Oct. 26, 2006
TO: Fans, Friends, and Supporters of Georgia Tech Athletics
FROM: Dan Radakovich, Georgia Tech Director of Athletics
I want to once again take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks to all of you great Georgia Tech alumni and fans for your unwavering support of our Yellow Jacket football program this fall. We have had an exciting year so far and can attribute much of our home field success to the atmosphere created by you and the Georgia Tech community. It is our hope that even better times are still to come.
This week, as you know, our Homecoming opponent is the Miami Hurricanes. Aside from being a festive and event-filled weekend, the game marks a critical showdown with one of our divisional rivals in the Atlantic Coast Conference. We encourage all of our fans to show the same passion and enthusiasm in supporting our team as always, but remember to be good sports. We should make a special effort to treat our opponent and its fans with the respect and dignity that sets Georgia Tech apart.
Remember that courtesy and sportsmanship should be a part of all of your weekend activities. And when the team needs your help on Saturday, be loud and be proud. We’ll show the ACC and sports fans across the nation that Georgia Tech is a special place.
HOMECOMING ACTIVITIES
As you visit campus this weekend, please be reminded of the Homecoming activities. The annual Wreck Parade will take place Saturday morning, beginning at 8 a.m. The Parade begins at Alexander Memorial Coliseum and travels south on Fowler Street to Peter’s Parking Deck. Fowler Street, including the intersection of Fowler and Fifth, will be closed until approximately 11 a.m. For those of you who park in the AMC lot, please enter via 10th Street. The south end of the lot will be used for staging during the parade, so please park in the north end of the lot until the vehicles can be cleared.
TOY DRIVE
I’d like to remind everyone that our student-athletes will be conducting the sixth annual Michael Isenhour Toy Drive at Saturday’s game. Fans are asked to bring a new, unwrapped toy, and student-athletes, in conjunction with the U.S. Marine Corps, will be collecting toys at all gates beginning 90 minutes prior to kickoff. Toys will be donated to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Toys for Tots and other local Atlanta-area charities. In the past five years, we have collected more than 7,500 toys for deserving children, and this year, our student-athletes have set a goal of 2,000 toys, so we hope everyone will participate.
BASKETBALL SEASON IS ALMOST HERE
Our men’s basketball team has received plenty of favorable publicity so far during the preseason. We have been picked to finish fourth in the Atlantic Coast Conference and to return to the NCAA Tournament this year, and have appeared in some top 25 rankings.
We have six of our top seven scorers back from last year, including the ACC’s top three-point shooter in Anthony Morrow, and our freshman class is rated as high as the sixth-best in the country. Fans attending the Nov. 4 exhibition game against Morehouse at Alexander Memorial Coliseum are reminded that the start time has been moved to 4 p.m. so that you can watch the Tech-NC State football game on ESPNU at 7 p.m.
Our home schedule is tremendous, including Penn State in the ACC-Big Ten Challenge and our state rival, Georgia, early in the season, and three of the nation’s top 25 teams in conference play, North Carolina, Duke and Boston College. Our Coliseum is sold out, and our team deserves to see every seat filled for every game.
Our women’s basketball team is fired up to tip off the 2006-07 season with an exhibition on Wednesday, Nov.1 at the Alexander Memorial Coliseum vs. South Carolina Upstate. With strong leadership, experience and depth on the perimeter, the Yellow Jackets expect to be a sleeper in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Georgia Techreturns four starters and nine letterwinners from last season including one of theACC’s top five rebounders, junior Janie Mitchell, and one of the league’s top ten scorers, Chioma Nnamaka, who’s 12.4 points per game lead the team, followed closely by Stephanie Higgs with 12.1 ppg. Our team also welcomes a talented crop of freshmen,including Australia’s Brigette Ardossi, who brings international experience, three-point threat Angel Buie, and a six-foot-two center with a six-foot-seven wingspan in Tiffany Blackmon.
With a strong non-conference schedulethat includes Georgia, Northwestern, Mississippi State and Vanderbilt and their challengingACC schedule, the Jackets look forward to an exciting season that will land them among the conference elite.
VOLLEYBALL HOSTS ACC MATCHES THIS WEEKEND
The Tech volleyball teams continues ACC play by hosting Duke and Wake Forest this weekend at O’Keefe Gymnasium. At Friday’s match, which begins at 7 p.m., the team will participate in the “Dig for the Cure” fund-raiser in conjunction with the Atlanta Chapter of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. Start time for Saturday’s match has been moved to 8 p.m. so fans can attend following the football game.
Again, thank you for your positive response to “The Good Word.” We welcome your feedback at goodword@athletics.gatech.edu While I cannot guarantee a personal response to every email that we receive, please know that they will all be read, so I do encourage your continued participation in this process. Some of your questions could become topics for future issues of The Good Word.
I also encourage you to share this letter with any Tech fan who may not have access to the Internet. Our goal is to inform and engage as many Yellow Jacket supporters as we possibly can.
I want to personally thank you for your continued support of Georgia Tech Athletics as we move forward with our vision for excellence.
Go Jackets!
