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Enjoyable game to watch, but we’re not quite there. I knew we were in trouble when Finley played a nearly perfect first half, and we were still barely up. Pair that with the inevitable coming out flat in the third/out-coached at halftime and it was really over before we ever played a snap in the second half. Shrugs….
My thoughts:
– In the first half we were very balanced on offense. The running, while not great, set up the passing and let Finley throw out of play action. In the second half, we just conceded the run which let Clemson start jumping those short passing routes. This is my criticism of Drink (well, along with the red zone). In the games he loses, he falls in love with the pass. It happened at Boise if you go back and look at their game stats, and it’s happened here multiple times.
– Defense was out there too much in the second half. In the end though, Clemson just looked bigger, stronger and more talented. They look now like FSU used to look. Their plan to rotate the OL kept them fresher in the second half than our defense.
– Special teams got us again
– Dabo out coached us. The quick kick was a back breaker.
– If I never see the “Wild Wolf” again, it will probably be too soon. That’s good for once a game near the goal line. Even then, JSAM on a jet sweep at 3/4s stride is a much better bet. That play seems to have disappeared from the playbook this year for the most part, though we did try it once with Hines.
– DD blamed a laptop on the Clemson sideline. He needs to send out an assistant to do post game pressers after losses.
– The officiating wasn’t nearly as bad as the ND game. I’m sure it didn’t feel that way in the stadium, but it looked like most of the calls were right to me on TV.It’s gut check time for the Pack. BC is quite improved and had a bye this week. They will be ready. I honestly think we’ll need our A game to beat them. Unfortunately we seem quite banged up and we’re probably a bit mentally fragile.
Beat BC and we might be able to win out. Lose to BC and we could go into a death spiral. Wake is much improved and played ND better than we did. Lose 4 in a row and we’ll have zero momentum going into a rivalry game (which is never good).
We played more defense tonight than we had in the past 6 years. We hustled more than we did in all games last year put together. We passed more on offense than we had in two seasons.
There are clearly things to work on — free throws, press break, some shot selection — but overall a good start to a new era. Don’t get me wrong, there was a huge size and skill advantage that made us look better than we were, but I liked a lot of what I saw.
tractor57: We’re probably closer aligned than it appears. I’m cautiously optimistic after seeing some good early returns. These are but the first steps in the journey and there will bumps along the way. Everyone is enthusiastic until that first loss sets in and then another hit comes after the first blowout loss.
Right now we’re 0-0. I’m filled with hope. I’m going with that for now.
I’d agree that HWSNBN was rigid (almost mentioned this), incredibly poor at adapting in game, and didn’t have good leadership ability under fire (the “my tie is choking me” move surely inspired confidence). All those things clearly held him back.
I’d also agree that HWSNBN was best with Hodge. In my memory it was because when things broke down, Hodge would take the team on his back and will his way to the basket for a bucket. Of course when Hodge was off (Seton Hall anyone?), it would create something incredibly ugly. The system would break, Hodge would go lone wolf (poorly) and we’d get blasted. But, I did love Jules and his on the court leadership made up for quite a number of HWSNBN’s limitations.
My comments were more aimed at recruiting strategy. HWSNBN had a pretty solid one. It just was to recruit to a highly flawed system.
I’m not ready to give KK a lifetime contract. He may not even work out. I just see an actual plan in place, and one that actually can work. It’s been nearly 30 years since I could say that and I’m pretty thankful.
Fowler ran it on the cheap, and to his credit that is something ingrained in NC State’s culture.
Let me rephrase “can’t miss” with respect to Archie. A true can’t miss is someone like Izzo. None of those candidates are walking through the door for NC State. It’s not happening. The only “can’t miss” move that I can really remember in basketball over the last 15 years was when Roy left Kansas to go to UNC. He went from one cheating machine to an even bigger one to help enable him. I guess one could argue Calipari to Kentucky (match made in heaven), but it’s only a matter of time until he has them on probation (well if the NCAA even cares any more). I guess one could argue that Pearl was a “hire me and you can’t miss getting into trouble” but that’s a bad attempt at humor.
Archie for NC State though was as good as it was going to get. I think he’ll do very well at Indiana, and for the first time in my lifetime I will be pulling for them (when they’re not playing NC State of course).
Outside of that though, KK was the best candidate that was left on the list that was also expressing interest. I really liked Holtmann and thought he was a way better coach than Ohio State deserved, but I’m not sure he was ever in play for us.
The best way to get them back in the seats is clearly a competitive home schedule, year after year, and a product to match. Simple as that…And misters for September.
…Or at least a cold beer.
There you go. Play sisters of the poor for the paycheck year in and year out and you’re going to have spotty attendance. Granted I was not at the game, but I didn’t hear anyone complaining about passouts against Louisville on Thursday night.
Rye – we have tried to do that in basketball but haven’t gotten over the hump.
I don’t think we’ve really been committed to doing that. We’ve made a NC State level gesture at it, but have not gone all in like Duke or Villanova.
We built the ESA and the practice facility. We’re seemingly going to build the dorms. At that point I think one could argue we have the facilities, though the ESA is now pretty close to 20 years old. We’re going to have to figure out what to do about that in the next 10 years or so, and our decision with what to do with Reynolds will likely be viewed later as short sighted. So, I’ll give you with facilities, we’re probably at an A-. Of course, that A- becomes one of the inputs.
Then there’s budgets for coaching, recruiting, support staff, etc.. When Fowler was here, we were spending near the bottom of the conference. Gott got a pretty nice budget and had an army of support staff, but we spent the money on Mark Gottfried. I think it’s great that we showed a level of support in funding for men’s basketball that we’d not done since V, but to spend it on Gott was a head scratcher. But hey, if it helped us attract KK, then I think I’ll probably be okay with that.
I would agree with you that the missing factor in our basketball program has been coaching, and it’s been that way since we had V. Les fell on the sword and was handcuffed, but I was a student then and went to a lot of basketball games. We just weren’t well coached. Then we had HWSNBN who had his own flaws and married himself to a system that just doesn’t work. We followed them up with Lowe and Gott who were obviously bad hires from day one, each with major red flags and obvious on and off the court limitations.
Here’s to hoping we’ve finally reversed that trend with the KK hire. I thought the only “can’t miss” candidate we had was Archie, but when he wasn’t coming then KK was the best choice. His style of play, recruiting territory, and overall track record line up with what we need.
I love the recruiting that KK and staff have done. This is exactly what we need to be doing. Load up on 4 star, 4 year kids that clearly fit with a system we’re trying to run. Win some games and we can sprinkle in a 5 star here or there. It’s important if we are targeting a 5 star, we go after ones that are fits for the system and ones that are of high character.
HWSNBN’s second 5 years was the closest to this model that we have had (in our post V years). The problem was that the system he picked was just a flawed one for college basketball. It fit his personality and projected self image, so I understand why he picked it, but the longer he went with it and the more he recruited to it, the harder it was for him to transition out of it when its obvious limitations had been reached.
KK plays a style of basketball that I absolutely love. I think playing that way we can go 10+ deep in the bench, which is unheard of in high major college ball. Play a deep bench and let everyone contribute, and you keep kids happy helping player retention. Keep the players and we can have one of the veteran teams that make deep runs in the NCAAs, picking off “more talented” but younger teams (ah la Duke, UCLA and Kentucky). Taking it to the opposition and mixing in a little “Showtime” will put bodies in the seats and make the whole process that much easier.
For the first time since V we have a coach that clearly has a vision and a philosophy that could work at NC State. Here’s to hoping that the results on the floor match.
This discussion is biased by when you attended. If you were around when Sloan and Holtz ran the programs, then both sports were great and no problem. I want both sports in the top 25… like Yow.
My first years at NC State we had Les in basketball and MOC in football. By that logic, I would suggest that we should be all in on women’s basketball. 😉
I base my logic on the actual inputs to the programs and that of our programs relative to the national landscape. I pair it with the fact that we’ve actually climbed the mountain before in men’s basketball, and did it under two different regimes. In my lifetime of following NC State sports, we have NEVER played in a meaningful bowl game or finished in the top 5.
My thoughts are and have been that we should funnel the inputs into men’s basketball to get over the hump. Then we can focus on this football thing. Until that happens, run football on the cheap, or as cheaply as we can afford to given that this is a cash cow and the primary source of revenue. By that I mean, you can’t neglect it too much, though I would argue that locked in revenue from TV as well as LTRs, it’s probably a pretty safe bet.
I haven’t listened to the original link, but would strongly argue a counter position:
– NC State has top 15 “input$” in basketball. We do not in football.
– We are a basketball school in the premiere basketball conference.
– It’s a lot easier to keep 13 kids eligible than 85. Given we seem unwilling to play in the grey, at least to the level of some of our competition, it makes the football mission that much harder.
– We may have competitive advantages against UNC, Duke and WF in football, but we don’t against FSU, Clemson, ND, etc.. That’s not to mention the SEC and Big 10 schools that recruit our footprint.
– We’re a lot further from the mountain top in football relative to things that we can control than we are in basketball.IF the bar is merely beating UNC, Duke and WF, then I guess I understand the argument. We clearly have better inputs than Duke and Wake, though I would argue we do not against UNC. If it is being nationally relevant, I clearly do not understand this argument.
I would also argue that it is laughable that what some think ails the football program are pass outs. That’s from someone who has only used them 1-3 times in many, many, many years of attending games in CF. I don’t really care one way or another about them. I would just point out that our two losses this year (thus far) have happened away from the “pass out zone” that riles so many.
I’d suggest that we let the pass outs discussion go. It was one of the many instances of finger pointing during losses by DD. That was his excuse game one of his tenure. Last week we lost the game because a safety didn’t make a play (called out by name despite getting beaten by 3 scores). A more constructive conversation is getting him better grooming on the post game press conferences.
Paki’s right. We have a problem with the schedule this year. It rivals one Lowe would have put together — 3 or so good games in the non-conference but the a bunch of RPI killing games. With the latter, win or lose it is kind of a loss, but with a new coach, system, heavy roster turnover, and Abu hurt, we’re not going to win those 3 good games early that we would need to have.
Regardless, I’m more excited about this year than ANY season of the Gottfried or Lowe eras. We finally have a college coach who will run a system that is effective for college basketball. I suspect that it will be paired with high effort night in and night out. If we do those things, it will be the first time I could say that about NC State basketball since V. Get a few 3 point shooters through recruiting and we’ll have a legitimate chance to actually make some noise.
And that post loss bus runs over another one:
Jarius has to get it down and he didn’t. Sometimes as a safety that’s your job is to get the ball on the ground and Jarius didn’t.
We @#$(* the bed today. Outclassed? Out prepared? Not up for the national stage? Didn’t like the cold weather? Punched in the mouth mentally and physically and didn’t recover? Out coached and motivated at the half? Heard for two weeks on campus how good we were? It could be any or all of those things.
The good news is that this was the game that “didn’t matter” in the big scheme of things. All our “real” goals for the season — making an ACC championship game and possibly winning a league title — are still out there. We’ve just got to regroup, heal up, focus and execute.
The bad news is that Clemson looks better than ND to me, and I’m not sure that anyone in our league is playing better than BC right now. We had better right the ship very quickly or we’re going 0-3 in this stretch. Go 0-3 in here and we could easily lose to Wake and enter the UNC game in a complete tailspin.
The next two weeks will tell us what kind of program we have. We faced adversity early this year and rallied. Can we do it again against tougher teams? I hope so.
This is also the reason why contract extension talk mid-year is ridiculous. Let things play out………
We should worry about the next 3 weeks before we make any proclamations about the future. We could go 3-0, or we could go 0-3. There’s probably a better chance at 1-2 than either. There’s a big difference between what 3-0 would tell us than what 0-3 or even 1-2 does.
One of NC State’s problems is that we’ve been far too quick to commit to Fool’s Gold. Many on these boards think that we turn over coaches too much, but the bigger issue is that we’re so starved for anything that resembles success that we lock coaches in prematurely that aren’t going anywhere. The last coaches we had in the two major revenue sports that were ACTUAL, LEGITIMATE flight risks were V and Sheridan.
Grey: I was at that Miami game as well. It was over before we ever really got out of the starting gate. The same happened against Ohio State as well. For all their bravado and bluster, outside of FSU and that ND Gator Bowl win, all of Amato’s teams post Rivers never really looked like they thought they could win.
Rivers was the wizard behind Oz….
statered is correct regarding Gameday. ND = NBC = no Game Day. It’s fine as I don’t think that Gameday is what it once was. If we were to somehow win this one, then we’d have a really good shot the next week against Clemson.
I watched a little bit of ND vs. USC. ND looks tough in the middle on defense and hits hard. I think they they’re vulnerable out on the edge. The key for us will be defense, turnovers and special teams.
Not looking ahead, but that BC game looms large. They’ve seemingly turned a corner, and quickly. I wish we had them earlier in the year, and not coming off our toughest back to back 2 games. I could easily see us going 0-3 in this stretch, though I don’t want that, nor would I necessarily predict it either.
Yogi: I’m fine with looking at the bright side, but let’s not be revisionist either. There’s a path behind the DD’s bus of post game press conferences. He clearly needs some schooling on handling the media. It’s easier to say the right thing when you are winning, but even this year he’s thrown some “none of you believed me” nonsense out. Be gracious in victory, accept the blame in losses, and act like you’ve been there.
Amato publicly said the right things. What he did behind closed doors obviously had some glaring gaps, but to the public was almost always spot on. The revolving door of assistants and the general downward trajectory of the hires made it clear we had huge problems in how the sausage was made.
I think we can agree on TOB. Coming off of HWSNBN in basketball, he was a really bad hire from the start and I was pretty vocal about that. He was the perfect Fowler hire — a “name” and one that was just good enough not to get fired, but not really trying to go big either. Run it cheap, run it tight, make a buck and avoid controversy. TOB’s general attitude in the media was that he was going to say what he wanted (which I appreciated), but at the same time if we fired him he was fine with it as well. It was his last rodeo and one that got him closer to his retirement lifestyle. There’s nothing wrong with that. I think Larranaga made a similar (and brilliant move) in going to Miami, but Larranaga’s had paid off better for him professionally.
Grey: I hope you are right on the DL coach. I contend with the talent we have on the field right now, I could coach them and they’d look good on the field. We’ve probably got enough depth for next year as well. The key will be the year after that. Do we have anything in the pipeline? This is a hire that we won’t really be able to judge for a couple of years. I’d tread with caution before judging, and would suggest we do the same relative to rewards. Larry Coker looked like a genius for 2 years as well………
In contrast, the OL hire is a very different situation. I thought we saw immediate improvement last year, and a line that improved all through last year. This year’s line is the best of the DD or TOB eras. App had a great line, particularly given their talent level. Quick returns on that hire, and I hope we lock him up.
McCallum: Agreed. There’s a lot of ball left to be played and the ND/Clemson stretch for us is brutal. We’re also closing with 2 teams we’ve historically not played well against (UNC and BC) and one that we find ways to lose to (WF).
DD fired the S&C coach and he also fired the DB coach who came with him from Northern Illinois. He’ Not afraid to make changes, which I appreciate. TOB was way too loyal. Amato had no one who wanted to stay.
Ledford was a fantastic hire and I thought so at the time. Hire like and we’ll be in very good shape.
Drink is proving good, though right now I could be the OC with this roster and line. We’re still not good enough in the red zone for my liking. Given the situation (outside perception of our program and that position after firing Canada), then it was probably a pretty solid hire.
I was in the minority who thought Canada was the right one vs Hux. Canada was rumored to have other issues outside of the product being put on the field. He also had been interviewing. On the field I thought we were really predictable relative to formation and motion and Mississippi State completely blew us up when they had a month to prep for us. With Hux people wanted him gone but I still think that is DD’s defense for good or for bad.
FSU 1 TD 4 yds Tot 22/39 (56%) (1 INT) 278 yds
Cuse 1 TD 10 yds Tot 30/47 (64%) (1 INT) 385 yds
L’ville 1 TD 23 yds Tot 26/48 (54%) (1 INT) 354 yds
Pitt 1 TD 33 yds Tot 24/45 (53%) (1 INT) 231 ydsIn two of those four games we were clearly had the benefit of timing. We got FSU in the first real game of a second string QB, and we got Pitt basically in the same place.
To add to that, Pitt inexplicably went to the third stringer and effectively conceded the game down 7. We’ve seen an awful lot of head scratching coaching moves over the past 11 years, so it was nice to see someone else do it. I thought Pitt came out with a great initial game plan offensively, but we either made adjustments at halftime (gasp) or woke up at halftime (second gasp). Either way, it was nice to see that script flipped and I would love to see more games where we win the second half.
We did much better against Jackson than we’d done the past two times we played him. That was a pleasant surprise. We let Dungy run a bit wild given that Syracuse effectively had no other actual options out of the backfield. He’s a gunner and a gamer though as we saw against Clemson.
In the end, I’m fine with a defense that stops the run and concedes some yards in the air. I’m one for forcing a team to be one dimensional, and would rather a team beat me in the air than just grind out drive after drive on the ground. At least my offense can get the ball back after a quicker passing based possession.
What I’m not fine with is a team that is so committed to stopping the run that they get beaten consistently by throws over the top. That’s what we saw early in the year, but that has improved.
Stop Clemson and ND from the home run ball and shut down the run, and I like our chances. Bite on some run fakes (and we did that against Pitt), and it might be a long day.
Oh, and I was a little disappointed when Canada left Pitt after last year for LSU. I was kind of hoping NC State would get to play him because I contend we’d have done very well against him schematically.
I don’t know how we are going to finish the season, however, for the first time in a long time, I’m not worried about our ability to compete in every game.
That sums it up for me. We’ve got a puncher’s chance in every game.
We need to get rested, healed and ready this week. The following two determine whether we’re playing for anything special, or just trying to avoid a stumble in the last three that would put us at 8-4. The schedule this year was always middle loaded, but if we could somehow get through the middle, we could have some very meaningful games in November and December (which haven’t happened here in over a decade).
Bilas didn’t “call” it. Bilas and the talking heads were given the exact script from the NCAA prior to last year’s NCAA tournament. If one remembers the coverage of the UNC games (vomit that I admit that they were even on in my presence), the media clearly were told by the NCAA or UNC’s lawyers what was going to happen. They were brushing over all the other violations and focusing on the academic scandal, yet at the same time saying that everything was fine because some “regular” students benefited as well. I knew something was really rotten then and Friday just proved it.
It is easy to appear prescient when one already knows the outcome………….. Bilas was just “blue” enough and go argue that it was “right.”
Both of these series of events make me dislike UNC and Bilas even more….
Yogi: I thought the same games were tough before the year that I think are tough now — Clemson, FSU, ND, Louisville, with swing games against WF, UNC and S.Carolina. We’re 2-0 in tough games and 0-1 in swing games. We took care of business in 4 games where I thought we should win (2 cupcakes and 2 Big East teams).
If there’s anything we’ve learned about our schedule, it is that FSU was clearly overrated (I thought that prior to the season) and that Louisville isn’t as good as they were last year (I’m surprised by this, but I guess the signs were there with their late season swoon). ND also looks clearly improved, so that game is harder than I’d expected. Clemson’s QB has looked better than I thought he was, but who knows how he returns from the Syracuse game. WF has clearly improved, but UNC has a lot of injuries (so a wash in those two).
I think the point you are making though is that we have a chance at something truly special. I hope we stay focused. I think the bye is coming at a very good time to get rested, get well, and get focused on two back to back games that are the biggest we’ve played in 20+ years.
chop: I agree. We had those good years with Rivers where we were on the cusp of breaking through. We were probably better positioned on the 5-3 year, but choked coming down the stretch. I still remember sitting in a restaurant and watching it unravel on the road against a fairly mediocre UVA squad. Talent wise, those squads were similar (or possibly a bit better).
We had a year with TOB where we were close, but didn’t get it done. That was with Russel the magician but little defense. This year’s squad is much more balanced and deep.
The two games after the bye tell us whether this will be a special season. Go 2-0 and we are setting ourselves up to play the most meaningful games really since 1979 in our football program. Go 0-2, and we need to finish strong to keep the season from spiraling.
