• The Virginia Tech Hokies head into their week long break for final exams with an 8-1 record, following Saturday’s thrilling 66-64 win at penn state. It’s their best start under Seth Greenberg. While the Hokies haven’t exactly beaten any teams currently anywhere near the top 25, thus far they have avoided any heart breaking, gut wrenching half-court buzzer beaters, and have avoided any embarrassing, head scratching losses. Some of their wins have potential to look decent on the resume come March.

While the Hokies lost to the best team they’ve played to this point, at temple, that loss doesn’t seem nearly as bad after the owls knocked off #3 villanova last weekend. Look at it this way, if the Hokies were in the Big Ten (11) (and let’s all count our blessings that we’re not) they would now be 2-0 in conference with two road wins. Not bad, especially considering the ACC lost to Big Ten (11) for the first time in the 11 year history of the ACC-Big Ten (11) challenge.

• Taking a look at this year’s freshmen, it’s becoming obvious that Erick Green is going to play a big role simply because of the lack of depth at the point position. Green did play a nice game against the nittany lions, hitting a three and getting good experience guarding psu star Talor Battle. But to me, the most impressive newcomer to this point has been Ben Boggs. Boggs has shown good court savvy, the likes of which have been missing from some past teams, and has demonstrated the ability to hit the open three and feed the big men in the post.

Think back two weeks ago. Tech was coming off a lackluster performance in the Philly Hoop Classic and heading to face iowa in Iowa City. The Hokies appeared to be dead in the water in the heartland, trailing the 2-4 hawkeyes 12-3 less then 5 minutes into the contest. That’s where Boggs stepped in by hitting two huge three-pointers that seemed to light a fire under this Hokie team and shake off the sluggishness. From there the Hokies used their superior inside game to separate themselves from the hawkeyes, but Boggs’ contribution was huge. As the Hokies continue to try to find a shooter to fill the void left by A.D. Vassallo’s graduation, future performances like this by Boggs will be key as Tech closes out its non-conference schedule and begins ACC play.