ATLANTA (January 2) – Georgia Tech sophomore basketball player Clarence Moore, who missed pre-season practice and six games while recovering from a fracture in his left foot, will sit out the remainder of the 2000-01 season and seek a medical red-shirt, head coach Paul Hewitt said Tuesday.
Moore, a 6-4, 225-pound forward from Norco, La., broke the fifth metatarsal bone in his left foot Sept. 3 while playing a pickup basketball game. He underwent surgery shortly afterward to insert a metal screw into the bone.
He returned to practice after the regular season began and made his debut in Tech’s 72-67 victory over UCLA. Moore played in five games before pain and soreness in the foot led doctors to sideline him prior to the Morgan State game on Dec. 23. He averaged 1.2 points and 1.4 rebounds and averaged 10 minutes per game off the bench.
“We’ll apply for a medical hardship for him at the conclusion of the season,” said Hewitt, whose first Tech team is 8-3 heading into Tuesday night’s first Atlantic Coast Conference game with North Carolina. “His foot hasn’t progressed satisfactorily enough for me to put him on the court. I always believe in giving players a chance to play at their best. Continuing to play him this year would not be fair to him.
“The pain and soreness he has experienced could be a signal of more problems, and we can’t take the chance that he would re-injure the foot.”
One of nine returning lettermen from last season, Moore played in all 30 games as a freshman, starting five, and averaged 4.8 points and 3.9 rebounds per game. In the five games he started, all consecutive games, he averaged 10.2 points, 8.6 rebounds and 2.8 steals, including a season high of 17 points against Florida A&M and 15 against Virginia.
