Georgia Tech-Maryland live blog

Greetings-

We’re about 25 minutes from tip and I’d say there’s about 100 people in the Philips Arena stands. I trust it’ll fill up; crowds seem to have been late-arriving this season and traffic is a little busy. But former Wake Forest coach Dave Odom is here for his TV work.

Some thoughts on this afternoon’s ACC extravaganza. Some thoughts.

1. Maryland has been playing Nick Faust at point guard with Pe’Shon Howard out with an ACL. The move “gives them great size and an ability to make some dynamic plays because he’s a talent, there’s no question about that,” coach Brian Gregory said. Faust is 6-6 and more of a forward. He’ll be a tough size matchup for Mfon Udofia.

2. Maryland is 1-6 on the road this season, is 13-1 when it out-rebounds its opponent and 2-10 when it gets out-rebounded. In the first meeting between the teams, Maryland took 38 rebounds to Tech’s 36.

3. Jason Morris should be more mobile and explosive with three more days to heal his foot injury. He gave 17 minutes and did not score against Clemson.

4. Quotable Gregory: “Sometimes, when you’re in the middle of it like we are, sometimes you take a step forward and two steps back and then you take another step forward and eventually, at least, you’re in a much different place than when you started. The job now is to continue to not have those two steps back and that’s kind of what we did on [Tuesday] night.”

5. Brandon Reed on Udofia being the team’s leader:

“He’s always been like that. He just has a way of saying words that people gravitate to. He’s very passionate about what he’s doing, so I think that’s really why he’s the heart and soul of the team.”

Enjoy the game.