Virginia Tech and Seton Hall played a tight game, but in the end it was the Pirates coming away with a 68-67 win. The Hokies dropped to 3-3 with the loss, while Seton Hall improved to 4-2.
Jarell Eddie paced the Hokies with 19 points, 11 rebounds, four assists and four blocks, but he also had several plays down the stretch that he would like to have back. Over the final few minutes, Eddie missed a deep jumper off the top of the shot clock, missed a short jumper in traffic on the inside rather than passing it to a wide open Ben Emelogu, left his man wide open on Seton Hall’s game-winning three-pointer, and threw an inbouds pass out of bounds with just 12 seconds left and the Pirates up by three.
On the whole, Eddie was Tech’s top player throughout the game. However, the senior forward would probably like to have the last two minutes of the game back.
Freshman wing Ben Emelogu scored 18 points for the Hokies, including two very deep three-pointers on Tech’s final two possessions to keep his team in the game. He was 7-of-11 from the field and 4-of-5 from three-point range. Adam Smith added 11 points for the Hokies.
Freshman point guard Devin Wilson struggled mightily on Friday night against Michigan State, but he played better against Seton Hall. Though he only scored two points, he did finish the game with eight assists and five rebounds.
Turnovers continue to be an issue for the Hokies. Tech turned the ball over 14 times, while Seton Hall had just seven turnovers. Coming into the game, the Pirates had struggled with turnovers just as much as VT, but they were able to gain the advantage in turnover margin on Saturday night.
On the season as a whole, turnovers are perhaps Virginia Tech’s biggest issue. The Hokies have 86 turnovers through seven games, while they have forced just 47 turnovers.
Tech had a chance to win this game. They led 61-57 with 1:44 left, but things came apart in the final moments. The Hokies allowed Tom Maayan to score an easy layup, and then Fuquan Edwin was left wide open on the wing for a three-pointer with 22 seconds remaining that put the Pirates up for good.
Virginia Tech returns to action on Tuesday, November 26 when they host Furman. Tipoff is scheduled for 7pm in Cassell Coliseum, and the game can be seen online on ESPN3.
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that inbound miscue by Eddie was at the most important part of the game. Most college basketball games come down to the final minutes if not the final seconds. That’s why free throws and fouls are so important along with good coaching. Otherwise you wouldn’t need a coach. Pay attention to turn overs and our lay ups and inside game are atrocious. One missed lay up, yes. But we miss the majority of them. It’s embarrassing. If I were a 6′ 1″ to 6′ 5″ or taller basketball player I’d be very embarrassed. I’m 5′ 10″ and 52 years old and I’m sure I could miss a lay up. I’m positive a lot of you will agree with what I say. After all we are a major college with 30,000 undergrad and grad students. Let’s coach and play like Duke, Indiana, Kentucky, Kansas, UNC. Why not?
Chris, don’t fall into that cliche of “he’d like to have that play (or two minutes) back.” If it’s not successful, OF COURSE he’d like to have it back. It’s lazy thinking on the part of commentators instead of speaking critically about how the play evolved. Also see “He has to make that catch.” No he doesn’t have to, because he didn’t.
Certainly the team has issues with turnovers, help defense and fast break execution but JJ has these guys playing hard and fast. Guys are running hard form end to end and pushing the ball upcourt at every opportunity. I really think Jarell got gassed at the end and it affected his play. He was working very hard on the defensive end to get rebounds while Raines was on the bench and JJ left him out there a long time. I like the make-up of these kids and only hope they get to see some pay off for their hard work (ACC is by far the top conference in the country).
As freshmen, you see a lot of ‘skittish’ tendencies where nerves are overcoming player’s ability to play to their max. Erick Green had it. Dorenzo Hudson had it. But the light bulb turned on and they got it. I think we may be seeing it for CJ as well.
But it never did for guys like Robert Brown and it still hasn’t for Jarell. Perhaps optimistic, but I see in Jarell, a top level, ACC scorer waiting to break out. His ball-handling is poor but his shot is silk (seriously, I would LOVE to see that guy shoot in an open gym), his rebounding has improved greatly and I think he can use his size to overcome his limited ball-handling skills in one-on-one matchups. But I’m still seeing him lock up when he starts to think too much. Like yesterday.
On the flipside, that’s what makes a guy like Emologu special. He’s got that ‘it’ factor coming essentially right out of the gate. I think Smith has it and I think Wilson also seems pretty heady for his age as well.
Decision-making on those turnovers is the key. Friday night it was driving into a crowd or even losing the ball right in front of a defender.
I have never been a fan of a single player bringing the ball up against pressure. Waving the help off. It slows down the progress of the team, slows down their ability to get into their offense and we could easily get a 5-on-4 advantage if we pass ahead and cut, potentially leaving a defender trailing for a moment. The second half saw us standing around a lot and having trouble simply passing the ball. Again, taking forever to get a good look. That was the bugaboo of the Greenberg offense..
Actually four main issues with the SG offenses:
1. Standing around, little movement that mattered or added up (same with those screens that didn’t matter)
2. 1-on-1 basketball
3. Little concept of using the posts in an organized way, i.e, high-low, laker cutting off a pass into the post.
4. Limited concepts against zone defenses.
What I have seen Johnson improve on to an extent is an approach against zones and limited use of posts. The use of posts still come down to whether or not our guards simply just shoot. And that was what the first half looked like. We fans and analysts often express disappointment in the lack of impact of our posts…Raines, Barksdale, others have gotten criticized in the past if their point numbers are down low but if we really analyze how we play on the court, we should know that our posts get few true intentional opportunities unless there is a concerted effort to get the ball in like there was to Raines in the second half against Up State. They have to score off of offensive rebounding. Not saying we should when Raines relies on hook shots and forces it sometimes but there are ways to get the ball to posts like other teams do.
The standing around and 1-on-1 aspects of Vt basketball remains…sometimes it improves but it is the essential element of VT basketball, maybe men’s basketball in general outside of coaches who develop a system that requires movement and interaction.
These guys are very young and deserve some slack. And boy can they shoot the “3.” Once they get this trunover problem fixed, they will be competitive.
Abundance of mental mistakes from Eddie = why a freshman was named captain. Using a CFB phrase: “it is what is is” is an appropriate way to summarize his contributions.
Yeah, he looks great at times and then he does some stuff that makes you wonder “what was he thinking”?
That last 3 by Emelogu was crazy, he must have been about 4 – 5 feet behind the line.