If the NC State Wolfpack men’s basketball team wants to prove anything this season, after an overall disappointing year, it’s going to have to start Tuesday night in Dayton.
NC State got the news on Sunday that — while they were one of the final selections to the NCAA Tournament, seeding in the West region — they will have to play in the First Four against Texas, a team that has already beaten them once before, if they want to make it to the tournament proper.
The Wolfpack barely squeaked into the NCAA Tournament and their ACC Tournament win over Pitt probably was the only reason they got in.
NC State finished the season losing seven of their last eight games and a lot of their marquee wins lost their luster as the season went on with a lot of those Quad 1 opponents piling on losses and their big win over UNC being clouded by the fact the Tar Heels were missing their two best players at the time.
Add in losses to Georgia Tech and Notre Dame, two teams who didn’t even make the ACC Tournament, and the resume started to accumulate quite a few holes.
NC State coach Will Wade said back in February after a last minute collapse against Miami, that the team would be lucky to even make it to Dayton, but he admitted Sunday that he was still surprised by the draw.
“I’m shocked to be going to Dayton, but we did it to ourselves,” Wade said. “We have a Quad 4 loss to Georgia Tech and we didn’t handle business down the stretch. We’re fortunate to be in, happy to be in. I did think our metrics and some of our stuff was a little bit better, but we’re not complaining about being in. We have a chance and now it’s on us.”
It won’t be an easy first matchup for the Wolfpack though, as they lost to the Longhorns 102-97 at the Maui Invitational back in November.
“I was surprised,” Wade said. “I think they try to avoid rematches in the first round, so I’m not sure what all went down there.”
As has been a problem all season for the Pack, Texas took advantage of NC State’s defensive shortcomings in their last meeting, scoring 48 of their points from beyond-the-arc at a 50% shooting efficiency.
However, the Longhorns also struggled to end the year, losing five of their final six games, so if NC State can tighten up defensively, they’ll have a good shot at advancing.
Despite how the season has gone and where the Wolfpack find themselves, the roster does have a lot of tournament experience on it.
Terrance Arceneaux made it to the National Championship with Houston, both Darrion Williams (Texas Tech) and Tre Holloman (Michigan State) have been to the Elite Eight and beyond them, there’s tournament experience with Ven-Allen Lubin (UNC), Quadir Copeland (McNeese) and Alyn Breed (Providence).
The Wolfpack will be hoping that that experience can deliver.
“That was part of the idea in putting a roster together and putting a team together was to get some tournament experience and make sure we were experienced in these situations,” Wade said. “So we have that and we’re going to lean on those guys and we need those guys to step up and come through for us.”
Should they win in Dayton, the Pack will have to catch a flight all the way to Portland, Oregon to play BYU just two days later on Thursday, so the path forward is certainly not an easy one.
But regardless of whether they advance or not, it feels almost certain that Wade will remain with the program moving forward.
The disappointing year had led to quite a few rumors surrounding the Wolfpack head coach and his future at NC State, mostly linking him to a potential return to LSU, where Wade coached for five years.
However, Wade made quite a strong statement in regards to those rumors just a few days ago.
“I was hired at NC State to do a job and this wasn’t gonna take one year,” Wade said. “I’ve already met with our administration about next year and some of the changes that we need to make and the things we need to do to put this program where it deserves long term. We’re gonna win and we’re gonna win big at NC State. That’s what we’re going to do moving forward. We have the resources, we have what we need and it’s up to me and my staff to get the job done.”
