch,” he eventually concluded.

The film doesn’t even include Kansas State transfer Nae’Qwan Tomlin yet. Memphis officially announced his addition to the program a few hours before tipoff and Hardaway said he would play in Saturday’s game against Vanderbilt if he’s ruled eligible in time.

But Hardaway also made sure to savor this one, and to note how meaningful Tuesday’s win – and that handshake – were to him.

He had been watching Virginia since his days as a coach at East High School, when he wanted to figure out how Bennett’s pack line defenses were as good as they’ve been over the years. So Hardaway made it a point to tell Bennett he’s “always going to be a fan,” only for Bennett to marvel once more at the team he had just faced.

“This is storybook for me,” Hardaway said.

The way things are going, the ending could be even better.

You can reach Commercial Appeal columnist Mark Giannotto via email at mgiannotto@gannett.com and follow him on X: @mgiannotto

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Penny Hardaway, Memphis basketball look 'for real' after Virginia romp