Mailbag 2/9

Gway79: Do you think that Pastner not honoring his commitment that the team could do “whatever they want to do” to his curly, hard-to-tame mop if they won the ACC championship has cursed the team and the reason Moses and Jose didn’t come back last year?

Ben: I mean, if you’re superstitious, sure.

Asa: There is a part of me that believes that things might have gone differently if Pastner had donned the cornrows. Perhaps that is the answer to our woes these last two seasons. You may be on to something.

Rob: Hey....it’s an interesting idea that I hadn’t thought of before. I’m not a very superstitious person, but maybe.

Jake: Hadn’t thought of it that way, but you might be right…

GTSMURF: Is Raeven Boswell injured, or is she not earning playing time and they are looking to redshirt her?

Jack: At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if they want to redshirt her. She just doesn’t fit in the rotation right now unless some injury pops up. I don’t think she was ever front of mind of the freshman that would get a lot of minutes this season.

GTSMURF: Her brother Markus is a 2024 fb recruit. He has received offers from Arizona and Colorado, among others. Are we recruiting him as well?

Ben: I can’t find any indication that Georgia Tech has targeted him. He’s currently unrated on 247Sports, and a quick Google search didn’t turn anything up on Rivals, so it looks like he’s still pretty off-the-radar thus far. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Tech target him at some point, especially since he reportedly has some other P5 offers. But at this point, that hasn’t happened yet.

CTjacket: Do you have a song (or songs) that you know are really good but due to circumstances you can’t stand it? Maybe it was overplayed, maybe an ex’s fave, maybe just reminds you of a difficult time.

Ben: Nothing immediately comes to mind, but really, anytime I listen to a song too much, I need a break from it, but it comes around. Kinda like in How I Met Your Mother with I Would Walk 500 Miles.

Jake: I listen to the same five songs over and over again, and once I’m sick of them, I rarely can listen again. I realize that’s pretty odd, but it’s how I’ve been forever. What it also means is that I have pretty strong associations between a song and a time or experience, so if that experience or season of life was negative, then I generally don’t have great connotations with the song.

Not necessarily a the most grave of negative connotations here, but one that comes quickly to mind is “High Hopes” by Panic! At The Disco. I was listening to it a ton in the spring of 2019 because it was popular and someone on Tech baseball (I believe Tristan English) was using it as their walk up song, but that Auburn walk off in the regional really spoiled me on that one. Sigh.

Kenbo: What’s the chance Pastner gets shown the door before the season is over? If so who would be the interim? Who would you want as full-time coach?

Ben: It hasn’t happened at this point, so I don’t think it’ll happen before the end of the season. Anthony Wilkins is the associate head coach, so it makes sense that he would probably be the interim were Pastner to get the can before the season ends. As far as a full-time coach, that’s a great questions and one I’m not super able to answer. My only preference would be for someone who is not a Georgia Tech alum.

Jack: It ain’t happening. The win last night against Notre Dame certainly has earned him any theoretical time back he had lost. The financials just don’t make sense to do it at this point. The season is already gone. Let’s suck it up and reset in the offseason.

Asa: Zero chance. I also believe there is a chance he might not even be fired in the offseason. However, this is all coming from someone who, despite the recent results, is a fan of Josh Pastner and thinks he’s a good coach. So take everything I say with a grain of salt. I have no more knowledge on this situation than you do. It’s all just speculation until something really happens.

Rob: Agree with everyone else that it is not going to happen during the season. As far as coaching options if he happens to be fired during the offseason, I think it is too hard to try to come up with even a short-list of names at this point. When it comes to college basketball, there are so many teams and lots of routes to go down when it comes to hiring a new coach. It could be an up and coming coach from a smaller school, an assistant coach at a high-major school, or even a name like John Beilein who is not currently coaching.

Jake: We won last night, and it was thrilling. I had nearly forgotten what that feeling was like - perhaps we extend Pastner forever? In all seriousness, I can’t foresee a midseason change happening, if one does. It seems to be a much less common path than the typical plight of a football coach.