Eagles Suffer Another Loss At Georgia Tech

The Boston College men's basketball team went into Saturday's game at Georgia Tech on a five-game losing streak. In a number of those games, however, the Eagles hung with their opponent for the majority of the contest. Facing a Georgia Tech squad that came in with a 1-7 ACC record, it was a great chance for BC to pick up its third ACC win and stop the losing streak. Unfortunately, the Eagles once again lost a close game, falling by just four points to the Yellow Jackets.

The Eagles came out of the gate strong, taking a 12-6 lead eight minutes into the game. Lonnie Jackson showed some great passing early on, assisting on two 3-pointers by Matt Humphrey. Jackson did a nice job of not shooting when covered, and instead finding open teammates. Yet, on some of the ensuing possessions, he tried to do too much, including firing up an air ball and passing inside for a failed alley-oop. Head coach Steve Donahue echoed that sentiment when discussing the Eagles offense.

"We kept the ball on one side of the floor, over-dribbled, and tried to make plays that weren't there," Donahue said. "I give them credit though. I thought they were very aggressive."

After the Eagles went up 14-11 with 10:42 left in the first half, they didn't hit any field goals until Jackson hit a three with two seconds left in the half. The Georgia Tech 20-19 halftime lead was aided by its 9-2 run during BC's drought. Over that period for the Eagles, they turned the ball over eight times and had 10 at the half. Donahue talked about what led to their struggles.

"I think it was a combination," Donahue said. "Georgia Tech did a very good job defensively, and we weren't really confident with the basketball. [They] blasted ball screens and blasted any kind of screen, making us really have difficulty passing the ball."

The game was close all throughout the second half, as the largest lead by either team was Georgia Tech by four. After Dennis Clifford made 1-of-2 free throws to put BC down one with 1:07 left, the Eagles had two chances to tie on 3-pointers by Danny Rubin and Ryan Anderson. They were both off the mark, and Tech came through with the four-point win. Donahue talked about how BC played when it was close.

"They executed a little better than we did down the stretch," Donahue noted. "They made plays and key shots. I thought we had a couple of open ones down the stretch that we didn't make."

Humphrey single-handedly kept BC in the game in the second half, and was the best player on the court for either side. He finished with 15 points to lead all scorers, and also led the Eagles with three assists. During the second half, it seemed that Humphrey was in every play, whether it was knocking down a deep-step-back three with the shot clock winding down, coming up with a strong block or steal, or hustling on the defensive end.

Humphrey also had a number of nice drives in the game, which proved to be a big help to BC's subpar offense. There were many possessions when they looked stagnant on the perimeter, and the Eagles ended up taking 27 threes, more than half of their field goal total. They only made eight of them, shooting 29.6 percent from three, and 34.7 percent overall. Jordan Daniels and Jackson combined to go 3-of-14 from beyond the arc.

"Unfortunately right now, neither team is a very good offensive basketball team," Donahue said. "We have got to get the ball hot, we never really had those opportunities."

BC grabbed 26 rebounds in the contest, one less than Georgia Tech, which came into the game averaging five more rebounds per game than the Eagles. Anderson once again recorded double-digit rebounds for BC with 11. This was all done despite the fact that the Eagles only got 18 minutes from Clifford. He recorded his fourth foul a minute into the second half, so Donahue looked to KC Caudill, who finished with 17 minutes, his second highest total this year.

Although it was another loss for the Eagles, once again they were in it up until the final buzzer. The experience can only help BC as they look to the future.

"This is not the end of the world. This is part of the process of building a program," Donahue said. "At some point, you hope everything clicks with this group, and further, as we will build this program, additional guys to help these guys."