Georgia Tech Battles, but Falls in Overtime Against Notre Dame

Georgia Tech has now lost four in a row and their record is 8-7

Things are not going well in Atlanta at the moment for Damon Stoudamire and Georgia Tech. 

After an 8-3 start and some promising wins, Georgia Tech has now lost four in a row and sits at 1-3 in ACC play after an overtime loss to Notre Dame. It has been tough sledding for the Yellow Jackets, who have Duke, Clemson, and Virginia coming up. 

There were no changes to the starting lineup for head coach Damon Stoudamire tonight. Nait George, Miles Kelly, Kowacie Reeves, Baye Ndongo, and Ebenezer Dowuona were the first on the floor for the Yellow Jackets. 

The first half was a back-and-forth for most of the first few minutes until Georgia Tech's offense went ice cold over the final four and a half minutes and after leading by seven, Georgia Tech trailed 31-29 going into the half against the Fighting Irish. It was a 9-0 run for Notre Dame to close the first half out and Georgia Tech only hit one of their last nine shots, going scoreless over the final 4:19. 

Notre Dame was shooting better than Georgia Tech, but turnovers kept the Yellow Jackets in the game. GT scored 14 points off of 10 Notre Dame turnovers in the first half. The Fighting Irish shot 45% from the field and 36% from three in the first half, while Georgia Tech shot 32% from the field and 29% from three. 

Damon Stoudamire coaching vs Notre Dame / Georgia Tech Athletics

Georgia Tech took a 34-31 lead to start the second half, but a 12-2 run from Notre Dame gave the Fighting Irish the lead back. From there though, it would be back and forth, with the teams trading baskets. With 1:22 left, Georgia Tech called a timeout trailing by two and needing to find some offense. Notre Dame went to the line and split the pair, which extended the lead to three points. 

Miles Kelly, who had a good night scoring, hit a bucket with 20 seconds left to cut it to one point. Notre Dame went back to the line and hit both and looked like they were going to seal the deal without overtime. 

Then, freshman Baye Ndongo hit an incredible shot to tie the game and send it to overtime. Ndongo has been arguably the best player for Georgia Tech this year and one of the nation's top freshmen. He tied the game and the Yellow Jackets were going to have a chance to win it. 

The problem was, that the offense scored only two points in overtime. Notre Dame outscored Georgia Tech 9-2 in overtime and sent the Yellow Jackets to their fourth straight loss. 

Aside from the offense just not being able to manufacture anything in overtime, there were two big things that led to Notre Dame winning this game. They shot 21 free throws compared to Georgia Tech's seven and they hit 19 of them. Georgia Tech is one of the top rebounding teams in the ACC but was outrebounded 48-33 against Notre Dame. 

Georgia Tech point guard Nait George / Georgia Tech Athletics

For the game, Georgia Tech shot 38% from the field and 31% from three. Notre Dame shot 39% from the field and 33% from three. 

Miles Kelly scored 25 points and grabbed seven boards, Ndongo had 16 points and nine rebounds, and Nait George had nine points and 11 assists. 

Georgia Tech has a lot of things to figure out right now. It is not good to score only two points in overtime and the offense struggled for most of the game, compared to how they looked against Boston College on Saturday. 

Coming into 2024, Georgia Tech was 1-0 in ACC play with a win against Duke and had three straight games against teams projected to be among the worst in the conference. This was a perfect chance for Stoudamire's team to get to either 4-0 or 3-1 in conference play and get some momentum. They failed that test and now the season feels like it is at an inflection point. 

Georgia Tech travels to Duke this Saturday for their second matchup of the year with the Blue Devils. The game will tip off at 5:00. 

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