What if?

The NC State Wolfpack has definitely experienced a (not unexpectedly) tough basketball season this year. The pill that is hardest to swallow, however, has been Engin Atsur’s injury. To this point of the season, NC State has compiled a record that is almost exactly what many fans expected. But, that expectation included Atsur’s presence on the court. When the two things which the team is most deficient are two things that Atsur does best – handle the ball and play perimeter defense – we are left with just a little twinge of ‘what if’?

A thread on one of the NC State message boards got me thinking about another ‘what if’ this morning.

What if…Larry Davis had kept his commitment to NC State and suited up for the Wolfpack this year?
I think that it would have been quite interesting to see Larry Davis on this year’s roster. Davis’ presence in this year’s backcourt would have been a huge boon for our talent and our depth. It also would had other impacts on the future of the program – Farnold DeGand would have most definitely not been recruited to transfer in.

Davis play at Seton Hall has improved since the beginning of the season. He currently averages almost nine points a game in 20 minutes of time. He has a 1:1 assist/turnover ratio, but is shooting a nice 44% from the three point line and 85% from the free throw line.

I was disappointed – not necessarily – heartbroken when Davis reneged from his commitment to State. But, I was not so indifferent to some of the ancillary issues related to the situation. For example, at the time I didn’t necessarily like the way that State acquiesced to Davis’ request to back out of his committment. I explained my position using some business analogies in this relevant entry.

I wish that I would have known more about the situation at the time as I would have been more sympathetic to Davis and less supportive on NC State.

Since the situation unfolded in April/May, SFN has learned that NC State had extremely limited contact with Larry Davis during the Pack’s search – oops…sorry…I mean “Lee Fowler’s search” – for a basketball coach. In fact, SFN got it on extremely good authority that Lee Fowler called Larry Davis all but ONE TIME during the month long search. Of course Davis was going to listen to other options when Bobby Gonzalez is in his ear every day (actually his AAU coach who ultimately took a job with Gonzalez) and Fowler has zero transition plan in place.

Good God.

Folks, it takes some serious talent to simultaneously botch a both coaching search and ruin a recruiting class while all the while losing almost 30 pounds because you are note built to handle the responsibilities and stress of your job.

Sure. There will be some people argue that Davis would have flown the coop anyway. That is your perogative. I really have no clue. All I know is that other coaching searches and transitions at NC State – Les Robinson to Herb Sendek; Mike O’Cain to Chuck Amato; Amato to Tom O’Brien seemed to be executed with far less turmoil and turnover of recruits. Thank God NC State hired the ‘consultant to do the work’ so that Lee Fowler could just be quiet for the recent change in football.

(Don’t misunderstand my mea culpa on the Davis situation. I still think that Davis and his people could have handled their side of the situation with more dignity, and I don’t back away from these comments related to the situation.)

06-07 Basketball Basketball Recruiting General NCS Basketball

37 Responses to What if?

  1. VaWolf82 01/24/2007 at 8:58 AM #

    On a recent interview with PP, Fowler said that he didn’t need a consultant for the BB search, because he knew so many coaches…and because so many coaches knew him. He also said that if he had to do the BB coaching search over again that he still would not have used a consultant.

    Let’s hope that Sid out lasts Fowler at State.

  2. VaWolf82 01/24/2007 at 9:03 AM #

    Crap…we’ve got to find an edit button.

    Having Davis and Werner this year would have helped the team….but there is no way to know if the help would have been enough to make a substantial difference in the W/L record. This year was always going to be tough…and without Atsur, it’s a little surprising that it hasn’t been even worse.

    We’ve watched two FB seasons without an effective QB and now a BB season without a PG at all. Let’s hope that we don’t see either situation again.

  3. gopack968 01/24/2007 at 9:04 AM #

    Speaking of ‘What Ifs’ – While Ced and Andrew probably made good decisions (only time will tell for certain), What If one or both had returned for this season? Either player had the potential to be dominanting, behind perhaps only Hansbrough for prominence in the conference.

    Questions like this can make you crazy. We have what we have.

    What If Atur plays tonight? Hard to see him making a huge difference out of the box after such a long layoff. It will take a few games with him at full strength for the team to adjust. This was always going to be a rough season – and it is.

  4. BoKnowsNCS71 01/24/2007 at 9:53 AM #

    My “what if” would go like this.

    He who shall not be named stayed. Simmons to NBA, Brackman to baseball. Engin hurt. Davis gets partial playing time becuase he is having trouble learning the “system” and others get some PT. Other players are not played and thus are not as productive. W-L record is same or worse — but not better. Lots of controversy and pressure to fire the coach. Duke beats State by 9.

    My 2 cents.

  5. RickJ 01/24/2007 at 9:58 AM #

    I have always felt that we should have played a harder line with Davis & Werner. No doubt we would have taken criticism for this stance but I think the school should have taken the lead and given Lowe some cover. My argument would have been that NC State is always going to honor a signed LOI and honor scholarships of players already enrolled whenever there is a coaching change. Furthermore, it is unfair to our current players to have to play a season with a depleted roster. Engin Astur would have been the prime example – Why should Astur have to play his senior year without enough players to practice?

    Who knows what Davis & Werner would have ultimately done? Come to State, sat a year or gotten a waiver from the NCAA? Had they come, my guess is that they would be playing and very happy and making no noise about transferring.

    Davis broke into Seton Hall’s starting line up about 5 games ago and is averaging over 25 minutes a game since then. Werner is averaging 13 minutes a game on one of the deepest and best front lines in college basketball. He is a lot like McCauley.

    Trade Davis & Werner for Degand & Lewandowski and our current team looks a lot different. Hopefully, next year Degand & Johnson will negate the loss of Davis and Hickson & Smith will do the same for Werner and the transition will be a memory.

  6. PapaJohn 01/24/2007 at 10:06 AM #

    If Engin plays tonight – you never know until you see who comes out on the court – I would expect to see the same performance as his last game. His shot will probably be off, his legs won’t be up to extended minutes, but his experience, poise, and defensive skills will be invaluable to this young team.
    GO PACK! _ Let’s take this one!

  7. Dan 01/24/2007 at 10:12 AM #

    Engin’s loss as a floor leader is just as big as anything else. He was the player groomed for the role by staff that includes two guys who lead champions from the same position. He was also the only guy on the current roster that had proved a committment to defense under the former coach. (McCauley and Costner get a pass here due to lack of opportunity) Our staff had a lot riding on Atsur. I dont know if our record would be any different, but I’m sure the product on the floor of late would be much better. I’m 99% sure that teams would not be having record nights from the arc against us. JJ Reddick called Engin the best perimeter defender in the ACC last year.

    In all fairness to everyone regarding Davis, if you look at other coaching changes across the country, its not all that unusual when it comes to nationally ranked recruits. That doesnt let Jed of the hook, and it also doesnt mean you cant have some harsh thoughts for the Houston Nutt – Mitch Mustain like behavior that Bobby Gonzales engaged in upon becoming the Seton Hall head coach, just like Bob Huggins, just like a myriad of other coaches. When it comes to recruiting today’s coaches are better than sharks at sensing blood in the water. The biggest failure of Lee Fowler was the total collapse between CalipariGate and the signing of Sidney Lowe. He was basically chumming the waters and drawing them in. I know that Lowe’s degree status would have kept it from being official until June regardless, but if Larry Harris had been brought back to Raleigh sooner Larry Davis would have been kept far more engaged.

    The other “what if” not mentioned here. What if Chris Wright was still coming here next fall? Would he have stayed committed if Larry Harris had been on staff mid April? Hickson, Wright, Smith, and Thomas + Costner, McCauley, Grant, and Fells? I guess we will never know. Gee. Thanks Lee.

    One question always plagues me: How did Lee Fowler go from being an assistant on Dana Kirk’s notorious staff to being assistant athletic director at the same school the following year? Dont schools usually clean house after that sort of scandal.

  8. redfred2 01/24/2007 at 10:21 AM #

    How many times has Sidney Lowe had to adjust to a different scenario already? Just remember that word adjust, there was not any capacity to do that before he arrived.

    I had heard some bits and pieces about the mishandling of the recruits and I had speculated here on SFN as to how I thought it had all played out. Unfortunately, I was closer to being right than I really wanted to be. What concerns me now, is that that same person is right there, and still heading up all departments at NC State. Now we have great coaches, but with the same people supposedly assisting them to reach higher levels. I see great new facilities, good coaches being limited and struggling more than they ever should, because they do not have proper support above them.

  9. choppack1 01/24/2007 at 10:27 AM #

    One thing about the “what if” game – is that it can played out for a lot of different coaches….What if Brian Clark doesn’t fumble on the FSU 49 in a tie ball game w/ 2 minutes left in the 4th quarter Philip’s senior year. What if Daniel Evans doesn’t take a shot to the head and we connect on a FG to beat Wake Forest this year. What if they don’t call that touch foul on Hodge in the 2002 game vs. UConn in the NCAA tourney, what if they don’t call that touch foul on Hodge vs. Vandy in the NCAA tourney…

    I would be more tempted to play the “what if” game if we had been closer in our losses. Yes, we’ve really had no shocking losses in b’ball this year. However, what has been disappointing to me is the way in which we have lost. In our 3 ACC home conference games, it looked to me like the necessary effort was lacking from one play or another in each of these games. Atsur’s prescence would definitely have had an impact – but could it make up 15 points – especially since he was hobbling coming into the season…

  10. BoKnowsNCS71 01/24/2007 at 11:09 AM #

    What if I had the winning lottery ticket tonight? Agree Chopack — woulda, shoulda, coulda’s are just dreams.

  11. old13 01/24/2007 at 11:13 AM #

    Incompitent! Offends alumni and fans! Figurehead! What does it take to get rid of Foulup!

  12. Gene 01/24/2007 at 11:17 AM #

    I think the biggest impact of not having Davis is it forced Engin to play a lot of minutes, early in the season, when the coaching staff wanted to rest him, since he had a sore Achilles. Albritton started one of our early season games (I think) and lasted 5 minutes and Atsur was pressed into service, since Albritton wasn’t getting it done.

    I think Davis would’ve allowed Atsur to rest, recover from both his sore Achilles and the fatigue of international play, which wound up right as classes / practice was starting and probably let him be at full strength going into the ACC season.

    Personally, if Atsur’s healthy, I hope he only plays 10-15 minutes tonight and they work him back into the line-up slowly. I really want Atsur to be healthy and able to go full speed in February and March. If we get into a post-season tournament, I’d like to have him be healthy, so we can make a run at that time, as well.

    Playing him a lot against UVa and risking another re-injury and 5-6 games out again, isn’t going to help us get through the season any better.

  13. Gene 01/24/2007 at 11:23 AM #

    In all fairness to everyone regarding Davis, if you look at other coaching changes across the country, its not all that unusual when it comes to nationally ranked recruits.

    One reason we should be very grateful to Dennis Horner for staying. If you look at what happened to Capel, when he got the OU job after Samson left for IU, Capel lost Samson’s entire incoming class, since they all opted out of their LOI’s.

    Just remember that word adjust, there was not any capacity to do that before he arrived.

    Didn’t realize Evitimov was recruited to play center, which he did for a couple of years, after Powell left.

  14. redfred2 01/24/2007 at 12:17 PM #

    I didn’t know who was recruited to play where, did you? The problem WAS, neither did the players. Was Simmons recruited to play “center” out of position at the foul line, while being the hub of the offense 15 feet from the basket?

    “Center” you say? Right.

  15. redfred2 01/24/2007 at 12:25 PM #

    Sticking a different part into a place where it fits even worse than the one it was replacing, is not adjusting, it’s just staying the course with even less to go on.

  16. foz 01/24/2007 at 12:38 PM #

    I prefer the “wait til” game to the “what if” game. It allows speculating and dreaming of things that may still happen.

  17. Sam92 01/24/2007 at 1:05 PM #

    i expect that we would have struggled this season even with Atsur in the line-up — just not enough firepower

    without him, it’s even harder.

    but hey, for unscientific reasons i’m optimistic about Sid as a motivator, getting the team we’ve got to play above themselves

    we’re going to pull out a close one against the cavs tonight

  18. Rick 01/24/2007 at 1:19 PM #

    I am never surprised at the level of incompetance LF shows.

  19. VaWolf82 01/24/2007 at 1:32 PM #

    prefer the “wait til” game

    I’ll never play this game again for many reasons…
    (1) You never know how kids will turn out.
    (2) You never know how long they will stay.
    (3) You never know who is going to be hurt.
    (4) I got sick of waiting for Herb to do something “next year” that he had never done in “this year”.

  20. Gene 01/24/2007 at 1:44 PM #

    I am never surprised at the level of incompetance LF shows.

    I’ll be more shocked, when LF gets praised up the wazoo, if the TOB and Lower hires work out.

  21. TNCSU 01/24/2007 at 2:02 PM #

    ^^^I prefer the “wait til” game to the “what if” game. It allows speculating and dreaming of things that may still happen.

    I concur, but we often have the glass half empty types! We have gotten Hickson since that time, and he is by far our highest ranked HS recruit in some time. We’ll have to wait to see if he lives up to his ranking, though.

    BTW, is Marques Johnson able to practice with the team now? I know he is supposedly enrolled already, but not sure if he is eligible to practice yet.

  22. burnbarn 01/24/2007 at 2:07 PM #

    yes, mj is practicing

  23. roandaddy 01/24/2007 at 2:14 PM #

    The problem with going on about “what ifs” is that there are just as many you could turn the other way…
    What if TOB used better clock management against us this year and Evans didn’t have time to complete the pass?
    OR— the greatest what if.. What if Lorenzo Charles WASN”T under the basket or waited for the rebound, or fumbled the shot…

  24. class of 74 01/24/2007 at 2:15 PM #

    I’m sorry but Atsur’s presence would not have made any dramatic difference in this season from what I’ve seen so far! Sid has few if any buttons to press with this squad as presently constructed. The only negative I’ve seen is how the guys can play so flat at times. It’s one thing to be overmatched by superior talent but playing hard, giving great effort for 28 to 30 nights a season should not be that difficult to do! I’ve seen too many lack luster efforts, not results but efforts, and that’s my only criticism to date.

  25. foz 01/24/2007 at 2:20 PM #

    “we often have the glass half empty types”

    If it is all only a guessing game (and it is), I prefer to be as optimistic as possible.

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