NC State doesn’t open play in the ACC Tournament until tomorrow. But, that hasn’t deterred many in the local media from on Herb Sendek and the NC State Basketball program. In addition to these interesting comments, a few more items have hit the radar the last couple of days.
John DeLong, one of the writers in North Carolina who is historically more sympathetic to NC State, wrote a neat piece on Wednesday that achieved criticism without directly criticizing:
Will anybody ever get a meaningful rebound again? Will Gavin Grant wear a mask to protect his broken nose? What’s up with these uninspired starts? What would it take to get Andrew Brackman’s hoops production up as high as his ERA, after another shelling on the mound Sunday?
Fortunately for Sendek, the answers aren’t really necessary until Friday afternoon, when State will play either Wake Forest or Florida State in the quarterfinals…
…In that sense (of making the NCAA Tournament), the pressure is off compared to what State teams have faced in recent years. Twice in the past three years, State has come into the ACC Tournament on the NCAA Tournament bubble. But in the sense that a four-game losing streak would cause State’s NCAA seeding to plummet significantly, the pressure is on. In the sense that the Anti-Herb crowd is riled up again, the pressure is on. In the sense that this team’s legacy is on the line, the pressure is on.
This seemed to be a special team at one point, maybe State’s best since the 1980s. But you can’t go down as a special State team if rival North Carolina sweeps you, then you fizzle out down the stretch and lay an egg in the postseason. You can’t go down as a special team if you don’t do something special in either the ACC or the NCAA.
Injuries have never prevented the really special State teams from being really special. David Thompson crashed-landed on his head, bandaged it up and won a national championship a week later in 1974. The 1983 Cardiac Pack lost Dereck Whittenburg for 14 games with a broken foot, but it wasn’t derailed. Bennerman has a tender hamstring. Evtimov has a sore foot.
