ATLANTA — It has been 25 years since Georgia Tech last suited up a basketball team this young. That 1980-81 team, like this year's, had no returning starters.
The prospect for coach Paul Hewitt's group isn't as gloomy. It is unlikely that Tech will endure another 4-23 record and winless ACC mark as it did back then. This year will surely offer its share of ups and downs, nonetheless.
There will be the sizzling outside shooting of freshman guard Lewis Clinch and the blocked shots from 6-foot-9 freshman big man Alade Aminu. There will be good passes and transition baskets.
But there also promises to be mistakes — perhaps many of them early as these Yellow Jackets cut their teeth on the 2005-06 season.
It began Sunday with an 96-57 victory over Augusta State in an exhibition game at Alexander Memorial Coliseum.
Clinch scored 10 points, and Aminu dropped in 15 points and blocked two shots. Sophomore point guard Zam Fredrick, who averaged 6.7 minutes a game last season, led Tech with 19 points and four assists. Anthony Morrow sank 5-of-8 from 3-point range to score 17.
Offense? No problem for this team.
Defense?
"There are still some things that we really have to clean up before our first game," Hewitt said.
The Jackets were out-rebounded 41-40, including allowing 22 offensive rebounds to the Peach Belt Conference representative. The defensive deficiencies that do not show up in box scores, like fighting through screens, also are concerns.
"It's hard to get momentum when you don't get stops and you're not cleaning up the boards," Hewitt said. "By stops, I mean one and done. If you're constantly taking the ball out of the net or constantly defending an offensive rebound, I don't care how much firepower you have offensively, it's going to be ineffective."
That is a message Hewitt will continue to drive home to a team starting four sophomores — Fredrick, Morrow, Ra'Sean Dickey and Jeremis Smith — and one junior, Mario West.
If anyone understands what Hewitt is after, it is West. The junior has been groomed for this role in the shadow of last year's senior-laden team. Now, it is West's turn to be in front. A defensive menace, West showed Sunday that he also could rise with authority to the rim.
"If I can take (Isma'il Muhammed's) explosiveness and the way he got to the basket, and incorporate that into my game, that would be good," West said.
A one-handed dunk from the left wing in transition over two Augusta State players led to a mildly sprained ligament in his left knee. West returned to the game briefly, but left again when he said his knee tightened. He'll be examined again today.
"I was happy to see him get up," Morrow said. "He is consistent every day, in practice and in games. We really need him."
"He's the one guy that I know can guard," Hewitt said. "He sets the tone for us defensively."
Augusta State scored 22 second-chance points and was led by Tyrekus Bowman with 15 points and Dean Brebner with 12. Tech gets another chance to shore up its defense and rebounding Saturday in a closed scrimmage against Furman.
"When we play against a big-time ACC team, they're gonna be coming to the glass hard, like (Duke's) Shelden Williams and (Wake Forest's) Eric Williams," Fredrick said. "As a team, we have to get to the glass. We have to box out. We've been going over that the past few weeks."