RALEIGH — With a chance to pick up a signature win, NC State folded in crunch time, missing the game-winning shot at both the end of regulation and overtime, to fall 77-76 to No. 19 Kansas Saturday night at Lenovo Center.
There’s no question that the NC State Wolfpack men’s basketball program is in a better place than it was one year ago, but frustrations have to be building over some of these losses that have been so close to flipping the other way.
Tough losses to Texas, Auburn and now Kansas is going to leave the Wolfpack without a chance of picking up a marquee win before they start conference play at the end of the year.
“We haven’t won some of these bigger games that we’ve scheduled,” said NC State coach Will Wade. “That’s just a fact. We haven’t won those, but I do think we’re close to winning them. I don’t think that every game is a referendum, but we certainly have to start winning some of these. We let an opportunity slip by today.”
NC State has not beaten Kansas since 1958, which was the first meeting between the two programs. Since then, it’s been 14 straight losses, but this was the closest it’s ever been.
“We have to get better no matter the opponent,” Wade said.
It was a close game the whole way through though, with 13 ties and 15 lead changes, but NC State has to be kicking itself for how the game ended.
To close out regulation, the Wolfpack got a key stop with seconds remaining and Will Wade elected to not take one of his remaining timeouts, however a Quadir Copeland floater failed to go.
“At the end of regulation, we kind of had it in a fast break situation,’ Wade said. “I don’t think we were going to get much better than Q shooting a little four-foot runner. I don’t think anything we could have drawn up would have been anything better than that.”
Then at the end of OT, with 1.1 seconds remaining Darrion Williams put up a final 3-pointer, which also was off the mark.
Perhaps a bit of controversy at the end too was that NC State senior guard Alyn Breed took an elbow to the face from Council as he tried to foul him to stop the clock with 19 seconds remaining in overtime, but upon review, the officials let it go, keeping just the initial foul from Breed.
“They didn’t really say anything,” Wade said on the explanation he got. “Just said it was a common foul.”
Really though, the Wolfpack lost primarily to Jayhawk senior guard Melvin Council Jr., who scored a career high 36 points in the win, including going 9 for 15 from beyond the arc.
In fact, Council’s nine 3s was the second most 3-pointers made in a single game in Kansas program history and was as many as every Wolfpack shooter combined tonight.
Coming into the game, Council had also made just five 3-pointers on 27 attempts.
“Incredible performance by Council,” Wade said. “He’s probably going to be telling his grandkids about that one. It was a great performance by him and give him credit. He had five 3s on the year coming in and hit nine tonight. He was in a rhythm and got going.”
Just one of those nights it seems, but it’s become a bit of a pattern with the way a few teams have had a standout performance from a previously quiet player against the Wolfpack this year already.
The team is struggling to find ways to win these big games, but Wade is confident that his squad can turn it around and find a way to get on a run.
“The results right now are lagging from our work,” Wade said. “The results haven’t shown on the scoreboard yet, but we’re massively better than we were 10 days ago when we left Auburn. Our team’s a lot better. You can splinter when you’re taking on water from losses like this, but I don’t believe this group will. But we are getting better.
“If we keep making progress, I feel really good about where we’ll be at the end of the year. I think we’ll like where we are and appreciate the struggle. But sometimes to get to this side, you have to go through some struggle and that’s certainly what we’re doing right now.”
