N&O: Hickson To Test NBA Waters

07-08 Basketball131

As we indicated just a couple of days ago…

RALEIGH — N.C. State freshman J.J. Hickson will enter his name in the NBA Draft but he will go through the process without hiring an agent, Wolfpack coach Sidney Lowe said Monday, leaving the door open for a possible return.”He’ll test the waters,” Lowe said. “He’ll get all the information he can and decide what’s the best thing. It may depend on where he’s going in the draft.”

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07-08 Basketball

131 Responses to N&O: Hickson To Test NBA Waters

  1. BigRed 03/18/2008 at 12:45 PM #

    Send the whole squad to the wilderness for two weeks:

    http://www.nols.edu/nolspro/expedition_leadership_training.shtml

    If that doesn’t heal it, maybe nothing would. Afterwards, talk to the instructors about the group dynamics they witnessed. At a minimum, you’d learn a lot about the individuals on your squad. With any luck at all, you’d end up with a group that had learned to respect each other, or at least the knowledge of who was and who wasn’t able to get through the difficulties.

    As a side benefit, the guys would come back toughened and conditioned. Nothing like carrying a pack at high altitude to improve your wind.

  2. Rick 03/18/2008 at 12:48 PM #

    “When Sid gets this program where he wants it, I’ll be waiting for this site to eat crow & admit Sid was a great hire & is a great coach.”

    So “this site” has made an official statement about Sidney? If so I was not aware of it. Hence there is nothing “this site” has to eat crow about.

  3. Rochester 03/18/2008 at 1:07 PM #

    When Sid gets this program where he wants it, I’ll be waiting for this site to eat crow & admit Sid was a great hire & is a great coach.

    I don’t think anyone here is rooting for the guy to fail so we can say we knew he sucked and couldn’t get the job done. I’d love him to be successful. I just didn’t see anything this year that led me to believe he will be. I’d be thrilled if he suddenly grew into the job next year. But I don’t think that’s the way it usually works.

  4. choppack1 03/18/2008 at 1:30 PM #

    Rochester – good point. We can’t close the book on Sidney yet. However, to think Sidney is going to be a great coach is an example of having an opinion w/ very little data to support your position.

  5. Trip 03/18/2008 at 1:33 PM #

    SFN: Not necessarily. The two groups of players were one set of friends vs another set of friends. A major catalyst in the rift will not be with the program next year.

    Am I the only one getting flashbacks of West Side Story? All I can think about is Grant having a dance off with Ferguson.

    If the problem was 2 sets of friends, and these 2 sets of friends refused to play “Good” basketball together… depending on who those 2 sets consisted of, it could have screwed our team up severely. IE:

    Grant/Hickson/Costner/Horner/Smith

    McCauley/Fells/Johnson/Ferguson/Javi

    If those 5 refused to play with the other 5, how the hell do you put a basketball team together?

  6. JeremyH 03/18/2008 at 1:35 PM #

    just goes to show, we are absurd for having a portion of our happiness depend on the actions of 18 to 22 year olds. I was that age not that long ago, but god do I have a better sense of commitment, responsibility, and interpersonal communication than I did then.

  7. Trip 03/18/2008 at 1:37 PM #

    Err, hit submit by accident… I was going to add to my post, in the first group you have no guards and in the 2nd group you have a ton of guards but only one big guy. If they refuse to play with each other you’re screwed, but if you try to put either of those line ups on the floor they’ll either dribble the ball off their foot every time or with the 2nd group, get clobbered by any guy that weighs more than 200 pounds. If that WAS the case, then Sidney was in a really hard place.

  8. BoKnowsNCS71 03/18/2008 at 1:44 PM #

    Maybe some of you know more about the rift. But i don’t think kids could have intentionlly played as poorly as these kids did.

    When I watched us play early against Presbyterian and NC Central who had 1 or 2 wins and about 30 losses together and we played poorly and barely beat them. I thought going into the UNC game that it could be bad – -and it was. What I saw was really bad passes and lots of turnovers. We must have led the league in TOs this year.

    Last year the team overachieved. This year without a floor general and smart play they underachieved. This team is like Jekyl and Hyde.

  9. Big Worm 03/18/2008 at 1:46 PM #

    “so Fowler did a terrible job hiring Sid, but he is a great hire & coach?”

    Fowler made his bed by hiring a coach with no college coaching experience. Now we all have to lie in that bed.

    Very few fans on here believe that Sid cannot ever be a good/great coach. I’d say most believe he can with the right assistant coaches and with some time to learn on the job. The $1,000,000 questions are “Who in the administration will assist him in rounding out his skill set and staff?” and “How long will that take?”

  10. McPete 03/18/2008 at 1:52 PM #

    i wish people would quit tapdancing around this rift debate and just plainly lay it out for all of us. who, exactly, has a problem with who? names people, and facts if possible. i think everyone assumes BC and McCauley had a problem with JJ getting their minutes and being the primary focus of the offense. is there anything else? cuz that part is old news.

    instead of west side story, it’s probabl more like Lord of the Flies. ie, no parental supervision to keep everyone in line.

  11. westwolf 03/18/2008 at 2:04 PM #

    How would you assess the recruiting of the staff so far? With Lowe’s strength being rightly identified as a “salesman” for the program, one with an NBA pedigre, and Harris, our primary and only long’term assistant being slotted to recruit primarily, I had hoped that our recruiting would have been a lot stronger than it appears.

    JJ–Blue Chipper, big-time no doubt, and Lowe’s NBA ties paid off.

    Tracy Smith –Top 50 recruit, big time recruit, you could win championships with players of this caliber at every position.

    But past those two, there is not a single recruit that nearly any coach in America couldn’t sign if he was the head coach at NC State.

    Mays–solid player, but was not a target of any Big Ten programs. We were the biggest “name” school to offer, so…

    Williams–see above, but substitute Acc/SEC for Big Ten.

    Thomas–same as above

    Javi–see above, X’s 2

    Marques Johnon–not only his being given a scholarship, but the fact that he continues to get playing time is one of the most troubling aspects when evaluating the staff. I’m sorry…but this guy may be one of the worst basketball players we’ve ever had. A complete bust.

    Scott Wood–He’s a good shooter, but has a serious lack of athleticism. There’s a reason that he has received NO offers from a single power conference school.

    In sum, this staff has only signed two players that were even recruited but other power conference schools. With the deficiencies in coaching that have been identified, this caliber of talent just ain’t gonna get it done.

    Thoughts?
    Williams

  12. McPete 03/18/2008 at 2:07 PM #

    ^
    i believe julius mays had an offer from purdue.

    don’t forget about ’10 commit CJ Leslie, who is projected to be a top 50 guy, IIRC. he obviously committed so early that he won’t have an impressive offer list.

  13. packgrad93 03/18/2008 at 2:20 PM #

    CJ WIlliams had offers from Clemson, VT & SC

  14. highstick 03/18/2008 at 2:26 PM #

    Somewhere in this thread, I interpreted some of this to be a “biological issue” rather than a “chemistry issue”. Did I misinterpret????

  15. Mr.wolfpack90 03/18/2008 at 2:36 PM #

    I feel that hickson is gone!
    Where does this leave us?
    Are we better than we were last yr?
    Will the team rally around el sid?
    Will our record be 1-15/8-23?
    Will norm sloan be walking thru that door?

  16. ktoh 03/18/2008 at 2:40 PM #

    westwolf : sad but true and look who we are supposed to be competing against for this talent. I say supposed because as a grad ,supporter who does not want anyone just to lose thier job for the sake of it! Let us be honest are we competing? Is that product on the floor the best we got? Does this team give its all? We are a great school! Bigtime athletic conference ,our front men are not living up to this and frankly I have seen enough and have no illustion that in 2,3 or 30 years Sid will have this mess turned around.

  17. jmartineau 03/18/2008 at 2:40 PM #

    With the team split in two, maybe we could have run the old Dean Smith blue team/white team thing. Seriously, could we have been much worse? 🙂

  18. JeremyH 03/18/2008 at 2:49 PM #

    highstick– somewhat, Fells accidently slept with Fergie. With Chanel No. 5, red heels, and that bright orange mop, Courtney never really had a chance.

  19. McPete 03/18/2008 at 3:18 PM #

    i’ll try again. can anyone sum this up for me? i must be dense, but is someone now claiming one guy slept with another players girlfriend? what’s the scoop, people?

    “i wish people would quit tapdancing around this rift debate and just plainly lay it out for all of us. who, exactly, has a problem with who? names people, and facts if possible. i think everyone assumes BC and McCauley had a problem with JJ getting their minutes and being the primary focus of the offense. is there anything else? cuz that part is old news.”

  20. StateFans 03/18/2008 at 3:33 PM #

    packgrad93…thanks for playing. Now, head back to the idiot boards…this place is obviously not a fit for you.

  21. packbackr04 03/18/2008 at 3:42 PM #

    http://scooterandhum.blogspot.com/2008/03/rebuilding-pack-is-tall-task-but-far.html

    THIS IS A GREAT READ, HOPE IT DOESNT BLOW YOUR MARGINS.

  22. b 03/18/2008 at 4:01 PM #

    Indiana, Michigan State, Purdue, and Xavier were in contact with Mays, possibly no offer was made because of the early commitment.

    I recall a statment Gavin Grant made back when the team played Seton Hall and Tony Haynes asked him if he knew any of the Seton Hall players like Costner. Gavin replied “I don’t hang out with Jersey guys”. I felt this curious as we have two from Jersey on our squad. At the time I wrote it off.

    If we are talking about woman issues, those can be difficult for young men to overcome. And I’m still pissed that Adam Harrington was pushed out of the program because of something like this.

    As far as offensive approach, I’m choosing to view this as a transition year. Sid seems to have decided to play the style he wants, despite the fact it didn’t take best advantage of the talent on hand. Purnell made a similar decision when he began, and the results are starting to come in after a few years of mediocre play at best.

    I saw the Donovan move, and it probably works for a guy with two titles. I think the last thing our guys need right now is to be locked out of the weightroom, though.

    I’d consider locking them IN the practice facility.

  23. westwolf 03/18/2008 at 5:04 PM #

    I’m hoping that Mays is better than his rating would indicate.

    I forgot about CJ Leslie, another top 50 recruit.

  24. Wulfpack 03/18/2008 at 5:21 PM #

    “i wish people would quit tapdancing around this rift debate and just plainly lay it out for all of us.”

    Is it correct to say that this team just screwed itself this year? There, that pretty much covers all the bases.

  25. blackdom 03/18/2008 at 5:26 PM #

    b “jersey girl” is a NY Metro area thing won’t get into it with you hicks just yet but it means nothing. Please stop the excuses as I said if they were f ing each other still no excuse for what we saw on the floor

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