Georgia Tech did the unusual Saturday, hammering an ACC opponent on the road. The Yellow Jackets’ 69-54 win over Pittsburgh at the Petersen Events Center broke an eight-game road losing streak in ACC games and was also their largest margin of victory in an ACC road game since a 26-point win over Wake Forest in March 2011, coach Paul Hewitt’s final season.
“I just thought overall it was a good team effort,” coach Josh Pastner said.
Five observations from the game:
Where the game was won
Tech (10-7 overall, 3-1 ACC) ripped Pitt in half to start the game, taking a 21-1 lead a little more than six minutes into the game. Using their length and quickness to create turnovers, challenging shots and sealing the defensive glass, the Jackets allowed no baskets in Pitt’s first 11 possessions and created five turnovers. At the other end, the cutting was crisp and the shotmaking unusually on-target.
“You spot a team 20, it’s going to be hard to get back from that,” Pitt coach Kevin Stallings said.
After scoring six points against Notre Dame on Wednesday, guard Jose Alvarado hit his first two 3-point tries and then scored on a cutter from forward Abdoulaye Gueye with an and-one foul.
“I was thinking, he has nine points in the first two (actually four) minutes,” center Ben Lammers said. “I was like, OK, this is looking pretty good so far. Keep doing this and we’ll win the game.”
It was remarkable to witness unfolding. Tech made 11 of its first 13 shots. Even contested layups, a perpetual weak spot, were going in. The Jackets got the offensive rebounds off both misses and scored later in the possession.
“I don’t even know how it happened,” guard Josh Okogie said.
Lammers said players knew what plays that Pitt was going to run.
"Our scout team did almost a better job setting screens and other stuff than they do,” he said. “Which is normal (given the close attention coaches give to the scout team)."
Decisive rebounding edge
Tech controlled the glass at both ends, as Lammers and Gueye overpowered a young team perhaps overwhelmed by Tech’s roaring start and still smarting from its 35-point loss to Duke on Wednesday.
The Jackets grabbed 15 offensive rebounds to Pitt’s 14 rebounds, a season-high 52 percent rate in a category where 35 percent is exceptional. Both Lammers (five offensive rebounds) and Gueye (four) had more offensive rebounds than any Pitt player had defensive rebounds. At the other end, Pitt (8-10, 0-5) had six offensive rebounds to Tech’s 24 defensive rebounds, 20 percent, Tech’s second-best rate of the season at that end.
Lammers finished with 16 rebounds, one shy of his career high.
“Obviously, I know I help out by getting rebounds, so it’s always kind of a conscious effort, but it’s not like, I need to get 20 rebounds this game,” Lammers said. “Just, it happened.”
Lammers continues to recover the form he showed in winning ACC defensive player of the year last season as his agility and quickness return after a sprained ankle in the second game of the season. He had two blocks and altered more shots as Pitt shot 39.3 percent from 2-point range, 12 percentage points below their season average.
“Ben just keeps getting better,” Pastner said.
Another starring role for Gueye
After playing perhaps the best game of his career the previous Saturday against Yale, Gueye topped it, going for a career-high 16 points on 7-for-8 shooting and bringing down eight rebounds.
He was critical to Tech’s quick getaway, blocking a layup, finding Alvarado on the cutter for the and-one basket, scoring a on screen-and-roll feed from Okogie and then beating Pitt down the floor to score on a put-back dunk after Okogie missed a layup in transition. He scored mostly going to the baskets or scoring at it, missing only his final shot, a jump hook.
He showed his rough edges with three turnovers, by fouling out and also getting hit with a technical in the second half, which Gueye said was for responding to trash talking from the Pitt bench.
“I got caught,” he said.
But his height, reach, quickness and effort, combined with an improving feel for the game, have been one of the most notable developments of the season.
“I have the confidence from everybody pushing me, like Josh O., Tadric (Jackson), Ben, everybody telling me, ‘Keep going! Nobody can guard your hook shot,’” Gueye said. “So I just keep doing it.”
Gueye has scored 38 points in 86 minutes in Tech’s past three games, which is more than he scored in his first two seasons (27, in 28 games and 236 minutes).
Four in a row
Tech has now won four games in a row (Miami, Yale, Notre Dame and Pittsburgh). Tech is also 3-1 in the ACC for the first time since the 2003-04 season, a year that ended with the Jackets playing Connecticut for the national championship.
“It feels nice to be on a little bit of a streak here,” Lammers said.
Tech has defended expertly and the offense has improved. Turnovers are still a problem, as are scoring lulls. The Jackets combined both after the 21-1 start, turning the ball over seven times in the final 19 possessions of the first half after committing just one turnover in their first 14. Tech had problems against Pitt’s full-court pressure, even once losing the ball on a 10-second call.
Miami had a bad night. Yale is under .500. Notre Dame was down its two best players. Pitt probably is the worst team in the ACC and played poorly to boot. Still, Tech won all four.
“But either way, those wins will definitely help us try to get our confidence to where now we can go to Virginia, who’s obviously a very good team, and we can go there pretty much fearless knowing we’ve won games,” Lammers said.
Tech will be at home against No. 3 Virginia at 8 p.m. Wednesday. The Cavaliers swept the home-and-home with the Jackets last season by a combined 33 points.
Personnel matters
Guard Justin Moore did not make the trip, Pastner said, for personal reasons. Moore is eligible and healthy, but did not dress for the three previous home games, either.
Walk-on guard Jon Brown also did not accompany the team because of paperwork reasons, Pastner said. Brown is the nephew of Tech legend Kenny Anderson.
A few Tech people of note were at the game supporting the Jackets – athletic director Todd Stansbury traveled to the game, along with his wife, Karen, and planned to stay Sunday to watch the Tech women’s team play Pitt. Sitting just behind the Stansburys was former Tech quarterback Justin Thomas, who is on the Pittsburgh Steelers’ practice squad. Pittsburgh plays Jacksonville on Sunday in a divisional playoff game.
Thomas visited the team in the locker room after the game.
“He was like, just keep hooping,” Okogie said.
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