Game Recap | bc (9-6) 86, Hokies (9-6) 75

Categorized | 2012-13 Season, Game Recaps

Game Recap | bc (9-6) 86, Hokies (9-6) 75

Posted on09 January 2013. Tags: bc, bc-010813

Make it four straight losses for Virginia Tech. Tonight, the boston college eagles picked up their first ACC road win since the 2010-2011 season, beating the Hokies 86-75.

What went wrong, you ask? Here’s the stat that explains everything: Virginia Tech committed 17 turnovers and bc converted those into 29 points. The eagles committed just five turnovers and the Hokies didn’t score a single point off of them. And that’s your ball game.

Erick Green, the senior guard from Winchester, a.k.a. the Winchester Rifleman, did his thing, dropping 24 points on 10-of-19 shooting. Jarell Eddie looks like he’s starting to get some confidence back as he scored 21 points, though he is still struggling from behind the arc, shooting just 2-of-8.

The Hokies got off to a good start and led much of the first half. With 5:35 to go in the opening half, Tech lead 23-17. The eagles proceeded to go on a 15-3 run, that included a 10-0 stretch, to lead at the half, 32-26. The Hokies never recovered.

Tech got close a few times in the second half, but were derailed by turnovers. Trailing by 12 early in the second half, Ranking and Eddie hit back-to-back threes to cut the lead to just six points. After bc missed a shot and Beyer pulled down the rebound, the Hokies fans were on their feet, but a turnover by Eddie led to a three by bc’s Lonnie Jackson and boosted the eagles lead back to nine points.

With seven minutes to play and the Hokies still hanging around, Barksdale scored his final bucket of the night to cut bc’s lead down to three, 61-58. Ryan Anderson missed a shot at the other end Eddie got the rebound, giving the Hokies a chance to tie the game. But Green turned it over and Anderson, who had just missed a shot, converted a fast break layup, putting bc back up by five.

Too many turnovers equals another loss.

I think it’s safe to assume that C.J. Barksdale is out of James Johnson’s doghouse, having served a one-game benching or lack of effort during practice. The sophomore forward not only played tonight, he was in the starting lineup. He scored the games first basket and ended up with six points in 16 minutes of play.

Speaking of the starters, all five (Barksdale, Cadarian Raines, Green, Marquis Rankin, and Eddie) had at least two turnovers tonight. And we’re not talking great defensive plays that led to steals, we’re talking bad passes, poor ball handling, and miscommunication.

Eddie turned the ball over five times, Green had three, and the remaining three starters each had two. The only Hokies that did not commit turnovers were walk-ons Will Johnston (17 minutes) and Christian Beyer (22 minutes).

Joey van Zegeren struggled tonight. He committed three turnovers, but having been on the court for that game, I can tell you that it seemed like much more. He does not have a soft touch around the ball at all. He is capable of making good plays, but not consistently.

Let’s go back to the bench play of Johnston and Beyer. Johnston’s defense continues to be his weakness, but he’s improving. He’s a walk-on playing significant minutes and his progress is evident. And then there’s Beyer, who led the team in rebounding for the second time this season. He pulled down eight boards tonight. This kid is hustling. Again, these are walk-ons.

They’re not as fast, or as skilled, or as big as the scholarship players, but coach Johnson clearly loves their effort and the fans do too. Especially Beyer – that kid goes for every ball.

Next up for the Hokies, a road trip to georgia tech on Saturday. Niemo’s got a parenting class (excuse me while I ROTFLMAO), so you’re stuck with me for the recap. Cope with it. Get it? See what I did there?

There is some good news… this game was NOT a reverse Bear Fight. So there’s that.

This post was written by:

Cope - who has written 220 posts on Tech Hoops.

Gary is a Virginia Tech graduate and veteran sports journalist with a career spanning on-air work in television and radio, and as a writer, editor and columnist in newspapers. He has covered the Hokies since 1993.

Contact the author | Visit the author's website | Follow Cope on Twitter

Niemo

bc’s highest point total of the season. In fact, they had only surpassed 73 twice before tonight, and that was against fiu and dartmouth.
Chris

Brown hurt, or in the doghouse?

Funny that the only two tonight to not commit turnovers were the walk-ons.

I just want to see improvement in this team. Unfortunately, nothing but regression over the last three or so weeks. Hopefully it gets better soon… this is painful!
- Niemo
  
  Brown was reportedly ill.
H-SCokie

Niemo talks about The program bomb, what in the hell are we going to call SG.?. The A bomb? Mr. Clean? The program is no where near where RS left it. sG makes RS look like Dean Smith when he bowed out with the Stackhouse team lined up.

Only thing SG didn’t do on his way out of town (I’m presuming) is take a dump on center court. It’s criminal where he has left us and I’m pissed.
- Niemo
  
  Are you kidding? stokes was the worst coach in the history of basketball (along with Bzdelik and Lowe). SG was 1000 times better than stokes in all facets (recruiting, coaching, game mgmt, etc). He made lemonade from stokes’s lemons that first year, taking a team that had finished at the bottom of the BE 3 years in a row to a 7-9 record and a tourney win.
  
  SG left us with 3 4-star players (and that’s not including EG). Matthews took off under SG, not stokes.
  - H-SCokie
    
    Now I’m probably dumb, but definitely not stupid so I’m not going to try and defend stokes at all – much less here. But the fact remains that SG put this program over a f’in barrel and I’m pissed about it. Just look at our roster and team that we currently have compared to the 2003 squad that Seth inherited. Which group would you choose?
    
    2003 – Matthews, Dixon, Collins, Gordon, Sailes, Harris
    2012 – Green, Eddie, Raines, Brown, Rankin
    
    Matthews averaged 17pts a game under Stokes his junior year and Carlos averaged 14. Factor in Collins and Gordon and that’s a damn good nucleus of talent for a coach to start with.
    
    Is Seth a better coach than stokes, yes.
    Is Seth a better recruiter than stokes, yes.
    Was Seth better for our program than stokes, yes.
    Did Seth leave our program in better shape then when he started, hell no.
    - Niemo
      
      First of all, I think Green, Eddie, Barksdale, Brown, Raines is pretty comparable to Collins, Matthews, Dixon, Gordon, Dowdell (And Dixon was out injured that first year, so SG didn’t even have him).
      
      And Seth was able to sell Collins and Gordon on coming to VT (along with bringing Dowdell himself). He also didn’t lose Matthews or Dixon to transfer. That’s on JJ to a degree (losing Harrell and Doo Doo), so I wouldn’t blame SG 100% for that.
      
      Plus, I think a lot of the credit for our 2003-04 season has to go to SG. BM and CD could score under stokes, but our teams still lost 80% of their Big East games. Good coaches overcome adversity. I think if SG inherited the same situation JJ did, we’d be a lot more competitive right now. It’s just part of learning on the job as JJ is. So again, I think some of it is on JJ. After all, SG had to overcome the loss of CD that first season.
      
      Plus, we have a pretty awesome practice facility that I guarantee we wouldn’t have if we were losing as much as we were under stokes and only drawing 3k.
      
      In conclusion, I am of the mind that SG had to go. Was it done in a smart way? No. And that as much as anything has screwed us. So I just can’t agree with blaming him for our situation. He did a lot of good for VT, tried his absolute best, but in the end couldn’t get us to the Big Dance more than once. And when a coach leaves, all hell breaks loose (look at indiana in Creens first year – I think they only had 2-3 scholarship players). JJ has to earn his money now and show he’s a head coach.
Hank

As I said on the previous string, Weaver probably set the program back years by firing Seth so late in the process. At that point we had no chance to bring in a high profile coach, and any coach hired was going to have no chance to bring in any new kids. We would have been better off just firing Seth after this year…… Niemo, you are no doubt right, JJ will be fired after next year.
Les

The front office effectively gave notice to the coaching staff one year in advance. It was open knowledge that SG and staff were given the goal to make the NCAA’s this year or get fired. It’s a long and highly improbable jump from last year’s 4-16 record to 11 or 12 conference wins that would be required to avoid being fired. They all jumped ship. If you were a recemt hire and joined an unstable company, the first thing you would do is go back to your previous employer to get your jo back.
- Chris_atl
  
  Interesting point Les. I had assumed that the assistants left purely because of SG’s coaching style. If they did leave because they thought SG would be fired the following year that puts a different slant on things. I really thought SG deserved another year because of last year’s recruiting class but understood the sudden move because of the ssistant’s fleeing.
  
  On the JJ one more year thing, there is always a point at which a team is playing so badly that a coaches job is at stake but I don’t think one more year is fair to JJ. I want to see how he recruits after being fully in place during the entire cycle. If we have a bad season next year AND his recuiting class is bad then I would be OK to let him go. But, if we have a good recuiting class I think he gets to play with them for 2 years before being subject to being canned.
  - Niemo
    
    Chris-ATL – Heck, Sidney Lowe saved his job 2 or 3 times due to the incoming recruiting class – so that certainly should be taken into account. Then, state finally wised up and realized “maybe having someone is actually a good coach could do something with these studs who haven’t panned out.” Here’s hoping JJ does get some studs on the recruiting trail AND figures out how to coach.
    - RK in Roanoke
      
      six games away is UNC. Make sure you do some multiple posts or 1000 could be UGLY! Especially since you will miss a couple.
      
      BTW – i am assuming parenting class is La Maz? Watch Bill Cosby’s routine instead of the movie they show. Cos is way funnier and that birth movie is nasty.
Les

Correction: Make that 4-12 record to 11-7 or 12-6.

I’ve seen it several times in IT where people quickly jumped back to their previous employers in order to minimize a bad career move on their resume’. If the company they left is undergoing expected layoffs, it’s understandable.
Blue Collar Hokie

hey bc, did yall want the ball? you do? ok, here ya go.
Smitty_VT_in_FL

It’s gonna be a long year. The turnovers were insane and occured at crucial times. They seemed as contageous as the flu. We are constantly pushed around underneath. The 1st half just seemed spastic. 2nd half seemed more determined, but the turnovers and some missed free throws definitely hurt.
Fan support seems non-existent at the game. I couldn’t hear the crowd at all. I saw a lot of empty seats.
We’re the basement of the ACC this year IMHO. Hope next year is better. It seems that this year could really hurt recruiting. I’ll continue to watch every game and pull for a win, but I’m thinking each of those games will be like tooth extraction…OUCH!
Go Hokies!!
- Niemo
  
  Smitty – students weren’t there, which always hurts. i actually thought it was a decent turnout of the alums, but obviously they don’t bring the noise.
http://www.thegarycope.com Cope-acabana

FYI – This was our 1,600th post! Surely that puts us into some sorta blog hall of fame, right?
- Niemo
  
  Ha, and I’m 6 away from 1,000! Will they stop the game to honor me? And I hope my 1,000th post is about something good, not a reverse Bear Fight.
  - RK in Roanoke
    
    six games away is UNC. Make sure you do some multiple posts or 1000 could be UGLY! Especially since you will miss a couple.
    
    BTW – i am assuming parenting class is La Maz? Watch Bill Cosby’s routine instead of the movie they show. Cos is way funnier and that birth movie is nasty.
    
    (posted in the wrong place first time. Sorry! Time to stop drinking tonight)
vang11

Johnson has been disappointing. We were more talented than BC at every position except for PF, and we should have been beaten by 20+. We absolutely suck this year. However I think that we are going to be better next year. We’ve shown press in two games and I think that we could run that well next year. One thing about this recruiting class is that they are long. We just need someone to step up and score and I think that we could be good.
- Niemo
  
  I will like to judge JJ based on his whole coaching philosophy (pressing) but our full court press has been beaten like a rented mule so far this year. Always leads to a 3-on-2 where the two don’t pick up the man with the ball and it is an easy layup, or they react too early and the ballhandler dishes for a dunk.
- Chris_atl
  
  I hope you are right vang11 but I just don’t see anyway we can be better next year losing EG. 24 pts. a game, 5 assists and still shooting nearly 50% from the floor. Enter Rankin as our new point guard which will likely be 8 pts/game and maybe 3 assist and well under 40% from the floor.
  
  If the crop next year is decent I still think it will take another year for that to kick in.
goodraisin

The lack of defense and the bad ball security is just brutal to watch. At this rate it feels like we won’t win another game this season. I know that’s not true… just that it feels that way. Has it been 6 weeks yet? Come back Marshall Wood!
FruitpieTheMagician

Well I certainly noticed a few things in this loss –

1. we got dunked on a lot
2. we went fast, got sloppy, and our ball-handling/passing got amateurish.
3. everyone in the crowd got the memo, and was adorned in orange/maroon except for our coach, who wore a PURPLE tie! I mean WTF? This isn’t JMU!

and just a general comment – basketball is a colorful sport especially when coaching is concerned. I don’t like the quiet-type, “sh#*, we are losing” approach. I miss the Seth-get pissed on/get pissed off approach! We look bad on the court and boring on the sidelines. Ultimately I want a raving maniac on the chairs especially if we are playing poorly. Seth brought that, I am not sure what JJ brings.
- Chris_atl
  
  Starting to hear more and more mournings at the loss of SG. Until the asst. coaching thing I was a supporter of giving Seth another year with his class. And we would still have Montrel.
  
  I saw Seth doing the ESPN thing last night and he was pretty good.
  - 69HOKIE
    
    I’m still glad SG is gone. It was a year too late. If we had kept him, DoeDoe and Harrell would NOT be at VT. We can only conjecture who else would have left.
    
    We have to support, and endure, what we have now. Hopefully JJ gets this bunch back on track. If not the new AD will have to fix it.
    - Niemo
      
      Yeah, Doo-Doo was gone no matter what. Harrell we could have refused to release from his LOI (if he even tried to leave). But EG claims he was going to leave, and MR also considered it, so who knows what would have happened if SG had stayed.
    - Les
      
      I don’t think we have to endure anything. If the team continues at its current pace, we’re going to be pretty close to the worst defense in the NCAA. We’re already the worst among teams in major college conferences. That kind of record speaks to extremely poor coaching.
      
      http://www.ncaa.com/stats/basketball-men/d1/current/team/146/p7
- Les
  
  Eddie was pressing on offense. I think that may be a good thing if Brown and Eddie play more aggressively, instead of passively waiting for open 3s. Defenses have figured out their games, and their weaknesses are hitting 3s with a hand in the face or scoring off of drbble drives.
RK in Roanoke

Sometime JvZ reminds me of Roy Brow, tall but not that skilled and with hands of stone.

(yea, that comment dates me. I am old(er))

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Categorized | 2012-13 Season, Game Recaps

Game Recap | bc (9-6) 86, Hokies (9-6) 75

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