MILWAUKEE — Georgia Tech fell well short once again Sunday in its efforts to beat a team from a major conference, falling 71-60 to Northwestern at Fiserv Forum as part of the MKE Tip-off event.
The Yellow Jackets are now 0-5 this season against power league competition. The latest defeat to such a foe was never really in question inside the home of the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks.
Tech never led in the contest and, even though it fought to get within three points toward the end of the first half, was handily beaten in the second half due to woeful offense and Swiss cheese defense (appropriate given the location of the game).
At 4-6, Tech is off to its worst 10-game start since the 1981 team was also 4-6.
“A third of the season’s done now and in order to get better, you just gotta own it,” Tech head coach Damon Stoudamire said. “Everybody has to own it and that’s how we have to get better. We gotta roll up our sleeves. It’s not about pointing fingers. We, collectively, have to get better. Period. There’s no ifs no ands and no buts about it. Individually you have to own your part to be successful.
“It gets a little hard because they’re not kids, but the reality of it is that they haven’t seen a whole lot, been through a whole lot of adversity in their lives so they’re still trying to figure that part out as well.”
The Jackets got 17 points from Lance Terry, 11 points from Jaeden Mustaf and 10 points from Ryan Mutombo. Mutombo had not played this season until Sunday and the Georgetown transfer also finished with seven rebounds.
Tech, now 3-18 when trailing at halftime and 3-24 trailing at the 5-minute mark of the second half under Stoudamire, finished with 16 turnovers and gave up 19 fastbreak points to the Wildcats (8-3).
“This look like three or four games ago. For me that was the disappointing thing,” Stoudamire said. “It doesn’t matter whether you’re whole, whether you have injuries, you can’t have live-ball turnovers. And sometimes when you take bad shots that’s like a live-ball turnover. It’s crazy to think a team like Northwestern, which doesn’t run at all, beat us 19-0 in fastbreak points. We have to become a smarter team if we want to become successful.”
Tech looked like a team that had one too many cheese curds at lunch, sluggishly playing through the first six minutes Sunday afternoon before scoring and finding themselves in an 11-0 hole. Four minutes later Jalen Leach buried a 3-pointer from the left wing to give Northwestern its biggest lead of the half at 21-9.
The Jackets kept themselves within striking distance, though, with solid defensive play and a Northwestern field goal drought of 5:38 allowed Tech to dent the deficit. Nait George’s 3 from the left wing with 2:33 on the clock made it 26-20 and back-to-back Terry triples cut the score to 29-26 with 53 ticks left.
Northwestern got a Brooks Barnhizer jumper in the paint before the halftime buzzer and went up 31-26 into the break. That margin could have been much worse for the Jackets who shot just 32.1% and turned the ball over 10 times in the first 20 minutes.
But the second half began in the same vein for Tech as Northwestern came out of the locker room with a 12-2 run, a run capped by an uncontested layup for Leach, to build a 43-28 lead
That margin grew to 47-30 with 13 minutes to go after a Ty Berry triple, and the Jackets never sniffed anything close to a serious comeback.
“It’s definitely frustrating. We fight to come back, and then we come out slow again,” Terry said. “A lot of that I put on myself as far as not coming out poised and being out of control and having a lot of turnovers. Really just need to keep coming out stronger.”
Barnhizer had 20 points and 10 rebounds to lead Northwestern, which shot 47% in the second half, and was one of three Wildcats to score at least 16 and one of four in double figures.
Tech is back at McCamish Pavilion at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday to host Maryland Baltimore County (7-5).
“Losing is frustrating no matter where you’re sitting, whether you’re on the court or you’re biding your time on the bench,” Mutombo said. “It’s been frustrating for everybody on this staff, everybody in this program. It’s been frustrating for the fans. But we’re gonna turn things around. We are gonna find a way to get wins. And that’s going to be soon.”
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