July 1, 2004
ATLANTA – Georgia Tech’s basketball team, coming off a run to the NCAA national championship game in 2004, will face Gonzaga, which made the NCAA second round last season, on Dec. 18 in Las Vegas in the nightcap of the Las Vegas Showdown, a doubleheader which will be nationally televised on ESPN.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority made the announcement Thursday in conjunction with ESPN.
In the first-ever meeting between the two schools, Tech and Gonzaga will tip off at 12:30 a.m. Eastern time (9:30 p.m. Pacific) at the Thomas and Mack Center, the home of UNLV. The Bulldogs are the defending champions of the West Coast Conference. That game will follow a duel between Oklahoma State, whom Tech defeated 67-65 in the national semifinals last year, and the host Runnin’ Rebels, scheduled for a 10 p.m. Eastern time tip on ESPN2.
The Las Vegas Showdown is in its ninth season and occurs during a week-long schedule of events in the city culminating with the Las Vegas Bowl post-season football game, which will be played on Dec. 23.
It is the second national TV game Tech will play in its non-conference schedule. The Yellow Jackets also will face Michigan on Nov. 30, also on ESPN. Tech’s complete schedule will be announced in mid-August.
MORE TECH BASKETBALL NOTES
**Head coach Paul Hewitt was listed at No. 71 among “The 101 Most Influential Minorities in Sports” in last week’s edition of Sports Illustrated magazine. Hewitt was one of 15 collegiate sports figures named to the list, and one of four college basketball coaches along with Tubby Smith (No. 60), Kelvin Sampson (No. 79) and John Chaney (No. 98).
**Hewitt also received the Fritz Pollard Male Coach of the Year from the Black Coaches Association earlier in June. He was honored along with the Female Coach of the Year, Dana “Pokey” Chapman of LSU, and former collegiate head coach George Raveling, a mentor of Hewitt’s who received a Lifetime Achievement Award.
**Luke Schenscher failed to survive the last of three training camps in a bid to make the Australian National Team for the upcoming Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. The 7-1 rising senior had made the cut to the final 17 players. Schenscher, who averaged 9.3 points and 4.7 rebounds for Tech during its run to the Final Four last year, will return to campus this weekend and resume the training regimen he used last summer to great success.
