Ben Lammers balances mechanical engineering, basketball

Usually in college athletics, recruiting stories are told by coaches and athletes. In the case of Georgia Tech center Ben Lammers, an associate dean in the school’s college of engineering gets a turn to spin a yarn.

Tech professor Laurence Jacobs recalled Lammers’ visit to the school in September 2013 when then-coach Brian Gregory was trying to lure him from San Antonio. Part of the visit included a stop at the Invention Studio, a multi-million dollar space in Tech’s main mechanical-engineering building that is outfitted with 3-D printers, oscilloscopes, water-jet cutters, lathes, bandsaws and other tools to enable students to tinker with ideas and projects.

“We took him through that facility, and I remember his eyes just lit up,” Jacobs said. “He was just, like, Wow, this is exactly what I want. I remember him saying to me, ‘If I come to Georgia Tech, can I do this?’ And I was, like, ‘Absolutely.’”