Updates on Hewitt; updates on spring football
A New York paper yesterday quoted Georgia Tech athletics director Dan Radakovich as telling 790AM the Zone that basketball coach Paul Hewitt had a “golden contract.” It also paraphrased him saying that if Hewitt were to leave for St. John’s, Tech’s next coach would come from a mid-major college because of the Institute’s financial constraints.
The issue is Radakovich didn’t appear on 790AM, nor did he say those things.
Hewitt did meet with St. John’s athletic director Tuesday evening, a few hours after Radakovich gave the Storm permission to talk to Hewitt, but no details have been made available. Hewitt is not in his office at Georgia Tech and the voice mailbox on his cell phone is full. A spokesman for St. John’s declined to comment Wednesday morning.
The same New York paper reported earlier this week that Hewitt, Florida’s Billy Donovan and Virginia Tech’s Seth Greenberg were the Storm’s leading candidates. Donovan reportedly turned down an offer of $3 million a year.
Hewitt is from the New York area and is known as an outstanding recruiter who could tap into the wealth of talent in the five boroughs.
However, he has said that he and his family are happy in Atlanta and aren’t looking to leave.
Hewitt is 177-144 at Tech, including 67-93 in the ACC.
—
Turning to football, Paul Johnson sat down with the media to preview the spring practices, which begin on Monday.
Hitting the highlights:
There is no depth chart right now because everything is still very fluid. Johnson said they hope to leave the spring, which ends with the T-Day game on April 24, with a two-deep.
Based upon experience, he said Anthony Egbuniwe, Albert Rocker and Osahon Tongo are penciled in at one outside linebacker, with A.T. Barnes, Malcolm Munroe and Chris Crenshaw at the OLB. Logan Walls and T.J. Barnes are at nose tackle (though he hinted that Barnes could be moved to offensive line), with Izaan Cross, Euclid Cummings, Jason Peters, Emmanuel Dieke and J.C. Lanier at defensive ends.
But Johnson said Lanier could move to nose tackle and that Steven Sylvester could move from inside linebacker to outside linebacker. He’s one of several players that could switch positions. A couple of defensive ends could move to outside linebacker and a couple of defensive linemen could move to the offensive line. Johnson said that DL-to-OL switch would be done for two reasons: one, to balance the scholarship numbers between offense and defense, and two: “I’ve challenged them on the conditioning and weight,” Johnson said. “I don’t want to lie to them. That’s [the OL] where they are headed.”
But he stressed that everything’s so fluid there’s not much point in trying to read too much into anything.
Johnson said he’s excited to see which players will be able to take what they are learning about the new 3-4 defense from the classroom to the field.
“It’s going to be important to see how fast they can learn the terminology,” Johnson said. “I don’t know how much the techniques are different. Everybody wants to make it rocket science. It’s not rocket science.”
Switching to offense, Johnson said that he’s been impressed by early enrollee Charles Perkins during morning drills. B.J. Bostic, another early enrollee, will start out at slot but may get time at quarterback.
Replacing three starters on the offensive line will be one of the more interesting areas to watch, Johnson said.
“Got some young guys who we’ve got a chance to get a really good look at,” Johnson said. “They may be an upgrade, but they’ve got to show us. How hard are they going to work, what are they gong to do?”
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166 comments Add your comment
Jesse Stone
March 25th, 2010
10:58 am
All this talk of Tech linebackers and no mention of Julian Burnett???
Jesse Stone
March 25th, 2010
11:00 am
Someone said it best earlier. Something along the lines of not caring as much if a coach gets his players to the NBA. We want the coach to get them to their sophomore year.
PlantationNBA
March 25th, 2010
11:02 am
Yeah, Jesse, and at least get them to class every once in a while.
PlantationNBA
March 25th, 2010
11:03 am
Being a feeder school for the NBA is nothing to brag about. At the home of Homer Rice’s “total person” program there should be more emphasis on well-rounded student-athletes.
QuickDrawCrittenton
March 25th, 2010
11:08 am
Lay off my man Hewitt or I bust a cap in yo’ azz. If it wasn’t for him I’d be preppin for finals in may senior year now…or maybe preppin for the next round of the NCAAs. Instead, I got me some big jack and a big azz 9mm, even if I ain’t got no job right now.
QuickDrawCrittenton
March 25th, 2010
11:12 am
Ever notice how the same folks who criticize football coaches and programs for exploiting athletes to further their own careers fully support basketball coaches like Hewitt who make huge salaries exploiting players who never get a real shot at the education guaranteed to them by their scholarships? Of course they need a coach to push them into the classroom until they appreciate it themselves, but some of Hewitt’s guys don’t stay here long enough to finish their second semester (see Favors).
ACC is a joke
March 25th, 2010
11:15 am
Tech has played two very average teams out of the SEC in UGA and LSU. 2 losses resulted in 3 tries. tech played Iowa, an average Big 10 team and we all know about the Big 10. Bigand real slow. Tech was humiliated. 39 total yds vs those slow, white farmer boys. Tech was the laughing stock of the entire 09 bowl season. What were the USA TV viewer ratings on the Orange Bowl??? Sad they were.
Tech did in 09 defeat SEC cellar dwellers in MSU and Vandy. Congrats. Frankly, nothing has changed at tech in 45 years. When Tech was in the SEC they were somewhat better than Vandy and MSU and Tulane and usually they prevailed in those three games.
Tech would never play Ole Miss and they rarely played LSU. Tech was in their best SEC days a 6-4 team with a usual win over Duke or a Rice out of conference and back and forth with true rival Clemson.
Tech grads my age are quietly and will always be ……………ashamed to be in the ACC. They miss UT, Auburn, Alabama and Florida. THESE were their natural rivals and Bobby Dodd’s son played QB at U of Florida. See? Dodd played at UT. Tech gridiron men my age know the truth. They are humiliated for being in the ACC. Why do you think CURRY BAILED for Alabama??? See?
Tech is better sutied to be in the ACC with MD, NC State, mighty Wake and UVA and they will usually struggle with the Miamis or the FSU of the world. Last year??? Congrats. No big deal to attend a BIG BOY bowl for the second time in 42 years.
I viewed Tech’s LAST Orange bowl and it too was a LOSS with Bobby Dodd at the helm, vs you guessed it ……………an SEC team, U of F.
ACC is small ball and all know it.
QuickDrawCrittenton
March 25th, 2010
11:17 am
It’s not only the NBA’s fault for employing children, it’s the coaches, school presidents, AD’s for continuing to admit them with the full knowledge that they won’t attend classes, won’t stay more than a year or two, won’t contribute to the academic atmosphere of the university, and generally speaking, won’t represent the shcool well once they’ve bolted early for the NBA. On the one hand you have Mark Price and on the other extreme you have Marbury and Crittenton. Unfortunately, Mark Price graduated many years ago (Iknow I was his classmate.)
QuickDrawCrittenton
March 25th, 2010
11:19 am
ACCJoker: are you as irrelevant as your diatribe? I thought so.
Whadaya mean I am being demoted??
March 25th, 2010
11:20 am
Two Navy flyers are busted and pumping jet fuel in Bahrain and that is something to be proud of …….. that RECKLESS fly over of an urban area. Poor judgement.
Dumb and DUMBER they are. Howdaya like me now? they are screaming.
The two also know that when they flew over BD stadium, there were only 12,000 fans in there.
Coach Keith
March 25th, 2010
11:47 am
GT Alum,
If memory serves me correctly, NO we were not good before Hewitt came except if you count the early 90’s. We absolutely SUCKED. How many times did we play for the National Championship before Hewitt? How many times did we play for the ACC championship before Hewitt? Further more if you asked the top 10% of high school players what their aspirations are, 99% of those kids would say to play in the NBA. “The end justify the means.” I still say things are not looking good for my Jackets now.
SILLY UGAY FANS
March 25th, 2010
12:06 pm
LOL,
I grant you that UGA won a game that GT should have won, and did it by beating GT at it’s own game. You say GT fans claim domination on a game won by 3 points, but what about UGA fans claiming domination by 6. I myself don’t hate the UGA program, but what I do hate is UGA fans that talk all this crap about GT being nothing and never having a chance against mighty UGA. So many UGA fans loss their argument just by the simple fact that they spend so much time trying to poke holes in GT’s game they show that they worry each and every year about the loss to GT.
dawgfan
March 25th, 2010
1:21 pm
We don’t claim domination on a victory by 6 points. We claim domination by 8 victories out of the last 9. You win one game in 9 years and then call our wins a fluke. Tech fans are simply not bright people. Really, you’re just stupid. Its like a nail talking smack to a hammer. You have nothing to say to us. We own you. It doesn’t matter what we do against Florida, Tennessee, or any other team not called Georgia Tech. It is completely irrelevant. We own you. For the love of a vandrook what is so hard about this for you nimrods to understand? It is quite laughable how you pretentious pukes act like you are so much smarter than everyone else, but can’t even understand football records. I have simply never seen anything like the delusion on North Avenue. We own you.
And really what it all boils down to Tech fans is that we have no resprect for you whatsoever. You act like kings of the damn universe for a 9-4 season and 1st victory over Georgia in 8 years. You put the score on rings that it means so much to you. You trash UGA football for an entire year. The tide has turned. There’s a new sheriff in town. You win a bunch of games in ‘09 against ACC and SEC creampuffs. Schultz and Bradley blow smoke up your butts about how awesome you are. You turn out in record numbers for the ‘09 UGA game convinced that you are attending the coronation of the new king of college football in the state of Georgia. You leave said game looking like you have just attended a funeral instead. Then, instead of taking your lumps like men, you rationalize and spin the loss as one of no importance. Your “goals” are all of the sudden a very fluid situation dependent upon whether you are able to obtain them. I mean really Tech fans, it doesn’t get anymore cowardly than that.
Thanks.
Jesse Stone
March 25th, 2010
1:48 pm
Coach Keith,
Are you serious? How mant times did we play for the ACC Championship before Hewitt? How old are you? I know Cremins won the ACC Tournament 3 times. I’m not sure how many Championship appearances he had. Finding a “Paul Hewitt” is not like finding a needle in a haystack. Finding a Paul Hewitt is like finding a drunk kid on an Athens street.
where's St Simon
March 28th, 2010
3:29 pm
tech face the facts.
last year we made the sorry excuse that you only beat us cuz we had a crappy defense. we were sayin stuff like ‘well that was the worst defense CMR had put on the field.
guess what. this year’s was worse and we held you to over 100 yrds under your rushing average.
the offense was tricky at first but any team with actual talent eventually figures it out within one or two games.
our recruiting class is and will be twice as good as yours so throw out the whole ‘just wait till CPJ recruits some REAL players’ dream
your ranking was purely based on wins vs bc, uva, duke, nc state, unc, and other teams from the ACC (All Cupcake Conference)
you will never be better than your owners from Athens
and no navy gimmick will ever change that
GO DAWGS
see ya at Sanford nerds
GTRocks!
March 28th, 2010
11:00 pm
Butt Sniffers from U GA Y – Football AND Basketball ACC Champs! Go back to the F A R M and wipe with your toilet paper diplomas!