After a disappointing loss at Duke on Sunday night, the Virginia Tech men’s basketball team must continue on the road to play Boston College tonight at 7 p.m.
“We really can’t concern ourselves with what happened on Sunday,” said Tech head coach Seth Greenberg. “We’ve got to more concern ourselves with obviously the challenge ahead playing on the road against Boston College.”
The Eagles (13-13, 4-8 Atlantic Coast Conference) certainly do not command the same respect this season that the Blue Devils do, but they are a formidable opponent.
In a Jan. 23 meeting against the Eagles in Cassell Coliseum, Tech (21-5, 8-4 ACC) narrowly escaped with a 63-62 victory behind a Dorenzo Hudson layup with five seconds remaining in the contest.
While the Hokies haven’t played excellent on the road in the ACC so far, they have been competitive in each game and even picked up wins over Virginia and North Carolina State. If Tech expects a victory over the Eagles, it will need to continue to play well.
The Eagles do not hold a stellar home record like the Hokies and have taken some beatings on the road, but ACC teams have been forced to fight for their victories in the Conte Forum for the last month.
Since Jan. 26, the Eagles have defeated Clemson and North Carolina at home, and narrowly lost home games to Florida State by four and Duke by three.
A definite key for the Hokies will be how well they rebound. In the win against the Eagles in Blacksburg, Tech was outrebounded by six, and Tech struggled mightily against Duke and 7-foot-1 center Brian Zoubek, allowing the Blue Devils to get 27 second-chance points.
“We’re relying on our guards to rebound the basketball a great deal,” Greenberg said. “It’s plain and simple. That’s an area we need to continue and improve and we need to continue to harp on, but we need to be more physical in our blockouts. Zoubek is a huge human being, and we just didn’t do a good enough job of blocking him out.”
In addition to the rebounding, Tech will also need to pick up its offense to hang with the Eagles, which shouldn’t be too difficult since BC ranks 11th in the ACC for field goal percent defense at 44 percent per game.
Tech shot 32.8 percent from the field against Duke and was 2-for-15 from three-point range. The Hokies held the Blue Devils to 29 percent, but the Hokies’ shooting will need to improve if they expect to win against the Eagles.
A version of this article appeared in the Feb 24 issue of the Collegiate Times.
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