The genesis of Georgia Tech’s run to the 2004 NCAA Championship game came many months before the Yellow Jackets went dancing in San Antonio.
The dreams of greatness took place during the summer after some ferocious pickup games in the old dingy freshman gym. That’s where the guys would gather every day and go head-to-head, scraping and scuffling to get better, to get tougher. That’s where the seeds germinated.
“These games would be really competitive,” recalled B.J. Elder. “One day I was sitting there watching – maybe we had lost or whatnot and we were on the side watching other guys play – and I looked at Will Bynum and I looked at Jarrett Jack and I looked at Clarence Moore – and I said, ‘Man, we don’t have any holes. We’re going to the Final Four.’ I said it that day.”
Anthony McHenry said, “Every day after those intense battles, we would go over to the cafeteria, and it’d be like nothing ever happened. I think B.J. was the first to notice this team could be special and I remember him saying, ‘If we can compete like this against each other, it’s going to be tough for other teams to beat us.’”
It was a period of uncertainty for the program. The Yellow Jackets had lost its superstar when Chris Bosh jumped to the NBA after one season. That was the main reason the Yellow Jackets were picked to finish next-to-last in the preseason ACC poll.
That turned out to be a factor that drew the team closer.
“Coach (Paul) Hewitt made it very clear that he didn’t want a one-man show,” said Is’mail Muhammad. “He preferred to have five or six guys averaging eight, 10, 12 points. I think we had multiple superstars on the team. You put them on a different team, and I think everyone’s numbers would have been high.
“B.J. could have averaged more, Jarrett could have averaged more, I could have averaged more. But everyone sacrificed their personal games to fit our system and our style of play. That’s why we were so successful, because everyone was selfless.”
The Yellow Jackets served notice of something special when they won the Pre-Season NIT, defeating No. 1 Connecticut in the semifinals.
Regular-season success
Georgia Tech changed a lot of minds early by winning its first 12 games, including the Preseason NIT Tournament at Madison Square Garden. That’s when the beliefs began to change.
“I was a little slow on the uptake of how good we were,” center Luke Schenscher said. “Beating UConn in the Preseason…
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