Josh Pastner and Georgia Tech Surprisingly on the NCAA Tournament Bubble

This year had low expectations for the Georgia Tech mens basketball team and first year head coach Josh Pastner. As a matter of fact, they were not even supposed to win ACC game. They have defied all expectations and have top wins over teams like UNC, FSU, and Notre Dame. You fans who do not follow the yellow jackets may ask why they have done so well for a program with a first year head coach and losing many top tier seniors from last year including slashing guard Marcus Georges-Hunt, long range sniper Adam Smith, and double-double machine Chuck Mitchell. They have been able to get tough home acc wins because of the winning environment Pastner has set up. First he puts so much attention on fans showing up to games and making Mccamish Pavillon the "Thrillerdome" again. He has had promotion after promotion to get fans to go to games as well as advertising on radio shows and talking to groups of students to put the hype back in GT basketball. This effort has given tech a better home crowd than they ever had with former coach, Brian Gregory. This year the band has been loud and the student section has been rowdy. Specifically the student section has been known to not let an air ball go for the entire game. Ask NC ST freshman Dennis Smith Jr. about that. Now that we have talked about the environment lets talk about what has actually been getting the job done on the court. Junior Ben Lammers has had a breakout season after getting limited minutes behind Chuck Mitchell and Nick Jacobs last year. This year he has turned into one of the most reliable two-way players in college hoops. He is 2nd in the NCAA in blocks as well as the Tech offense being ran through him. He can post up as well as having a very good midrange game that has allowed him to have outburst of multiple 20+ point games this year. Next we have to talk about Tech's Diaper Dandy, Josh Okogie. This Frosh has picked up the slack from Georges-Hunt's graduation last year. He can put the ball in the bucket with a pair of 30+ point games as well as scoring a game winning bucket at the buzzer against Notre Dame. Senior Quentin "Ice" Stephens is the oil that makes the team win ballgames. He is very streaky and when he is hot tech tends to win but if he goes 0-9 from the field they are in trouble. Another wild card this year for GT is guard Tadrick Jackson. He may be the most offensively skilled player on this team and provides well needed sparks of the bench. Any team playing Tech needs to beware of this man on the court of all times. Tech's other key players includes the dime dropping Josh Heath, as well as Defensive Stopper Corey Heyward. These two guards may not score at the level of other players named above but their above average effort and talent helps this team out very much. If GT can get a couple more wins and get to around 21 wins they should be golden to back there way into March Madness. Not to bad for a team that wasn't supposed to win an ACC game.