WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — Wake Forest has blown a few big leads this season. The Demon Deacons had much more fun flipping that script against Pittsburgh.

John Collins tipped in a rebound with 18.8 seconds left, and Wake Forest staged its biggest comeback in 18 years, rallying from 19 points down to beat Pittsburgh 63-59 on Wednesday night.

Collins finished with 22 points and 13 rebounds for the Demon Deacons (16-12, 7-9 Atlantic Coast Conference), who let significant leads slip away in losses to Clemson and Florida State but turned the tables on Panthers — in the process matching the biggest comeback in school history — to avoid a loss that certainly would have crushed their NCAA Tournament bubble hopes.

“We’ve been on the losing end of a lot of games similar to this, but there’s not been one ounce of quit in any of these guys,” coach Danny Manning said. “Tonight was a game that we’re able to enjoy because we did it when we didn’t have our best offense and we had multiple guys make contributions. We just scrapped and found a way.”

Michael Young scored 24 points and Jamel Artis added 11 for the Panthers (15-13, 4-11), who had the ball with less than 30 seconds left in a tie game.

Collins stole the ball from Artis on the wing, and after Bryant Crawford brought the ball downcourt and missed a layup, Collins tipped it in for the lead.

Young missed a 3-pointer with about 10 seconds remaining but the rebound went out of bounds off Crawford’s hand with 5.6 seconds to play, giving Pitt a sideline inbounds pass — but Chris Jones’ cross-court pass went into the Panthers’ bench.

Coach Kevin Stallings, asked by reporters afterward about that pass, briefly lowered his forehead to the table before saying it “missed our mark by about 20 feet.”

Freshman Brandon Childress then hit two free throws with 4.8 seconds left to seal it.

“We played well enough, we were in position to win, we should have won, and we didn’t,” Stallings said.

Crawford finished with 10 points for Wake Forest.