AJC > Sports > Tech > Blog > Archives > 2007 > January > 31
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Assessing a meltdown
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
You know it’s going bad when you go from saying Tech can win if Ra’Sean Dickey and Jeremis Smith show up and give the Jackets get an inside game only to have them show up and give the Jackets an inside game and they lose anyway to the ACC’s 11th place team.
Of course, Smith and Dickey didn’t get busy until the second half, when Tech attacked the basket more, got buckets, and earned 22 free throws - a sharp contrast to one attempted in the first half.
But Wake attacked the basket the whole game, and Dickey (nor anyone else) failed to slow Kyle Visser other than by fouling him. He hit 10 of 12 of those.
Ball game.
Tech scored 45 points in the second half, the Jackets’ best offensive half by far in this four-game losing streak. But they gave up 44. Couldn’t stop anybody when it mattered. A trend of late.
Without getting too deep, the Jackets don’t appear to be as athletic overall as perhaps some predicted they’d be — witness how infrequently they press when that was supposed to be so much more prevalent this season, and how they consistently succumb to dribble penetration. The absence of Lewis Clinch doesn’t help here.
And the point guard is struggling, forcing his shot and his passes (five straight failed alley-oop attempts over two games by my unofficial count).
Paul Hewitt can’t find any answers, either.
I didn’t foresee such difficulties.
