Amazing.
This year’s NC State squad added a McDonald’s All-American and 2 other strong recruits to a team that returned 63% of its scoring, 68% of its rebounding, and has freed up space to play Cedric Simmons who didn’t play enough last year to impact the returning numbers. This week, the Pack scored 42 points in a universally described “ugly game” after only scoring 61 against Notre Dame (despite having a big lead and getting the chance to shoot free throws with the lead).
Carolina returned less than 10% of their scoring after losing their top seven players and they win AT Rupp Arena over the #10 ranked, Kentucky Wildcats.
Could you imagine if NC State lost that many players? We’d be hearing how it takes years for anyone to rebuild after such a “touch luck” exodus. Of course, we’re nowhere near competing on the level of programs like Carolina, so I don’t NC State has to worry much about losing that many players (unless they transfer….which has been known to happen).
Just for some perspective, NC State has defeated a single Top 10 team on the road throughout Herb Sendek’s 10 years of out of conference play. That was a December 2001 at Syracuse, who proved to be grossly over-rated when the failed to qualify for the NCAA Tournament that season.
For precision — Carolina has won as many road games against out of conference Top 10 teams in the last 6 hours as NC State has won in a decade.
Congratulations, Carolina.
