Count me as one person that can’t figure out the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. In Georgia Tech’s last 4 games, they’ve lost to Georgia, beat Duke, lost to Virginia, and then go on the road and beat North Carolina. Huh? What’s going in Atlanta? First let’s talk about the game with North Carolina.

Paul Hewitt’s best teams have always had a dominant guard play. Today he got dominant guard play. Iman Shumpert was the best player on floor in this one. He scored 30 points with 6 assists and 4 rebounds. Forward Gani Lawal had a strong double double with 12 points and 12 rebounds. Sharpshooter Brian Oliver chipped in off the bench with 8. Georgia Tech jumped out to a 20 point lead then held on for dear life to get the 73-71 win. If there is such thing as  a season saving victory this might be it for the Yellow Jackets. They now have two impressive resume building victories; the win over Duke and now the road win at North Carolina, but heck if I know what will the Jackets will do next. What will be the key to keeping up the momentum, from the UNC win?

It’s going to be guard play. The Jackets are set inside with Gani Lawal and forward Derrick Favors. Favors has struggled recently, but he’s far too talented not to breakout soon. If Shumpert can continue to play anywhere near what he showed today, Georgia Tech is an extremely dangerous team. What I really like about Tech’s potential is that there are still players not playing their very best. As I said Favors is struggling a bit. Guard De’Andre Bell scored only 5 points today and is easily capable of averaging 8-12 points a game.

Next up is a Clemson team hitting on cylinders. The Tigers are coming off their own strong road win at NC State, and a 19 point whooping of North Carolina. The Tigers guard Demontez Stitt is doubtful for the Georgia Tech game Tuesday. Clemson provides another opportunity for a quality win for the Jackets, but their pressure defense will challenge the Tech guards. It should be quite a battle in Atlanta.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, January 17th, 2010 at 8:28 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.