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I can’t imagine Shaka Smart taking the Wake Forest job as long as Ron Wellman is the AD there. Wellman’s tenure is almost a mirror image of Lee Fowler’s tenure here. Neither HWSNBN or Jeff Bzdilek, both immensely unpopular with a huge part of their teams’ fan base, left on their own accord when they should have been fired long ago. And those two weren’t the only coaches who overstayed their welcome at those schools under these two ADs.
Reminiscent of many if not most of NCSU’s hires in revenue sports, I believe Wake will end up taking who they can get, not who they want.
Also, I don’t think Duke’s loss makes State’s loss last night any easier to take for Wolfpack fans. Duke will simply re-load next season, but what in the world will State have next season? After what I saw last night, I wish the entire State team AND coaching staff would not be back next season. I’ve followed State basketball since the late 1950s and this one ranks up there with the worst loss ever in terms of defining a program and its direction. This ship ain’t coming in because it ain’t gonna sail.
Until fundamental changes are made in recruiting and coaching hires, I honestly don’t think things are ever going to get any better for State sports, especially in basketball and football. And with ACC expansion putting smaller fish like State and Wake in a larger pond, the futures of sports at these two schools are at best not good.
What I wanted to see tonight was a decent performance by a school that’s struggling to turn it’s once-storied program in the right direction.
What I saw instead was probably THE textbook example of why this program is not only still mired in mediocrity, but is sinking. And tonight, the entire country saw us under a microscope.
If you could put this team’s, no- this PROGRAM’S mental toughness on the edge of a razor blade, it would be like rolling a bb shot down the middle of I-85/40 through Burlington.
Until NC State University goes in a different direction with the type of players and coaches it recruits, I see only ther kind of pain and suffering that our fan base is enduring tonight after the Orlando debacle.
If I were in charge of NCSU tomorrow morning, my first move would be a complete housecleaning from the AD all the way down and through the athletics department.
Mental midgets we are.
If Arizona State can make this field, you’ve got to figure that we were in it all the way!
I imagine there are a lot of Wake Forest fans who would wholeheartedly, even financially, support a Ron Wellman campaign for ACC Comish.
Thank GOD (and maybe Coach K) that there will be no NIT for this team this season!
This Duke team has much talent but also has much inconsistency. And this is why I don’t think they’ll be a Final Four team this season.
If the 3s aren’t falling for Duke, they can be had. Plus, we owe them, big-time. Just like we did Syracuse.
I feel good for Jim Boeheim, who doesn’t like Greensboro and now won’t have to see the place for another whole year. I feel good for Roy Williams, who now won’t have to whine about his team’s shooting woes until next week. (Did he see the second half officiating during the Pitt game?)
State is back in the NCAAT conversation, but they’re on the wrong side of the bubble (second four out per ESPN). A win today will put them on the right side of the bubble, and depending on how other teams do, they will have a shot at the Dance if things fall into place. A close loss will put them high on the NIT list, but I don’t care about those 8:30 selections, just the ones at 6:00.
Yesterday’s win was primarily for the program. Today’s opportunity will be primarily for the Dance. Duke is in no way 35 points better than State, not this year’s Duke team, anyway. If ever the Pack has had an “All Hands On Deck” game, this one’s it. This one should come down to pride.
I sincerely hope that the ACC moves not only it’s basketball tournament to NYC, but also it’s football title game and it’s headquarters there as well! PERMANENTLY!!!!!!!!!!
I have no more allegiance to the ACC. I certainly will keep pulling for State, but I’ve had enough of this conference. I will no longer pull for any other ACC team, period, in anything. Never again.
I hope we win the ACCT, but if we don’t and don’t get a bid, I hope only 4 teams get NCAAT bids, and I hope all 4 lose out the first game.
Just rename the GD conference the New Big East Conference. To hell with them!
I’m aware that the league didn’t schedule this one. But they did allow it to be played after an outcry from the fans.
It’s probably the only time that ACC officials have listened to their conference’s fans in years, and probably the last.
Instead of waiting for yet another ACC team, how about at least re-aligning for football NOW? Place the Big Four, GT, FSU and Clemson in one division, and the rest of the league in the other. You would have primarily old ACC rivalries in one division and old Big East rivalries in the other. Even if you argue that this wouldn’t work, how can anyone admit that having FSU, Clemson and now Louisville in the same division gives balance? I have nothing against Duke, but there is no way in hell the Devils would have made it to Charlotte via the Atlantic Division.
I do like randygupton’s re-alignment proposal, and I would keep UVA in the “ACC” division, not bring in Miami. But why do we have to have divisions in the first place? Why can’t the league simply give each team 4 primary playing partners and rotate everyone else equally on the schedule?
The ACC has become a league of haves and have-nots, and the have-nots are being shafted in the scheduling. Nowhere was that clearer than seeing WF, VT and Clemson dumped from the ACC-B1G Challenge for 3 new teams who had never played an ACC game. And you can bet that Duke, UNC, Syracuse and Louisville will be the favored sons in basketball from now on, getting the games that matter most so that ESPN can create new rivalries at the expense of old ones.
For those of you who don’t think the State-UNC football and basketball rivalries could eventually be limited, look no further than baseball, where the league allowed these two nationally-ranked teams to play but once in the course of a 50-game schedule.
Who wouldn’t vote for Warren for POY? Maybe Andrew Carter, N&O’s UNC writer, who said a few days ago that although he couldn’t vote on COY, his vote would be for Roy over UVA’s Bennett.
There are yet bridges to cross, with trolls beneath them all…………
Like most on here, I also think officiating in the ACC and in college basketball in general leaves a lot to be desired. The biggest problem still seems to be favoritism toward “big name” teams, like the Blues, but other problems are surfacing.
From my seat at last weekend’s State-Miami game, a game ACC officials probably paid little attention to, I saw what I consider to be just about the worst-officiated game I’ve seen in the ESA since it opened in 1999. The level of incompetence of those 3 referees was off-the-charts bad. You wouldn’t have seen this kind of officiating in a Duke-Carolina game, but it seems that the States and the Miamis of the ACC are having to make-do with whatever they can get from the ACC zebra corral.
In the second half of the Miami game, Miami was awarded a shooting foul when their player was fouled on his way to the basket. The ball was well below his knees when the whistle blew, and only well after the whistle did he bring it up into a shooting position. But he was awarded two foul shots anyway. On the ensuing possession, our player drove in for a basket but was hammered by the Miami defender. Despite making the shot, the bucket was disallowed and charging was called. And on Miami’s inbounds play, they committed a backcourt violation seen by everybody in the building except the 3 refs on the floor. All of that came in a 30-second span.
That may not have been as critical as the blown call against Warren in the UNC game a few days earlier, but it came at a time when we needed a lift but didn’t get it.
The longer I watch ACC basketball, the more convinced I become that when I watch teams like State, Wake Forest, Clemson, Boston College and Miami play on the road in places like Cameron, the Dean Dome, and now the Carrier Dome, those teams might as well be playing the 1990s Bulls in the United Center.
I have both mags, and rate the End of An Era cover better.
I have Thompson’s and Burleson’s autographs on the ’74 cover. Any chance I could get Walton’s John Hancock on it, and if so, how would I go about it?
Pack85EE, I’d love to think that there’s a light on the horizon, but it’s dark even with 20/20.
Since Sheridan left in the early 1990s, football has had little to celebrate other than Torry Holt and Philip Rivers, and no titles. Not even a 2nd place finish since the divisions. No BCS bowl invites. Our home schedule gets worse each season as our long-term rivals disappear, and as optimistic as I was about our current coach, I saw more things from my seat last season that I disliked than liked.
Since Valvano left about 25 years ago, basketball has tanked. We had Julius Hodge’s senior season, but possible greatness in that NCAAT was quashed by HWSNBN. And after a decade of that failed experiment, we had half a decade of even more misery with almost our Lowest point in BB since the scandals in the early 60s.
Women’s softball rocks, as does bass fishing and track. Soccer has been interesting at times, but we have failed to produce the kind of program you’d expect in this area of the country, where multiple ACC teams have won it all.
Baseball might have been great but that went South (to Columbia). Baseball is really good now, but I’m afraid that Rodon’s departure will leave baseball in the same condition that Warren’s departure will leave basketball.
I’ve followed Wolfpack sports since the 1950s, and it seems we were always pretty good at something most of the time. If we were down in one sport, then we were up in another. But for some time now, we’ve not been very good at anything that matters. We didn’t win an ACC football game last fall, and we’ve lost 22 of our last 24 basketball games to our main rival, UNC.
The only positive that I can see in the state of our sports right now is that it couldn’t possibly get any worse, and has to get better.
Maybe.
The worst of times is right now. 27 years removed from an ACC basktball championship and 35 years removed from an ACC football title. And going nowhere in either sport except bass ackwards. Maybe we’ve won a baseball title since then, but who really cares?
All we talk about on here is the past. Such is the State of Wolfpack sports.
Pitt is NOT going to be a bubble team. They’ve already earned an NCAAT bid and will be there with UVA, Duke, Syracuse and UNC. I don’t see a 6th ACC team getting a bid, unless FSU wins two this week and makes it to the ACCT finals.
Warren should be the POY in the ACC. I wish him well in the NBA, although I believe he’ll struggle initially because the larger and taller NBA defenders won’t allow as many of those floaters as he’s getting off in college. One more year in college would help him a great deal, but who would want to come back for another year of THIS?
Without Warren next season, we will be a team that not only can’t (or won’t) play defense, but a team that can’t play serious offense.
Maybe I missed something, but why did Washington and Lewis sit out much of the 2nd half?
wufpup76, this is EXACTLY what I said in an earlier post.
Keep remembering the November game, and besides, Central has a much better shot at getting into the NCAAT.
Hopefully, the Central game will run well past 9pm, so that we can be reminded yet again of the November loss that set the tone for this season.
We’ve got people on here worried over whether or not we’ll face Duke or Virginia on Friday?
I’m more concerned with Thursday.
I don’t want us to lose next Sunday to BC, nor do I want us to do what we’ll probably do next week in Greensboro- bomb out to yet another team we should beat.
But seriously, folks, it’s time to put this lousy, miserable, forgettable season into the history books.
There is absolutely NOTHING to be gained by going to the NIT, and probably as a road team. I got my fill of the NIT under HWSNBN. It’s a LOSER’S tournament, a place for underachieving BCS-level teams, and smaller schools who will be trying harder to knock off one of ’em.
I sat through the Miami game yesterday. Enough already!!!!
The only way I see State in the NCAAT is for them to win the ACCT. It is illogical to think that State could close out Miami, Pitt and BC and then win one in the ACCT, and be invited to the NCAAT on that. Beating a .500 team and a 7-win team at home, plus beating a team on the road that this column puts on the bubble won’t exactly enhance the Wolfpack in the eyes of the NCAAT Selection Committee.
In fact, not only will it be NIT, but there’s a good probability we could be on the road if selected.
I’m got LTR seats, but several years ago I bought my last NIT ticket. I am absolutely done with patronizing mediocrity. I know I’m going to get hammered by the OH, QUIT WHINING- THEY’RE JUST A YOUNG TEAM, GIVE THEM MORE TIME crowd. Whatever.
This basketball program needs not only wholesale changes, but I now believe that our athletic program needs a complete housecleaning, from the top down, with exploration of how we can get out of this miserable league and into a conference where we’d be a valued member instead of cannon fodder for a few select teams who will continue to receive preferred status in everything from scheduling to officiating.
I arrived over an hour early last night at the PNC, and noticed how the upper bowl was filling up, much the same way it does when we are infrequently allowed to host Duke. Will we be allowed to host the Blue Devils next season, or will ESPN and Swofford determine that Duke should instead keep on playing Syracuse twice and also Louisville? Stay tuned.
When I sat down, two guys decked in UNC garb were there, cheering their team. We exchanged predictions; they of course said UNC by 11, and I told them UNC would win by 1 point.
The game started as expected, with State getting ahead and maintaining the lead until it mattered. The no-call against Warren was a backbreaker; we lost what mental edge we had with that play. Sadly, many if not most of us expected THE PLAY to happen eventually, because it always does.
I was at the Florida game a few years ago and hollered all the way through the final two minutes for State to QUIT FOULING! Last night, I hollered through the final few minutes for us to PLAY DEFENSE! The results of both those games were the two most gut-wrenching losses I’ve sat through in this building, and I’ve seen most all our games there so far.
Last night’s game didn’t doom our NCAAT chances because they were already doomed by the horrible losses vs UVA and at Duke, UNC and Clemson. But this game DID add another Paige to the What It Means To Be A State Fan Handbook.
Simply put, this game was the epitome of Wolfpack basketball.
This game will have little if any bearing on the NCAAT for this State team. Barring a run to the ACCT title game, that ship has already sailed (and sunk). But it will have major impact on the State fanbase psyche and a little bump in national recognition, thanks mainly to Carolina’s revival this season.
The other night, I turned on the State coaches show on cable channel MASN, and noted on the channel lineup that it was titled “The Matt Gottfried Show”. To say that our program is in the midst of a worsening identity crisis is an understatement. Tonight’s game is a must-win if we are to ever begin the process of returning to even a competitive status with the other Triangle ACC schools. The 8pm time slot, on local tv only, is a dead giveaway that nobody outside this state cares a hoot about this game, and not because Carolina is playing.
Anything can happen tonight, but it’s time we quit playing scared against this school (and Duke). How else do you explain the beatings administered by the Blues and then having a game stolen by the #1 team? For too long, the same State team that has been competitive in most games has run away and hidden in the games vs the Blues. Until these “head case” games stop, our basketball program will continue its slide into oblivion.
State’s bubble has already burst. To say that State has some chance and Clemson has a slim chance to no chance is illogical. They beat the hell out of us Tuesday night, they have a better overall record than we do, and they have more quality wins than we do. In fact, we don’t HAVE a quality win this season, but we do have a turdbowl full of bad losses.
There are only 2 unanswered questions remaining about the ACC this season. One is the order of finish for the top 5 teams, and the other is whether or not Clemson will be the 6th ACC team to make it to the NCAAT. There certainly won’t be a 7th, nor even a 6th if the Tigers don’t make it.
Right now, VT is one of the worst ACC teams I’ve seen in years, yet I wouldn’t be shocked if they beat us tomorrow. I expect UNC to beat us next week, and I expect us to lose at Pitt. BC and Miami are home games, but that’s not meant much this season.
Even if we close strong and win 2 games in the ACCT (which would come against the worst teams in the league), this season is over unless we’re dumb enough to sign on for the NIT. RPI is irrelevant when you play like crap all season.
