State @ Carolina Pre-Game Thread (Updated Wed 9am)

08-09 Basketball General175

Note: Originally posted by Alpha Wolf and amended on Wednesday by Jeff

State is obviously improving and has won back-to-back ACC wins for the first time this season. The Wolfpack also snapped a nine-game conference road game skid Saturday in Atlanta. For their part, UNC’s Tyler “Will.i.Am” Hansbrough loaned PG Ty Lawson some of his infamous determination last night.  Lawson put that to good use in the final minutes of the UNC-Miami game, as he led the Tar Heels win 69-65 in Coral Gables.

On paper this looks like a Tarheel romp, and all indications are that will be how it plays out. Yet Another has some nice general statistics. Speaking of statistics, Section Six will statistically show you Tracy Smith’s impact on our offense by clicking here. With that said, I fully expect Smith to be in foul trouble and on the bench within the first eight minutes of tonight’s visit to Chapel Hill.

Caulton Tudor has gone so far as to say that the Wolfpack’s goal in Chapel Hill tonight is simply to ‘compete’. Honestly, I can’t disagree with him. The talent differential between these two rosters is just too large and is only accentuated by the strength of Carolina’s backcourt compared to the struggles of the Wolfpack’s backcourt (which is definitely improving).

Tudor makes a legitimate point about the debacle in Chapel Hill last year…

For all practical purposes, State’s 2007-08 season ended on Jan. 12 with a 93-62 loss in the Smith Center. Sidney Lowe’s second team entered that game at 11-3 overall, on a seven-game win streak and with a resume that included respectable wins over Davidson, Cincinnati, Seton Hall, South Carolina and Villanova.

But after one of the most humiliating first halves in school history (UNC 43, Pack 13), the Wolfpack disintegrated. State won only four more games and lost all sense of team unity. That’s how fast you can slide from 11-3 to 15-16 and into oblivion.

…but he fails to mention that was one of the Wolfpack’s first games without injured starting point guard, Farnold Degand and with struggling freshman, Javi Gonzalez. Degand wouldn’t have meant a Wolfpack win; but his presence would have made a huge difference in the manner in which we were embarrassed.

Don’t forget, the Wolfpack went to the halftime locker room down only 41-40 in his Coach Lowe’s first trip to Chapel Hill before Coach was rushed to the hospital during halftime. So, I am not convinced that this program just ‘naturally’ gets clobbered in Chapel Hill.

If NC State can have their best game of the year – and our bigs get fair enough treatment from the officials to get to the free throw line for a number of shots proportional with the contact that they draw – then Pack could have fighter’s chance tonight because of the improved play of Farnold Degand in the backcourt and Courtney Fells on the wing. The team is surely aware that a win would be money on any regular season resume.  They’ll need a complete, forty minute effort against a Tar Heel squad starting to head towards its peak, and winning will be difficult.  Thing is, this is the ACC and anything can happen.

* WRAL has a lot of insightful comments from Coach Lowe regarding changes, substitution rotation, our post play and more that you can see by clicking here. This is interesting stuff.

Starting with the Virginia Tech loss, the largest number of players that have seen more than a minute of playing time in any one game is eight…

…”[We are] just looking at our team, being fair, giving everyone an opportunity and trying to narrow that thing down to eight players.”

* The N&O has recognized that for the second straight year that no players from North Carolina high schools will be starting in tonight’s Game. (Click here)

This is the second straight season that neither basketball team has had a starter from North Carolina. The 2007-08 season was the first time in at least 29 years that all five starters from each team came from outside North Carolina.

* ACCNow also has a video podcast that can be seen by clicking here. We’d love to embed their stuff, but their technical department obviously falls short of the talent of JP Giglio’s impressive administration of the site.

08-09 Basketball General

175 Responses to State @ Carolina Pre-Game Thread (Updated Wed 9am)

  1. redfred2 02/17/2009 at 12:43 PM #

    I’d have to say that it’s more of a tradition than anything else, or just that people when expect you to behave a certain way, you don’t want to disappoint them no matter how ridiculous you may wind up looking in the end, but I do have four $20 bets on the game at work.

    Money is tight around here, but it’s OK though, I still have plenty of time to cancel that next order of Enzyte.

  2. Wolfercoyote 02/17/2009 at 12:44 PM #

    Our improvement as of late is a great stride and at the right time also! I believe we can win at unc tomorrow but even if we lose our league record can still be very respectable at season’s end.

  3. triadwolf 02/17/2009 at 12:46 PM #

    I’m hopeful for a win, but I do not expect a fairly called game. Last night I inadvertantly caught part of the Ole’ Roy radio show. He actually (and I imagine did so with a straight face) called out the ACC officials for allowing the teams to play Hansbro more physical than any other player in the league. He thinks that not nearly enough fouls are called on players who play him. Roy also said that he has officially brought this up to the league officials (sounded like on Monday). Anyway, he has laid the groundwork and I expect ole’ Tyler to be shooting from the stripe quite a bit tomorrow night.

  4. LRM 02/17/2009 at 12:48 PM #

    61Packer,

    I respectfully disagree with your assessment of the Pac-10, and so does the RPI.

    The ACC offers Carolina (4), Duke (5), Clemson (10), Wake Forest (16) and Florida State (20) all ahead of the Pac-10’s highest rated team, Washington (22). Its other “marquee” teams are California (23), with four conference losses; Arizona State (25), four losses; UCLA (32), four losses; and Arizona (43); five losses. Meanwhile, USC (44) has as many losses (9) as State, while Stanford (86) is in ninth place (4-8) and has virtually zero chance of making the tournament.

    What this shows is that the Pac-10 is mediocre.

  5. wufpup76 02/17/2009 at 1:16 PM #

    ^^Roy should be thankful that the most physical player in the league averages 2 fouls against per game and has fouled out twice in his career (thank you, Golden Chain … and I like calling him “Blood”) … So, it’s ok for Blood to dish it out, but not take it. Got it. And so have the refs for his entire career. And … you’re complaining (working the system for more)? Like Joe Ovies and others were saying on an 850 thread this morning, yeah – Blood kinda brings some of it on himself. Get TFOI Roy (though I applaud your attempts at getting even more for Blood).

  6. 61Packer 02/17/2009 at 1:42 PM #

    All I said was that the Pac 10 has 5 NCAA tourney teams, and maybe a couple more. I never said they were a great conference. The ACC is a better conference than the Pac 10, but I don’t believe one bit that Clemson and FSU or even Duke right now are better than any Pac 10 team.

  7. Wulfpack 02/17/2009 at 1:47 PM #

    The Pac 10 is playing better defense as a whole than the ACC. That’s about the only nice thing I can say about that conference. The offense in that league is horrid. It’s highly conceivable they won’t have a team playing beyond the first weekend in the NCAA Tourney.

  8. Sweet jumper 02/17/2009 at 2:34 PM #

    The little bit of Sun Devil bball I have seen over the last 3 seasons demonstrated no Princeton Offense like we saw here for 10 long years.

    I know that to beat UNX, we need to stop Lawson, but I am not sure how to do it or who can do it. He has been shooting and playing so well over the last several games that maybe he is due for a subpar game.

    I hope we take the ball at Hopsbrough from the start and dare the refs to not call fouls on him.

    Go Pack!

  9. redwolf86 02/17/2009 at 3:41 PM #

    I don’t know if you guys heard this, but i heard on 99.9 this morning that Roy said on his radio show monday that he would not be surprised if Tyler Zeller played on Wednesday, but he will have made an official decision on his redshirt status by the end of the week.

    could be a whole new element we were not ready for, but after not playing for about 3 months if he does play, hopefully he won’t even be effective

  10. Gene 02/17/2009 at 3:45 PM #

    I hope we take the ball at Hopsbrough from the start and dare the refs to not call fouls on him.

    That’s like daring a five year old with an ice cream cone in his hand to eat it. 🙂

  11. TheCOWDOG 02/17/2009 at 4:49 PM #

    Well now, do ya think we might see the ol’ tringle and 2 on Wed? ( the morphed 1-2-2 )

    That could keep Lawson busy. Makes us weak in the corners, but seems to me that Ellington and Green are better shooters from the wings.

    Maybe my imagination, but they don’t appear to shoot as well from the corners.

    Don’t expect 2nd chance points from us, we’ll need to get our asses back.

    I’d expect more of Degand at pt. as he has become a scoring threat. Lawson doesn’t care for shooting pt. guards.

    Whatever the case, it will be a monumental task. Especially if we have to overcome TOs and offi-schills alike.

  12. Ed89 02/17/2009 at 5:06 PM #

    ^^^The Pac 10 is playing better defense as a whole than the ACC. That’s about the only nice thing I can say about that conference. The offense in that league is horrid.

    Not that I really like discussing the PAC-10, but it’s alot easier to play defense against a crappy offense, thus the defensive numbers look better than they are. The last sentence in that paragraph really doesn’t support the first one. Most teams play better defense against a horrid offense. Anyway, let them play a high-scoring offense, and we’ll see. Usually, in hoops good offense beats good defense.

    If anyone out there doesn’t see how much better we’ve been playing in the past few games, you need to open your eyes. Some (i won’t name names) are going to keep up the “Sid’s not getting it done,” blah, blah, blah til they’re “blue” in the face. I just think it’s counterproductive, as Sid is not going anywhere anytime soon, and with the continued improvement and recruiting, the anti-Sid posts will keep dwindling — as it’s done in the past week. I’m sure if we lose another game, they’ll be back posting in force.

  13. wufpup76 02/17/2009 at 5:18 PM #

    ^We’ve actually been a pretty effective zone team this season, so I certainly wouldn’t mind seeing more of it … The defensive effort for this season has been the best since SL started here as we’re holding our own in man D

    You could say the same for rebounding efforts as well …

    Always room for improvement, but the improvements in these two areas have been the most pleasing to me

  14. Texpack 02/17/2009 at 5:27 PM #

    I have always believed that the best way to stop a transition type guard like Lawson is to put a body on him around the mid court line. That disrupts his vision and makes him slow down for long enough that the rest of your transition defense has a chance to catch up to the break. The model for doing this was the Houston Rockets defending Magic Johnson in the 1986 Western Conference Finals. I would consider having Fells or CJ Williams guard Lawson when Degand is in the game. Their size advantage might bother Lawson.

    After watching some of the OSU-Wisconsin game Saturday night the PAC 10 doesn’t look quite as bad as the Big 10. We are playing better basketball right now than my wife’s Longhorn’s. This is the worst I’ve seen them play in the last 5-6 years.

  15. BSIE80 02/17/2009 at 5:38 PM #

    It would be nice to see Fells hit 30-35 pts and win by 10.
    We will need someone to really have a career type game to win this game.
    The last couple of games, we have had 4-5 players in double figures. Which means everyone has contributed. The chances of this happening tomorrow is slim. It may happen but it has not been this teams history.
    Our best chance is for someone to go off and hit all their shots. A Teague like game, or reaching back in time (Earnie Graham- from Maryland and went for like 44 against us).

  16. TheCOWDOG 02/17/2009 at 5:40 PM #

    Problem with picking Lawson up at 1/2 court might be his speed. Getting by a defender immediately creates the kind of switches that killed Duke on the wing.

    If Fells is on Lawson, that puts Degand on Ellington. Don’t like it, but ya never know.

    I’d really like to see what happens in a zone first. There are probably no bad ideas against this team.

  17. redfred2 02/17/2009 at 5:52 PM #

    ^Cowdog, I agree, if you allow either of those guys to have that open shot from the wing, and especially from the left side, they will KILL you.

    I’m definitely looking forward to the game tommorrow night, but at the same time I’m trying to recollect all of my memmories of our worse loses in that series. I’m thinking that might help to balance out my tendancies to go overboard in the way of optimism.

  18. TheCOWDOG 02/17/2009 at 6:07 PM #

    ^
    Red, that might not be a bad idea. I might go all the way back to ’75 in ACC tourney loss to ’em, killing our shot to defend NCAA crown.

    That was a heartbreaker. 30 pt. blowouts never affect me like that loss.

  19. TheCOWDOG 02/17/2009 at 6:29 PM #

    This just may be the thing to do. Bring out the losses, those demons and excorcise the shit out’em

  20. McLovin 02/17/2009 at 6:49 PM #

    I’m taking the same mindset I took for the Wake game – we will lose by 20+

    Lets hope it works again…

  21. McLovin 02/17/2009 at 6:49 PM #

    I’m taking the same mindset I took for the Wake game – we will lose by 20+

    Lets hope it works again…

  22. BJD95 02/17/2009 at 6:50 PM #

    First of all, this is not going to be a Sendek discussion thread. I have edited several entries, and I have more f-ing kidney stones – please don’t make me keep this shit up. I’m begging you people!

    Back on topic, the biggest problem with this matchup is that we are ill-suited to exploit the few small chinks in UNC’s armor. We don’t have a scoring PG, nor do we have multiple three-point threats.

    The only way we win this game is if Lawson is really, REALLY sick. Like vomiting on the court sick (that would be a good way to get our starters a little extra rest, too).

  23. BAC79 02/17/2009 at 6:59 PM #

    The only way we win this game is to play good transition defense and not make stupid turnovers.

  24. redfred2 02/17/2009 at 8:22 PM #

    BJD, I know you’re feeling well, but I think maybe you might have jumped the gun a little bit there. One of those posts that you edited was just someone offering up a HERBal remedy for those stones that you’re lugging around.

  25. tcthdi-tgsf-twhwtnc 02/17/2009 at 8:33 PM #

    Maybe I shouldn’t say anything but could anything be worse than State/UNC in Chapel Hill 2005? I’m pretty sure that was the game it seems like UNC scored only 3’s and dunks.

    I just looked the game up and the following paragraph explains how State fans have had to endure just about everything over the last 20 years.

    Feb 3, 2005

    Julius Hodge had 18 points but couldn’t keep the Wolfpack (13-8, 3-5) from falling to 3-7 in their past 10 games. The trouble started when point guard Tony Bethel contracted colitis after a 2-week battle with the flu, and he sat out four games.

    3-7 in the last 10 games (5 consecutive NCAA tournaments, ahum, State started the season 10-1), colitis (wt*), 2-week battle with the flu (2 weeks? was it the bird flu?)

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