Five Things to Know for 2007-2008
Basketball is approaching and there are TONS of great preseason previews out there! We will work our way to a few of them in the coming weeks, but thought that we would share this quick piece from ESPN’s Pat Forde today.
Congratulations to both Sidney Lowe and Dereck Whittenburg. (Isn’t it fun to say their names together? Especially at the start of the 25th Anniversary season of the Wolfpack’s 1983 National Championship?)
Coach Lowe’s Wolfpack is listed in a group with Georgetown, Tennessee, Washington State, and Indiana as the “Next Five” ‘ready to pounce if any of the (top five) teams above falter’.
It really is unbelievable. Here we sit garnering literal Top Ten national attention in only Coach’s second season after not earning this kind of attention in ANY of the previous coach’s ten year tenure?! It’s crazy. Especially in light of an Athletics Director that told you for eight years that it takes five or six years to “build a program the right way”. I’m still waiting for the apology.
Additionally, Coach Whittenburg takes home the top spot of “Coaches Doing an Underrated Job”
1. Dereck Whittenburg, Fordham: Now in his fifth year, his win total has improved every season, from six to 13 to 16 to 18.
The funny thing is that most of of Pack Nation was ready to dump the FB season and jump to BB. Now, with TOB and the boys making a season of it, our attention will be pulled both ways for the next few weeks.
A nice outcome!
Anyone who thinks the Tarheels have one of the best fan bases loses all credibility.
Amen to that PackMan, but I guess he’s never met a Tarheel fan before.
Ah, but they are the most knowledgeable. Just ask them.
This could end up being a very nice hoops season.
we make it in this top ten (next 5 ready to pounce!), yet we don’t have a top ten sophmore or freshman, according to this list. ready to start giving state its props as a team, but not quite ready to acknowledge and thus “promote” any outstanding indiv. players, say JJ or Costner. sure, ok.
^^the top ten for freshman pertains to “impact” freshman, which this list considers Kyle Singer moreso than JJ. considering the bdevils need more help, then I can concede this.
My only concern is how how Sid manages to take advantage of our bigs while maintaining speed at the appropriate positions. at the same time i dislike to think we don’t have our most talented guys on the floor to avoid matchup problems, but i suppose is something we will have to deal with in being terribly overloaded at forward. obviously there is some granularity here I have not addressed.
Hickson will smoke Kyle Singler, and maybe Deon Thompson of UNC. But nobody will defeat that Hansbrough fella over at UNC. When you are allowed to move around the floor like you are Michael Jackson at a celebrity dance competition, you cannot beat someone like that. I expect him to do great at the pros, as he is already conditioned to being allowed to travel a bit. Did I say Kyle Singler sucks? Well, he does. We are so good in the paint, I expect for people my age (32) to compare our incoming class to the likes of Thompson, Shackleford, and yes (last but not least) Chris Washburn. I wonder what Washburn is up to now. Probably in the state pen doing a few years. Well, lets set that aside for right now. We all remember how good Washburn was. JJ Hickson will likely go down as the greatest center in the ACC since Allah Abdelbaby at Duke. He might could rival Virginia’s very own Ralph Sampson. He is bigger than Sampson was weight wise. I wonder if Sampson was fed good meals at home when he was little? Seemed on the light side to me. Now Lowe does not have that problem however. Lets go state! I expect for us to defeat that rival down the road this year. We will get Carolina too. We will be vying for that top spot in the ACC, along with those Blue Devils of Duke and Tarheels of North Carolina. If we can get the officiating on our side like Duke has had for so long now, I am just about sure we can’t be beat.
Don’t know how Costner got left off this list:
Five Stellar Sophomores (14)
The talent from the recruiting class of 2006 didn’t all go pro with Greg Oden and Kevin Durant. Sophomores we’ll be talking about this season:
1. Stephen Curry, Davidson
2. Jodie Meeks, Kentucky
3. Earl Clark, Louisville
4. Chase Budinger, Arizona
5. Raymar Morgan, Michigan State
wow, why was this game so close??
http://deadspin.com/sports/what.s-his-qb-rating%3F/kirby-freeman-did-not-have-a-good-day-319226.php
^What’s that saying involving counting…and eggs?
I agree for the most part and think we have the makings of a really good, if not great, basketball team this year. But, let’s all pinch ourselves and remind ourselves that there are still some unanswered questions…this is still just year TWO…that this the same media that gave our former coach (not team) but coach, good press in years past…and it’s still the same media that thought we were crazy not to feel like we were luckliest university on the planet just to have him out on the court.
So, it’s not too hard to figure out that they don’t really know what in the hell they’re talking about a good percentage of the time, so take them for they’re worth. Please don’t take that wrong, or as negative, I’m not at all saying that the press wrong about the STATE of the Wolfpack BB program right now and it’s certain that it’s improving by leaps and bounds, but we still do need to show some restraint in the expectations department and be ready for the possibility of some setbacks.
As for me, I’m confident in just one thing, that is that we will improve as the season progresses. Considering the close of last season and the new additions, what more could we ask for? Oh yeah, I’m confident in one more thing too, that this is going to be a season of basketball, kickass NC State style basketball, that I been waiting for a long, looong time.
^Terrible typing, skipped words and etc., I’m going to sleep.
“You guys are being unrealistic. If you think that some guy who has never coached a college game in his life, who’s never even recruited a kid or learned ‘how’ to recruit, is just going to come in and work miracles — you’re disallusioned.”
Oh, but how I do love reading back over the archives.
“Don’t know how Costner got left off this list:”
Five Stellar Sophomores (14)
The talent from the recruiting class of 2006 didn’t all go pro with Greg Oden and Kevin Durant. Sophomores we’ll be talking about this season:
1. Stephen Curry, Davidson
2. Jodie Meeks, Kentucky
3. Earl Clark, Louisville
4. Chase Budinger, Arizona
5. Raymar Morgan, Michigan State
Choppack1 – I suspect Costner was left off because he was in the recruiting class of 2005. Remember, he was hurt his first year and took a medical redshirt. Otherwise, he would definitely belong.
“Especially in light of an Athletics Director that told you for eight years that it takes five or six years to “build a program the right way”. I’m still waiting for the apology.”
I am sure Jed would argue the “right way” prat of that statement so he can save face. It is amazing how a coach can make such a difference. We went from not having an inside game to having one of the best in the country in TWO years. We went from “happy to make the tournament” to expecting more, in TWO years.
“Especially in light of an Athletics Director that told you for eight years that it takes five or six years to “build a program the right way”. ”
do we have to have this discussion again? Sid’s “in year TWO” success has to give some credit to the previous staff for getting the program into great shape to build upon. I doubt if Sid would have had this much early success if he had taken over when Herb did.
“We went from not having an inside game to having one of the best in the country in TWO years.”
Only 2 seasons did we not have a great inside game (between Powell & Ced’s soph season)
“We went from “happy to make the tournament” to expecting more, in TWO years.
speak for yourself. I haven’t been “happy to make the tourney” since Herb broke the 10 year drought of making the tourney in ’02. Doubt many others were either.
packgrad,
Knock it off or you will be banned again.
“do we have to have this discussion again?”
We have to have every discussion again. Every topic MUST be a circular firing squad.
Or so it seems.
I love pickin’ me some scabs.
And can we actually see this team play a game that counts before we proclaim what Sid has accomplished in year 2? We have one exhibition, and even that game revealed that we have some things to work on (defense against quick penetrating guards, for one thing, defensive rebounding, for another). We don’t know what this team can do until we see how they respond to the tournament down in Florida over Thanksgiving, followed by the trip to Michigan State. A typical Herb team we would expect to go 2-2 in those games. Will this team do better? We’ll see…Aside from a big win at Purdue few years back, we’ve been terrible on the road in the ACC/Big 10 Challenge…(is that Purdue game our only road win?)
” “Especially in light of an Athletics Director that told you for eight years that it takes five or six years to “build a program the right way”. “
do we have to have this discussion again? Sid’s “in year TWO” success has to give some credit to the previous staff for getting the program into great shape to build upon. I doubt if Sid would have had this much early success if he had taken over when Herb did. ”
God, you are ridiculous in your love for Herb. Yes, we have to have this discussion over and over because of stupid revisionist history on the part of Herb lovers. Sure, Sid owes Herb for bringing in the guys who would compose the Iron 5 and, yes, the IMAGE of the program was better than what Herb inherited in year 1, but the team Herb left Sid was a skeleton of the former bubble team he coached due to all of the seniors graduating, Ced & Brackman saying goodbye, and the recruit defections. Sid did not inherit an NCAA bubble team even if Herb managed to accomplish consistent bubble status in previous years. When your only subs in year 1 are one skinny freshman and a walk-on, you ARE rebuilding—no matter how many players the previous bubble coach had in year 10 when he was completely destroyed by a coach who spent less time rebuilding a football school following the Pender mess.
” “We went from not having an inside game to having one of the best in the country in TWO years.”
Only 2 seasons did we not have a great inside game (between Powell & Ced’s soph season) ”
You can’t give Herb credit for Hickson or Smith (and please don’t make everyone laugh at you more by asserting something stupid like Hickson was on the verge of signing with Herb to play the Princeton Offense—that was never going to happen despite Hickson’s respect for Larry Harris).
Also, you obviously have NEVER spoken to Powell or Ced about this. If you had, you would know that they never thought we had an inside game either. Powell left in part because he was totally pissed off about Hodge being the center of the offense and everything else—meaning, he got to stand around the top of the key and watch Hodge go 1 on 5. Ced was totally pissed off because, except when Coach K utilized his skills one shining moment over at Cameron, he never had a chance to develop his inside game or get a reasonable amount of touches down low—instead, he spent most of time with his back turned at the key passing to cutters rather than being fed and allowed to dominate like he did at Duke.
If Herb was so damn great, he would still be here. He wasn’t, and no amount of lipstick is going to make his mediocre bubble results look worthy of defense from anyone with any sense. It’s a shame Herb didn’t take all of his delusional fans with him when he left for the desert…THAT would have been his GREATEST accomplishment by far…
It’s the Hatfields and the McCoys…
It’s is the “happy where we are” people vs “bitter that his man got run off” person
It’s the “smarter than can possibly be good for you” vs. the “pathetically stupid.” Am I right on that?
It’s the “can see clearly” vs “blind as a bat”
He’s gone and nothings gonna bring him back.
It is time to move on.