Greenberg directing Hokies to regroup

Story by Chris Graham
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Listen to “The SportsDominion Show” interview with Virginia Tech basketball coach Seth Greenberg. Show Length: 9:22.

The final score was 92-53. Might as well have been 92,000,000-53 for the way that it felt.
“Obviously I’m disappointed with the way that we played this weekend. But I’m not totally discouraged,” Virginia Tech basketball coach Seth Greenberg said to reporters in his weekly teleconference today.
It had seemed heading into Saturday’s game at North Carolina that the Hokies could be in line for an upset – with UNC missing Ty Lawson and coming off a pair of tough road games, and the Hokies coming in fresh as daisies with a week to prepare for the Heels.

The loss was the third in a row in ACC play for Tech, which had stood at 5-3 in conference play just a week and a half ago.

But even at 5-6, Greenberg is playing with house money with a team that was expected to do jack squat in the ACC this year after losing the likes of Zabian Dowdell, Jamon Gordon and Coleman Collins to graduation.

“It’s all part of that learning curve – and really when I look at the bigger picture, we’re at a push. We’ve had five wins, we’ve played five home games. This league is a lot about who you play, when you play them, where you play them, and that a lot of times determines your record. And being in a push at this stage with this team isn’t the worst thing that could ever happen to us,” Greenberg said.

It doesn’t get any easier for the Hokies this week. Tech is on the road at Maryland on Wednesday night.

“We’ve got to play better. It’s plain and simple. We’ve got to rebound better. We’ve got to defend more consistently. We’ve got to make some shots. We’ve got to deal with adversity better. There’s a myriad of things that have to improve,” Greenberg said.

“Obviously we’ve got to find a way to win on the road. Some of it has to do with the schedule-maker. I don’t know how many teams in our league have two road wins. We’re fortunate to have two roads wins. Unfortunately, we gave two of them back. We’ve got to find a way to do some of the little things that give you a chance,” Greenberg said.

Chris Graham is the executive editor of The SportsDominion.