In one month’s time, local teams will be hitting the hardwood as the college basketball season gets underway, and it’s a safe bet that a lot of NC State fans will be happy to leave what’s so far been a disappointing football season behind.
After a few seasons of growing apathy, there’s a new energy surrounding the NC State basketball program after last year’s crazy run.
Nobody was expecting the Wolfpack to pull off what they did last season.
Last year, NC State finished seventh in the ACC Preseason Poll and not a single player received any votes or consideration for preseason teams or honors.
But after conference play was finished, the Pack, with a 9-11 record and sitting as the ACC’s 10th seed, shocked the world.
The Wolfpack won five games in five days to win the ACC Tournament, the lowest seed to ever accomplish that feat, and stole a bid to the NCAA Tournament.
But the magic didn’t stop there.
As an 11-seed in the NCAAT, the Wolfpack just kept finding a way, beating Texas Tech, Oakland and Marquette to set up a date with Duke in the Elite 8.
They handed the Blue Devils a 76-64 loss and made it to the Final Four for the first time since 1983.
The miracle run would end there as the Pack fell 63-50 to Purdue, but it was one of the craziest and most unexpected runs in school history.
Going into this season, the fact of the matter is that the Wolfpack lost a lot of talent with DJ Burns, DJ Horne and Casey Morsell all reaching the end of their eligibility and Mohamed Diara taking his talents overseas.
NC State also saw the departure of assistant coach Joel Justus who played a big part in the Wolfpack’s guard development. He joined the Ohio State Buckeyes as an associate coach.
Finally, the Pack also lost MJ Rice, Ernest Ross, LJ Thomas and Kam Woods to the portal but none of them were really impactful players for NC State at any point last season.
In place of them, Kevin Keatts will be relying on a variety of transfer portal additions and potentially a few freshmen.
Keatts has been a portal wizard for years and he went to work this offseason as well.
NC State grabbed a pair of players from Louisville, junior guard Mike James (12.6 points, 5.0 rebounds) and senior forward Brandon Huntley-Hatfield (12.9 points, 8.4 rebounds), senior guard Marcus Hill (20.5 points, 5.0 rebounds, 2.6 assists) from Bowling Green and senior guard and one-time Tar Heel Dontrez Styles (12.8 points, 5.8 rebounds) from Georgetown.
The Pack also has a trio of freshmen joining the roster including a top-75 recruit in Paul McNeil Jr., four-star guard Trey Parker, who changed commitments from the class of 2023 to the class of 2024 and four-star guard Bryce Heard who took the final scholarship spot moving from a 2025 commit to a 2024 commit.
The newcomers will be building around a veteran core of defensively strong senior guards in Michael O’Connell, who also led the Pack in assists last season, and Jayden Taylor.
Add in the return of Ben Middlebrooks and Dennis Parker Jr., who each had some big moments for the Pack last season, and NC State is looking like a team still capable of doing some damage.
With Keatts’ portal magic and the Wolfpack’s commitment to a high-energy, defensive game, the Wolfpack could be a contender for back-to-back ACC titles and another solid NCAA Tournament run.
However, there’s always going to be concerns with portal-built teams.
Today’s game isn’t as much about development anymore as it is about finding underappreciated or underutilized veteran talent from around the country.
But the obvious risk there is chemistry.
Will the pieces that you bring in fit not only with the other players you’ve recruited, but also in the system that Keatts and the staff have implemented?
That will be the big question for NC State.
The Wolfpack’s season will begin on Nov. 11 as the Pack takes on the South Carolina Upstate Spartans.
Important dates to remember are a rematch with the Purdue Boilermakers on Nov. 28, the SEC/ACC Challenge that will see the Wolfpack take on Texas on Dec. 4, a showdown with blueblood Kansas on Dec. 14 and the start of conference play will be Dec. 31 as NC State heads on the road to take on UVA.
The in-state rivalry games will be on Jan. 4 (at Wake), Jan. 11 (vs. UNC), Jan. 21 (at Duke), Feb. 19 (at UNC) and Feb. 22 (vs. Wake) and the matches against the new ACC teams will be on Jan. 18 (vs. Cal), Jan. 25 (vs. SMU), Feb. 5 (at. Cal), and Feb. 8 (at Stanford).
