By: Kenneth Harrison

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Georgia Tech athletics have seen better days.

During the 1990’s through early 2000’s they were good in both football and Men’s basketball. They were accustomed to playing in the post season almost every year.

Fast forward to now and both are in trouble. The Yellow Jackets have not played in the NCAA Tournament since 2010. Tech is currently 10 – 12 and 12^th in the ACC. There are 15 teams in the conference.

The most recent game was an 80 – 72 loss to Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish are only 4 – 6 in conference play but they swept Georgia Tech this season.

“You can’t leave points off the board because (the Irish) will make you pay because of their offensive skill set,” coach Josh Pastner said after calling Notre Dame perhaps the best offensive team in the ACC.

“We did a great job with 20 offensive boards, a good job in the red zone (paint, 44-18). The bottom line is they hit some tough 2’s and they made nine 3’s. We didn’t make enough 3’s (4 for 18). Not having Mike Devoe hurts us because it takes away a shooter.”

The first person we have to look at is Josh Pastner. He’s been the head coach in Atlanta since 2016. The best record he had was 21 – 16 in his first season. Since then they have had losing records and won less than 15 games each season.

Based solely on the product on the court he is not right for the job. He also has additional personal issues that have negatively affected the program.

The NCAA announced that they have banned Tech from the 2019-20 postseason, put the school on four years probation, placed recruiting restrictions on the staff, forced the program to vacate wins, and fined the ACC institution an undetermined amount of money.

The question is what did he do to cause this? He brought his friend Ron Bell around the team and he committed major violations. This was reported in November 2017 when jilted former friend Bell shared this with the media.

According to the school, Tadric Jackson accepted benefits totaling less than $525 while Josh Okogie accepted benefits totaling less than $750.

Bell turned over documents to CBS Sports that show he spent $233.40 on a plane ticket for Okogie, sent him three pairs of shoes totaling around $444 and ordered him two shirts totaling $56.

Bell also provided CBS Sports with documents that show he spent $233.40 on a plane ticket for Jackson, sent him two pairs of shoes totaling around $271 and ordered him New York Knicks apparel worth $80.

Those documents add up to around the estimates Georgia Tech self-reported, and any incongruities could be chalked up to estimation differences, which are allowable by NCAA rules.

What I do not understand is why Pastner has not been fired yet. He is not getting results on the court and he has baggage. It looks like a safe bet that they will not be able to qualify for the NCAA Tournament even if they were eligible.

They need to part ways from him after the season and hire the right coach. They can get back to being a contending team in the ACC with the right leadership.