Limiting mistakes focus of Georgia Tech road trip
There were 18 seconds left in the game with Clemson, and Josh Okogie had just thrown the ball away. Georgia Tech head coach Josh Pastner called a timeout and lit into his young freshman about the need to be cautious.
“He’s throwing the ball away and he comes into timeout and I said, ‘What are you doing?’ and he said, ‘Coach, we’re up 12, we’re OK,’ and I said, ‘No, we’re not OK. The game is not over until the buzzer.’ Our team has got to play until the final buzzer. There is no room for error, we just don’t have that.”
It turned out Okogie was right; Georgia Tech went on to beat Clemson by 12 points.
But Pastner was even more right. He’s said it over and over this season: Georgia Tech’s margin for error is zero. And while the mantra does wear old after a while, it still remains true. When Georgia Tech limits mistakes, it has a chance. When it doesn’t, it has no chance.
The necessity to limit mistakes will be at a premium during Georgia Tech’s three-game road trip, which begins 6:30 p.m. on Sunday against N.C. State in Raleigh in a game televised on ESPNU. The Yellow Jackets play at Virginia Tech on Wednesday and at Virginia on Jan. 21 before returning home.
A good sign from the Clemson game was the performances of point guards Josh Heath and Justin Moore. They combined for 11 assists and only three turnovers and did an excellent job playing within the system.
“When they play like that, good things happen,” Pastner said. “They have to do their job, and doing their job means they don’t have to win us the game. They just need to run the team, keep it simple — and I don’t like using the word ‘lose’ — but just don’t lose us the game by throwing up bad shots and throwing the ball all over the place.”
Georgia Tech, which has exceeded all early season expectations, visits a team that has been among the most disappointing in the conference.
N.C. State has had a rough start to its ACC schedule. The Wolfpack (12-5) has won just one of its first four ACC games, including a 51-point loss at North Carolina and Wednesday’s 74-66 loss at Boston College. But head coach Tom Gottfried’s team is 10-0 at PNC Arena.
The Wolfpack feature one of the conference’s most exciting young players in freshman Dennis Smith Jr. He has lived up to his preseason billing by averaging 18.6 points, 4.1 rebounds and 6.1 assists.
Terry Henderson (15.4 points), Torin Dorn (12.9 points, 5.9 rebounds) and Abdul-Malik Abu (11.6 points, 7.8 rebounds) are the other top scorers on a team that averages 81.7 points.
Georgia Tech broke a five-game losing streak last season against N.C. State, beating the Wolfpack 90-83 in Raleigh. Abu had 22 points and 11 rebounds for N.C. State.
“We’ve still a long way to go. We’ll continue to get better but we’ve got a touch stretch coming up,” Pastner said. “We’ve got three road games, three very tough teams, and for us to have a chance we’re going to have to play near-perfect.”
This story was originally published January 14, 2017 at 3:09 PM with the headline "Limiting mistakes focus of Georgia Tech road trip."