No post season of any kind for Wolfpack

08-09 Basketball General102

Despite all the frustration that many State fans are currently expressing — it is weird to think that had the Wolfpack just hit a couple of missed free throws in the last minute of games against Marquette, Florida and Virginia Tech that we would have been guaranteed an NIT bid and would have entered the ACC Tournament on the NCAA Bubble. Think about that.

It’s the ‘little things’ that make all the difference – and items like free throws, defense, general fundamentals and organizational professionalism are the ‘little things’ that this basketball program needs to improve upon with no time to spare.

Lee Fowler may still believe that he ‘knows basketball’, but he evidently doesn’t know anyone that can get his basketball program into any of the three secondary basketball tournaments being played this year.

NIT
Link to ACCNow

It wasn’t a surprise that the Wolfpack wasn’t invited to the NIT. There are actually some pretty good matchups in the NIT.

CBI
The College Basketball Invitational (CBI) – which saw Tulsa defeat Bradley to win year’s inaugural tournament – felt as though it would be natural fit for State’s season to extend. (Link) But, the Wolfpack failed to make the CBI field that included, Stanford, Richmond, Charleston, Troy, St. John’s, Oregon State, Houston, Green Bay, Vermont, Wyoming, UTEP, Northeastern, Nevada, Wichita State, Boise State & Buffalo.

If only those Athletics Directors ‘knew basketball’!

CIT
The new CollegeInsider.com Tournament will not include the Wolfpack. The website for this tournament discusses the event and includes the following that would explain how nothing but mid-majors comprise the field.

Eligible Teams:
Participating teams must finish the regular season with a winning record against division I opponents. Teams whose conferences have less than fifty-percent (50%) of their teams participating in the NCAA and NIT tournaments will be given higher priority for selection into the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament.

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08-09 Basketball General

102 Responses to No post season of any kind for Wolfpack

  1. boonami 03/16/2009 at 12:04 PM #

    Wulfpack I know you are correct. I was just jealous to see Xavier again doing well (granted it is the A-10) and knowing we had a shot at a guy like Miller.

  2. Noah 03/16/2009 at 12:06 PM #

    “whadya doing? some stunt flying up there?”

    Oh yeah? And what’s he say?

    “He don’t say nothin’. He just gives you THAT look. Ya know, he’s got THAT look!”

    (I haven’t seen Fletch in ages. Chevy Chase’s last good movie.)

  3. Noah 03/16/2009 at 12:07 PM #

    BTW, I think I’m going over to Fowler’s house and tell him I’m from the mattress police.

    “There are NO tags on these mattresses!”

  4. Rick 03/16/2009 at 12:07 PM #

    “I just don’t think that JT can get those minutes w/ his knee. CJ, in the second half of the season got plenty of minutes. He played OK. At this point in his career, he’s very easy to guard. He’s a threat to shoot the 3 and he has a good pull up j – but that’s the extent of it.”

    AS opposed to Fells who, when feeling like it, wold shoot the open three and drive once to the basket every game. Fells did not even have a pull up shot.

  5. Rick 03/16/2009 at 12:08 PM #

    “One has to think that if the players we had on the bench were capable, they would have been playing. Since they were not logging major minutes – on a team that couldn’t even make the Not Invited Tournament, I have trouble being really enthused about their capacity to lead the team out of the wilderness.”

    That is certainly my initial thought. I also wonder how much the petulant way the “leaders” of this team took to Hickson played into any playing time.

  6. whitefang 03/16/2009 at 12:17 PM #

    Maybe it is talking down the program, but I just don’t think Lowe is a good coach period. I don’t believe he is going to improve enough to ever be an effective college D1 coach. Talking down a program that finishes in the bottom 3rd of the ACC every year under his watch is pretty damn hard to do I think. It is not possible to talk it down much more. The results pretty much speak for themselves.
    I think there is a good chance that one of the teams that finished under us is going to make a coaching change.

  7. wufpaxno1 03/16/2009 at 12:18 PM #

    Showing Sid the door after three years would set the program back another four years. You have to realize that Sid has been playing “Mutts” for the past three seasons, and I don’t mean that as a slight in any way to our upper classmen. We were not happy with the system that was employed by our former head coach and most of us were not the least disappointed when he elected to move as far away from competitive basketball as he could.
    Sidney has elected to employ a system that is more in line with what we as Wolfpack faithful would expect. The problem is that he is forced to try and fit the players that he has into a new system. He is trying to run a scheme meant for race horses with Clydesdales. This creates a Catch 22 situation, if you run the offense that the players he inherited where brought here to run, you risk being forced to recruit players that run that kind of offense or settle for lesser talent while in transition. If you recruit players to run the scheme that you want to employ, you are forced to use the existing players to play a style that they are not equipped or accustomed to playing while your recruits develop over time. Neither is a good option, but I think that Sid chose the later because it was the shortest route to the success he is hoping for.
    You take your lumps early and build for the future and I see promise in the young talent that we have. Mays looks good and with experience will get better. Tracy Smith is a beast and will own the paint in the ACC and he moves really well for a big man, CJ is a work in progress but will get better, Javi is becoming a serviceable ACC guard, Horner has adapted to the new system despite not being recruited for it, and I believe Sid was on the cusp of bringing in a very good class before being affected by the indecisiveness of a teen age, and it may yet still prove to be a good class.
    Give the man one more year before passing a verdict, if next year turns out to be a train wreck then I will get off the train and get on the bus, but I have a feeling that we will see what the Basketball future for the Wolfpack will look like with next year’s team, good or bad.

  8. whitefang 03/16/2009 at 12:28 PM #

    Slightly off topic, but I just received this email due to re-upping my fb tickets for the fall:
    “The Virginia spring sports teams are roaring into their schedules with tons of early season success. The spring sports teams are 111-10 to date! The breakdown looks like this: baseball (15-0), men’s golf (20-1), women’s golf (17-0), men’s tennis (18-0), women’s tennis (10-2), men’s lacrosse (9-0), women’s lacrosse (5-2), and softball (17-5).”
    It pisses me off because State seems to be content at sucking in athletics. OK I know we don’t have a freaking lacrosse program anyway, but still we are bigger and have more lenient admission standards so why can’t we compete with a damn small school with a bunch of blue-blood pricks (my kid excepted of course!)? Why do we accept mediocrity? Why do we say WTNY and we accept the same or worse next year anyway with no consequences?
    Sorry just had to rant a little.

  9. choppack1 03/16/2009 at 12:30 PM #

    Rick – I was thinking about what Fells brought to the table when I was writing that. I understand why you’d question Sid on playing Fells in front of CJ.

  10. Noah 03/16/2009 at 12:53 PM #

    How many schools actually HAVE lacrosse teams? It seems like everyone has a top-20 team (that fields one). Are there only 20 teams?

  11. whitefang 03/16/2009 at 1:03 PM #

    Noah, probably. I have been to one lacrosse game in my life and stayed 10 minutes until I went back to the car to drink. Point is we do have spring sports too and we seem to be OK no matter what their success is. I believe that a school like State should expect to compete at the highest levels if they bother to field a varsity team in a sport, and I don’t think it matters to our “leaders” if we aren’t competitive.

  12. Texpack 03/16/2009 at 1:09 PM #

    We dropped lacrosse as a varsity sport while I was at State so there would be too few schools participating to award Carmichael Cup points

  13. Wolfpack_1995 03/16/2009 at 1:15 PM #

    “wufpaxno1
    March 16th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
    Showing Sid the door after three years would set the program back another four years.”

    I think it’s a moot point. Sid will already have set us back 4 years once he stays here for next year.

    Why we hired a career loser in the NBA and CBA is beyond questionable.

    But hey, Coach Fowler knows basketball!

  14. 85Designo 03/16/2009 at 1:24 PM #

    Back after the 83 championship our beloved Chancellor Bruce Paulton sat top center row waved and cheered on with the students, yelled at the zebras and made the world know that the andministration was on board. the student section would chant “Bruce Bruce Bruce…… The BOT put an end to that as they did with Valvano and the whole program went to hell after that. Where is “Coache” Fowlup at our games. Anyone ever see him?

  15. whitefang 03/16/2009 at 1:26 PM #

    Not that it matters in the least since I wouldn’t know a lacrosse game from field hockey, but there are 57 Div 1 lacrosse mens teams and 83 womens according to a Google search.

  16. Noah 03/16/2009 at 1:28 PM #

    Not that it matters in the least since I wouldn’t know a lacrosse game from field hockey, but there are 57 Div 1 lacrosse mens teams and 83 womens according to a Google search.

    Wow. So I wasn’t that far off! : )

  17. Hrryhood 03/16/2009 at 1:59 PM #

    Wrong Noah. European and Christmas vacation are both GREAT movies. I believe he made Spies Like Us after Fletch as well…

    Sorry for the off topic guys but I had to put Noah in check. I really can’t think about our bball team anymore anyways.

  18. PoppaJohn 03/16/2009 at 2:07 PM #

    Thank Goodness This Miserable Season Is Over!!!
    And just to ice the cake, Leslie walks. Perfect.

    It will take me six months to get over this year. See you at the first kickoff.

  19. ruffles31 03/16/2009 at 2:23 PM #

    Whitefang,

    Funny that you mention UVA athletics as reports are that Dave Leitao just got fired.

    http://www.wralsportsfan.com/college_basketball/story/4749251/

  20. primacyone 03/16/2009 at 2:25 PM #

    Put this in the newer thread and then realized it probably should go here:

    Leitao fired at Virginia. I bet they go after Grant.

    Edit. Looks like they are making a run for Capel.

    In other news, looks like our baseball team may not be ACC competitive this year as well. If football starts 2-6 again, I may go buy a UNC hat.

  21. whitefang 03/16/2009 at 2:30 PM #

    Ruffles,
    I hinted in an earlier post that a school below us in the standings was getting ready to pull the trigger so I am not surprised.
    It was strongly “inferred” to me last week by a UVa insider. There is some other stuff there beyond performance too I heard.

  22. NCMike 03/16/2009 at 3:11 PM #

    Division II anyone?

  23. jeremya3690 03/16/2009 at 3:15 PM #

    It really doesnt matter to me at this point that we didnt make it to the cbi or cit. This season was pretty awful. but I can see some hope for next year. It seemed to me as though costner and fells gave up late in the season. So I’m glad they they both are leaving. Gonzales is playing better, smith is playing really well and horner is stepping up too. If we get john wall, we would be very good, even if we dont, lorenzo brown shows promise. and wood and howell will add to the team nicely as well. CJ Leslie decommiting doesnt help any cause at all but I am looking forward to seeing what lorenzo can do next year.

  24. pack fan 03/16/2009 at 3:15 PM #

    Can we as State fans handle another year of going backwards. I am so sick and tired of having to put up with freakin Tarhole fans everyday during b-ball season. Sean Miller is my first choice. Lets go get him while the iron is still hot. Whatcha think?

  25. blackdom 03/16/2009 at 4:19 PM #

    Anthony Grant .But since VA canned Dave, looks like if we don’t act soon, we will be left once again with someone no one wanted, and being told nobody had any interest in the job.

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