Georgia Tech Basketball Preview

After finishing its non-conference slate with a 10-2 record and a win against a good St. Mary's squad, the Jackets entered league play thinking that it could avoid the ACC cellar this season. But after losing each of its first five conference games (with an average margin of defeat of 12.6 ppg), Georgia Tech appeared destined to finish at the bottom of the ACC standings. But on Saturday against Wake Forest, Tech looked like world-beaters, opening the game up with a 37-7 run before cruising to an 82-62 win.

Tech isn't as bad as its 0-5 start implies. Their record is more indicative of their schedule than general ineptitude on their part. I think we would have gone 1-4 against a schedule of vs. Miami, @ NC St, vs. VT, @ Duke, @ UNC. Georgia Tech is better than their early record indicates; but they're not about to open up an early 20-point lead on us either. Tech is actually pretty close to us in terms of RPI, sitting seven spots above us at 124.

Georgia Tech doesn't have any guys on offense that jump out and wow you, but they do a have a bunch of solid contributors. They've got 4 guys that average at least 9 ppg, but their leading scorer only records 10.5 per contest.

Mfon Udofia, the coolest name east of the Mississippi, leads the offensive attack for the Jackets. His scoring numbers have actually gone down a hair from a year ago, but his assist to turnover ratio has improved, something that any point guard should strive for.

Tech has a couple of freshmen to watch out for in Robert Carter and Marcus Georges-Hunt. The Jackets have a couple of upperclassmen in the front court comparable to Booker in size (but inferior in production) in Kammeon Holsey (6-9, 230) and Daniel Miller (6-11, 255).

With Booker unlikely to completely be over his illness (playing two games in three days certainly won't help matters), and with Milton Jennings' inconsistent performance an always unknown, Tech would be wise to feed the ball in to its bigs early and often.

On Sunday, I asked for somebody to step up on offense, and Milton and Damarcus Harrison responded. With Booker unlikely to be at 100%, they're going to need to step it up once again if we are going to win this one. I think we have the better team in tonight's contest and should pull out the W at home, but if Harrison and Milton struggle to get things going, we could be in for a long night.

Game tips at 7 on RSN (Fox Sports in the Upstate).