Some notes from Georgia Tech's 57-56 win over Wake Forest Saturday, game story here.

1. Georgia Tech's defense, with a little help from Wake Forest, was exceptional. The Demon Deacons shots 29.2 percent, Tech's best performance in that category since the same Deacons shot 25.9 percent in January 2011.

Center Daniel Miller’s five blocks tied his season high. He had five blocks against the Deacons in the first game, coincidentally. Both he and guard Mfon Udofia dug in defensively, as Uodfia was guarding C.J. Harris, Wake Forest's leading scorer. He scored 15, a fraction above his average, but Udofia’s tight defense limited him to eight shots, forcing Harris’ teammates to shoot more often, which was not a winning strategy for Wake. Aside from Harris and forward Travis McKie, Wake’s other players shot 6-for-27.

“They just run a lot of things for him, a lot of special plays for him,” Udofia said. “Just dial in and never relax, that’s pretty much it.”

Udofia, with Miller’s help, forced Harris into a spot to give up the ball on Wake’s final possession of the game. Harris took the inbounds pass in the backcourt, dribbled all the way to the basket but had no shot, so he had to pass to the corner, where Marcus Georges-Hunt read it and nearly stole the pass, deflecting it out of bounds.

Forward Devin Thomas missed at the buzzer. It’s funny; Thomas had a clear look at the rim, as Brandon Reed fell down trying to stay with him. It was a tough shot, but it’s not unreasonable to expect him to make that shot, which, of course, if he had, would have dropped Tech to 0-5 in games decided by five points or less.

The story would have been Tech missing opportunities at the start and then scoring on just two of its first 17 possessions of the second half. Instead, the shot bounced off the rim and Tech had its first back-to-back ACC road wins since 2007-08 and the story was instead Marcus Georges-Hunt’s strong finish and the Jackets scoring on 11 of their final 17 possessions, including their last four.

The game has a degree of randomness that mostly has been cruel to Tech thus far. The Jackets finally got a bounce to go their way.

“Robert (Carter) hitting those free throws, that was big,” Miller said. “Especially early on, we couldn’t hit anything from the free-throw line. It was just our game to win, I guess.”

2. Tech started off horrendously from the free-throw line, missing four technical shots to start the game. (Not entirely relevant, but I heard reliably that the technical on Wake Forest coach Jeff Bzdelik was his first since 2007.) However, Tech made its final seven free throw attempts of the game to finish 9-for-15.

The final two were made by Robert Carter with 8.7 seconds left, the two most clutch free throws made this season. Coach Brian Gregory said that when Carter was on the line, “I was praying like you wouldn’t believe.” Carter had been down after missing the front end of a one-and-one with 2:12 to go against Clemson that proved costly in the three-point loss, and had been doing extra work at the line in practice. He entered the game as a 59.3 percent free-throw shooter.

“I felt good about him going to the line,” Gregory said. “He’s a good shooter. The times he misses, a lot of it is maybe more lack of concentration than ability. Young guys do that sometimes.”

3. Forward Kammeon Holsey was 2-for-8, missing a number of shots he typically makes. He was shooting 55.8 percent from the field going into the game.

“You just have off nights sometimes,” center Daniel Miller said. “Usually those are automatic. I see him about to take that shot, I run down to the other end of the floor.”

He wasn’t the only one who missed from in close repeatedly. Wake forwards Aaron Rountree (four blocks) and Arnaud Adala Moto were factors in getting Tech’s bigs off their game.

“We also rushed a little bit on the post,” Gregory said,” but we told our guys we’ve got to keep getting the ball inside and keep attacking the basket something’s going to break. It finally did.”

4. Jason Morris played two minutes in the second half in his first action since the Miami game Jan. 5, when he aggravated his plantar fasciitis injury. Morris’ recovery has been a little slower than expected, but he could definitely be a help off the bench as his conditioning returns. He’s the most versatile guard off the bench and probably the best defender.

 5. The Tech women won their only game of the week, a 79-70 road win against N.C. State. Sydney Wallace made 10 of 20 shots, including four 3-pointers, to score 26.

The schedule gives Tech a relative break for its final four regular-season games – at Wake Forest, home against Miami and Clemson and at Boston College. Wake, Clemson and B.C. are all in the bottom five of the league (along with Tech and Virginia Tech). Miami is in fifth at 8-6 overall, but it’s an eminently winnable game for Tech at home.

It would appear, though, and last weekend’s two home losses (by a combined four points) to the Hokies and North Carolina probably assured it, that the only way the Jackets will make their seventh consecutive NCAA tournament berth is by winning the ACC tournament.