Feb. 2, 2004
ATLANTA – Georgia Tech begins a stretch of four road games among its next five, beginning Tuesday night with a visit to Tallahassee to meet Florida State at 7 p.m. in the Tallahassee-Leon County Civic Center.
Tech (16-4 overall, 4-3 ACC), ranked 14th in the nation pending release of this week’s polls, is tied for third place in the ACC with Wake Forest after dropping an 82-74 homecourt decision to first-place Duke (7-0) Saturday. NC State is alone in second place at 5-2 following its victory at Maryland Sunday.
Florida State (15-6 overall, 3-4 ACC) had an 88-73 non-conference win over Savannah State Sunday and has won two of its last three ACC games, including upsets of No. 7 North Carolina and No. 10 Wake Forest in consecutive games. The Seminoles are tied with the Tar Heels for fifth place.
Tuesday night’s game will be televised over the ACC regional cable network and air in the Atlanta area on Fox Sports Net South. Georgia Tech/ISP radio network coverage can be heard in the Atlanta area on WTSH-FM (107.1).
A win over FSU will put Tech in third place by itself and give the Yellow Jackets their best record at the halfway point of the ACC schedule since the 1995-96 season. Tech has done no better than 4-4 since then. A Tech win will give the Yellow Jackets 17 wins for the season, matching Tech’s best total under Paul Hewitt (17-13 in 2000-01). Tech equalled last season’s win total after 19 games.
Tech is 3-3 on road games this season, 1-2 on the road in ACC games. The Jackets visit Tennessee on Saturday, then after a home contest next Tuesday against North Carolina, travel to Virginia and Maryland.
“I was pleased with our mindset when we all got together yesterday,” said head coach Paul Hewitt. “We had a hard-fought loss Saturday, and our guys poured a lot of emotion into that game. I was pleased with the way we came back yesterday. We realize that the Duke game is behind us, and we have to move on to Florida State.
“Florida State is an outstanding defensive team. There is nothing new there with how sound and how strong Florida State is defensively. Nate Johnson [FSU point guard] is having as good a year as any. He’s doing a great job for that team.”
Five Tech players are averaging in double figures this season, led by 6-4 junior B.J. Elder at 15.4 points a game (4th in the ACC), 6-3 sophomore Jarrett Jack (13.4 ppg, 16th in the ACC), 6-4 senior Marvin Lewis (11.3 ppg, 24th in the ACC), 6-0 junior Will Bynum (11.2 ppg, does not qualify for ACC rankings) and 6-6 junior Isma’il Muhammad (10.9 ppg).
Jack, Tech’s point guard, and Luke Schenscher, Tech’s 7-1 junior center, have started every game this season.
Jack, who led Tech with 19 points against Duke, is third in the ACC in assist average (6.20 per game), fourth in steals (2.25 per game) and seventh in assist-turnover ratio (2.00-1), while shooting 48.8 percent from the floor. Schenscher, who scored 18 points with eight rebounds against the Bkue Devils, averages 9.0 points and a team-high 6.2 rebounds (11th in the ACC), hits 55.1 percent of his shots and ranks fifth in the league in blocks (1.40 per game).
Elder, who broke a shooting slump in his 36-point effort last Tuesday night against Clemson, has hit 34.3 percent of his three-point attempts (10th in the ACC) but has struggled overall this season at 40.3 percent. He averages 14.6 points a game, shoots 36.3 percent from the floor and 80.8 percent from the foul line against the ACC.
Muhammad, a 6-6 defensive whiz who has started the last six games for Tech, would lead the ACC in field goal percentage (62.0) but falls 12 field goals short of qualifying for the rankings. Since going 6-for-6 against Virginia on Jan. 15, Muhammad has made just 13 of 31 shots from the floor. He is Tech’s second-best rebounder at 5.2 per game.
Lewis, who has averaged 10.3 points in ACC games, is shooting 37.5 percent from three-point range this season (5th in the ACC) and 43.8 percent against the league (2nd best).
Bynum, a 6-0 junior who has given the Jackets a big lift off the bench, broke into double figures for the season after the Wake Forest game and has improved to 11.2 points per game for the season. Even better in ACC games at 14.1 points a game, he has shot 44.4 percent from three-point range against the conference.
Clarence Moore, a 6-5 senior who missed the Clemson game with a toe injury but returned to play against the Blue Devils, averages 6.1 points and 4.8 rebounds for the season, and has hit 46.5 percent from three-point range and is second on the team with 26 steals.
Tech’s other primary reserves include Anthony McHenry (2.8 ppg, 3.3 rpg), a 6-7 junior playing strong forward, and Theodis Tarver, a 6-9 sophomore postman who has averaged 1.1 points and 2.1 rebounds since getting back on the court Jan. 11 after a pre-season knee injury.
Defensive pressure, both half-court and full-court, continues to be the catalyst for Tech and creates the offensive opportunities that have the Yellow Jackets averaging 79.8 points a game (third in the ACC, best in Paul Hewitt’s four years at Tech) and shooting 46.7 percent from the floor (also third in the ACC).
The Jackets have allowed only six teams — Saint Louis, VCU, Georgia, North Carolina, Wake Forest, Duke — to shoot 40 percent this season, and have limited their opponents to 37.3 percent collectively and 27.5 percent from three-point range. Those figures rank first and second, respectively, in the ACC for all games, and are second-best in the ACC for conference games only.
Tech’s scoring yield of 63.7 points a game this season would be the sixth lowest in school history if the season ended today. Its field goal percentage allowance would be the fourth lowest, and the three-point yield would be a school-record low.
Tech Series vs. Florida State
> Georgia Tech has won three of the last four and 12 of the last 19 meetings in its series with Florida State, but the Seminoles still hold a 27-22 lead in the all-time series which dates back to 1963.
> The teams have split the regular-season series five of the last six years except the 2001-02 season, when Tech won both games. In that span, FSU also won the schools’ only ACC Tournament meeting (63-62) in 2000.
> Tech is 8-14 in games played in Tallahassee, including a 5-7 mark at the Tallahassee-Leon County Civic Center. Since the Seminoles joined the ACC, Tech is 5-7 in Tallahassee.
> Last season: Tech defeated FSU on Jan. 14 in Atlanta, 81-74. Marvin Lewis scored a career-high 33 points, hitting 11 of 13 shots from the floor and 6-of-8 from three-point range. On Feb. 15 in Tallahassee, FSU took a 15-point halftime lead and withstood a Tech second-half rally to win 71-64 behind Anthony Richardson’s 18 points.
> Tech has won four of the six games against FSU with Paul Hewitt as its head coach, and split the two games with the Seminoles under their head coach Leonard Hamilton. Tech is 2-1 against Hamilton, with a victory over his Miami team in December of 1997.
> Since FSU joined the ACC, the Seminoles have won 13 of 25 meetings. Florida State won the first six in a row, Tech followed by winning five straight, and is 7-7 against the Seminoles since then.
> In those 25 games, 10 have been decided by four points or less, 16 by 10 points or less. One of those games went to double-overtime, which the Yellow Jackets won 110-108 on Feb. 11, 1999 in Tallahassee.
> Tech and Florida State were both members of the old Metro Conference from 1976-78, and the Seminoles won three of those four meetings.
From Georgia Tech’s 82-74 loss to No. 1 Duke Saturday:
> Tech’s 37.7-percent shooting from the floor was its lowest in an ACC game this year, and its 31.8 percent from three-point range matched its lowest. After the scored was tied at 66-66, the Yellow Jackets missed 11 of their last 13 field goal tries, and missed seven of eight after the game was tied 68-68 at the 3:27 mark.
> Duke shot 50 percent against Tech for the third consecutive time. The Blue Devils were the first team to achieve 50 percent against the Yellow Jackets since NC State did it in the ACC Tournament last year.
> Duke’s 38.9 percent from three-point range was the second-best percentage a team has shot against Tech this season (VCU shot 50 percent). Tech has allowed 25 threes in its last three games.
> Tech did a better job preventing offensive rebounds against Duke, allowing the Blue Devils 12 offensive boards and 13 second-chance points. In the two games prior, Tech gave up 41 offensive rebounds, leading to 42 second-chance points.
> Tech itself took 17 offensive rebounds against Duke, tying a season high, and turned them into 13 second-chance points.
> Tech forced 21 Duke turnovers, tying Virginia for a season-high against the ACC.
#14/16 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (16-4, 4-3 ACC)vs. Florida State (15-6, 3-4 ACC)February 3, 2004 * 7 p.m. ETTallahassee-Leon County Civic Center (12,200)
TV: Fox Sports Net South; Mike Hogewood, pbp; Dan Bonner, color
Radio: Georgia Tech/ISP Network (WTSH-FM 107.1 in Atlanta); Wes Durham, pbp; Randy Waters, color
Series vs. Florida State: FSU leads, 27-22 In Tallahassee: Tech is 8-14 At Leon County C.C.: Tech is 5-7
Georgia Tech coach Paul Hewitt: 130-75 (.634), 7th season overall 64-48 (.571), 4th season at Tech 26-29 (.473) vs. the ACC 4-2 vs. Florida State (1-2 in Tallahassee)
FSU head coach Leonard Hamilton: 229-231 (.498), 16th season overall 29-21 (.580), 2nd season at FSU 1-2 vs. Georgia Tech (1-1 at FSU)
Next for Georgia Tech: Feb. 7 at Tennessee, 3 p.m. ET Next for Florida State: Feb. 8 at Maryland, 1 p.m. ET
