Georgia Tech will be without ACC’s top scorer and player of the year, Moses Wright, on Friday, when the Yellow Jackets’ number 9 faces 8th-placed Loyola Chicago in a game from the first round of the NCAA Tournament, according to a Jeff Goodman’s report from Stadium. by CBS Sports. Playing without Wright will be a crushing blow for Georgia Tech as it makes the program’s first appearance at the NCAA tournament since 2010.
At 1.80 m tall, Wright is the team’s main big shot and would have been assigned to help contain Loyola Chicago’s star center, Cameron Krutwig, an AP All-American of the third team who leads the Ramblers in scoring. Wright was particularly influential in the last six games of the Georgia Tech regular season, averaging 23.5 points and 10 rebounds per contest to send the Yellow Jackets into the postseason with haste.
Georgia Tech won its first ACC tournament title since 1993 last week to secure an NCAA tournament offer – although the Yellow Jackets were also designed to do Big Dance as an at-large team.
A veteran Wright was an unknown high school candidate who has steadily progressed through his four seasons at Georgia Tech to become one of the most effective graduate players on the ACC for the past two seasons. Its progression reflected the development of Georgia Tech as a program under the command of fifth-year coach Josh Pastner. The Yellow Jackets suffered during seasons lost in Pastner’s second and third years before closing the last strong season to enter the 2020-21 campaign with impetus.
The winner of the game Loyola Chicago-Georgia Tech is expected to face Illinois’s No. 1 in a second round game on Sunday.