On Wednesday, No. 25 Georgia Tech won again, flying past Louisiana Monroe in a 97-37 rout.
The victory moved the Yellow Jackets to 10-0 and matched the best start in program history (the 1977-78 team was also 10-0, although against much different competition). It was Tech’s first game as a ranked team this season, and although very few people were there to witness it during a December afternoon inside McCamish Pavilion, coach Nell Fortner’s side went about business as usual.
“Absolutely it’s what you want to strive for,” Fortner said about her team cracking the Top 25 this week. “But it’s not the end all, be all. It’s just, ‘Hey man, we must be doing something good. But let’s keep working hard because we got a lot of goals that we want to try to attain.’ It’s exciting and I’m happy for ‘em. We’ll enjoy it, that’s great, but we got work to do.”
No Tech women’s basketball team has ever been 11-0. That could change at 2 p.m. Sunday if the Jackets can go on the road and beat No. 14 North Carolina (9-1) in their ACC opener. But win or lose on that day, Tech’s first month of the season has already been nothing short of remarkable.
Wins over South Dakota State and Oregon (ranked No. 21 at the time) in Hawaii, and a home win over Mississippi State, has put Tech’s NET ranking at 23. Tech’s other seven victories have all been by double digits and by an average of 36.4 points.
Going into Wednesday’s matchup with ULM, the Jackets led the ACC in assist-to-turnover ratio, rebound margin and 3-point defense and were second in the conference in assists per game, bench points per game, offensive rebounds per game, scoring margin and fewest turnovers per game.
“I know what they’re capable of because I see them every day,” Fortner said. “We are not anywhere near where we need to be because this conference is so incredibly hard. It’s just tough. It’s super tough. So you’ve gotta be really on point and locked-in on some things that you’ve gotta do.
“We still have a lot of room to grow, a lot of room to improve on and every day is something defensively we’re trying to get better.”
Fortner brought in a highly regarded recruiting class for the 2024-25 season to get the program back on track after a 17-16 season and 7-11 mark in the ACC last year. Those recruiting efforts have paid immediate dividends.
Credit: Georgia Tech Athletics
Credit: Georgia Tech Athletics
Dani Carnegie, a freshman from Grayson High School, is coming off the bench and leads Tech in scoring with 13.9 points per game. Chazadi Wright, a freshman from Wesleyan, is also coming off the bench and scoring 6.9 points per outing. They have complemented veterans Kara Dunn (13.3 points and 6.3 rebounds per game) and Tonie Morgan (10.9 points and 5.3 assists per game) along with starter Ariadna Termis, a 6-foot-6 Spaniard anchoring the middle from her center position.
Fortner has played 12 players this season. Six of those are averaging at least 21 minutes per game and 11 are averaging more than 11 minutes per contest.
“I would say how our bench is deep and the defense,” said Rusne Augustinaite, a sophomore from Lithuania, about the team’s undefeated start. “I think defense wins games and coach (Fortner), every practice we work on defense. I think it’s really important for us to have good energy and we can rotate fast and be aggressive. If we got tired we have somebody to sub in and we keep going. Defense is the key for us right now.”
Sunday’s trip to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, will be Tech’s second opportunity for a win against an opponent considered Quad 1 according to the NET rankings. In January, the Jackets must go to Louisville (44), Notre Dame (7) and Duke (11) and have a home game with Nebraska (29) on Dec. 21. February’s slate includes a matchup with North Carolina State (24) and a trip to California (31). Tech has twelve games remaining against Quad 1 and Quad 2 opponents, seven of which are on the road.
If the Jackets played like they played Wednesday, racing out to a 28-10 lead after the first quarter and 53-14 lead at halftime, they will put themselves in position to beat whomever is in their way over the next three months.
“It’s been fun to watch this group come together and start to really see who we could possibly be. But we’ve got some tough challenges ahead of us, we really do,” Fortner added. “That’s where you really know who you are, start understanding who you are. Can you handle the challenges? You might not win every game, but how are you playing, how are you competing? But it feels really good with where they are right now.”
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