NC State 72
Rider 63
Can we say ’survive and advance’ in the Old Spice Classic and get away with it?
* State shot 70% from the free throw line but it didn’t feel like it as the Pack started 15 of 16 and then finished that game by shooting 8 of 17.
* At the half the three point shooting was as follows:
Rider: 6 for 10
State: 0 for 8
* But, State shot 5 of 6 from behind the line in the second half. More importantly, both Farnold DeGand AND Javi Gonzalez hit wide open threes that they are going to HAVE to hit this year if the Wolfpack is to be successful.
* Courtney Fells was clearly the player of the game.
* Trevor Ferguson played a few minutes in the first half and didn’t do much to impress. The Rider player that Ferguson was guarding immediately drained a three pointer; Ferguson missed both of his wide open three point attempts in the first half.
* Dennis Horner saw no action on Thursday. It will be interesting to see if Horner can replace Ferguson’s minutes.
* Next up - Dave Odom’s South Carolina Gamecocks on Friday at 10:30am.
BJD did some live blogging during the uneventful game -
19-13 Rider, and we look even worse today. Started McCauley, did not provide mojo.
3:00 - Evidently, a tighter rotation means Fergie plays while Horner sits. I really, really don’t get it. He’s actually playing at the same time as Javi and Fells, which is baffling beyond words.
3:04 - No Grant, no Hickson. Wow, is that a shitty lineup. Have scored 2 points in like 6 minutes.
3:06 - Rider by nine. Remember the Hindenberg? You are watching the hoops equivalent.
Halftime - Sid needs to peel some paint in the locker room. This shit is completely unacceptable. Rider 31, NC State 28.
4:04 - Second half is much, much better. Pack by 7, Fells at the line for 2. Still plenty of time to choke, UNO style.
We just need to stop shooting 3’s. I think we’re 0-6 currently from behind the arc… Gonzalez is working hard though.
pathetic showing so far. i was willing to write that loss to NO off as our basketball teams “central florida” game, but it is clear we have a LONG ways to go.
I have no idea what we are trying to do on offense.
i am keeping track of ill-advised 3s
the count so far this game is 5
Apparently a few of the 3’s that I thought we attempted to take were right inside the line… but just in general, we’re shooting so terrible from the perimeter… Fergy just failed twice in a row on the 3, just please take him out.
There is zero chemistry between Hickson, Ben and Costner. Ahh, growing pains.
Good news: We’re hitting free throws so far.
Know what I like most about Gavin? His passes actually set his teammates up. Can’t say that about anybody else.
We play 4 vs 5 because we don’t have a pg.
We stand and watch guys shoot 3’s over us on the perimeter.
Funny people complain about Hickson—he is our only consistent scoring option on offense and the only guy who consistently brings it on defense and around the boards.
Ben is forcing his game.
Costner just likes to shoot 3’s and that’s it.
Grant is second to JJ in bringing it.
Not sure what Fells is doing, up and down.
Tomato gives us nothing if he can’t hit wide open 3’s.
Javy and Farnold are non-factors.
Not sure where Horner is…
If we can’t shoot from the outside, we have to raise it up on defense and create easy shots on the run. In the halfcourt, if you can’t shoot, we have to bang it inside.
the stat of the half…..
3point FGs
Rider- 6-10
State- 0-8
I tried to quelch the orgasm on these boards and others several weeks back by pointing out that we have no reliable outside shooting guard and three untested point guards, and was roundly condemned.
Oh well.
We hit a three? 2 of them? Time for Hickson to throw on domination mode inside.
NCSU with the lead. Grant fouls Thompson hard and it looks like Fells has decided to play today.
We are leading, but we still suck. How many turnovers, 15?
Seems that good things DO happen when Tferg doesn’t play at all for the 2nd half. Gamecocks in 20 hours.
Much better performance by us today. Yes…we still had too many turnovers and we struggled shooting at first. Once we muddled through the 1st half we played a decent 2nd half. Degand played very well today. I thought Hickson was used correctly throughout the game. I didn’t like how we started holding the ball at the 4.5 minute mark, we were having success attacking. We should have kept that up. We shot pretty well from the free throw line (around 75%). The big thing I’m seeing is, and it seems to apply to last season and this one, so goes Fells, so goes the team. If he has a big game, which he did today, then we usually win. When he stinks it up it is usually an L. There was definite improvement over the last game. Costner still needs to step up his game and we need to cut turnovers and things will start looking up.
Almost forgot about Fergie. Our bad stretch in the first half came when he was in the game. His man hit a big 3 pointer to increase their lead. He needs to be on the bench unless we are ahead by 20….errr….25.
It may just be me, but I thought we looked our best today when we had our 4 returning starters with Javi on the point.Maybe even the best so far in this short season.
Javi hit a big 3 in the game. It was a good offensive set for us that got him wide open and he nailed it.
Fells=Grant from last year. Looks good a lot of the time but then makes those mistakes leaving you wondering. I thought he looked better in this game but he needs to be consistent.
Hickson is still a beast. Going up against some real competition and still played well.
Free throws down the stretch are important. We’re lucky to have escaped while hitting almost none of them. First half FT shooting was nice though.
Why does Ferguson play. He adds nothing to the lineup.. It’s especially annoying that he takes time from Horner.
Degand just always seems out of control to me. He out runs the ball even.
5-6 3s in the second.. FT shooting down the stretch in the 2nd was horrible. With 3 minutes left we had 1 made FT ON 4 POSSESSIONS..
Where was JJ in the 2nd. Fells had a nice offensive game. We are very shaky with the ball.
We gave up 16 offensive rebounds.
Like I said….so goes Fells so goes the team. He is a good shooter when he is hot. We have to be able to kick it out to him for the 3’s to open up the inside game. Then….we have to hope he doesn’t make one of his classic bonehead mistakes. He seems to be getting a little better about those. He needs to cut out the fastbreak 3 pointers though. They are costing us 2 rebounds a game at least. He just needs to take it in and jam it. Aside from Fells….I think it is hard to deny that our chemistry was much better today in the 2nd half. Lowe appears to already be getting a handle on what works.
Man…where is everyone today. I’ve never seen it this quiet after a game….especially one we win.
coach just said he sat JJ for breaking a team rule.
“Almost forgot about Fergie. Our bad stretch in the first half came when he was in the game” - uh, the ‘bad stretch’ was the ENTIRE 1st half and Fergeson wasn’t the only one who played poorly.
I hope Degand is a better FT shooter than what he’s shown. otherwise i wouldn’t want him in the game near the end in a close contest.
Really struggling to understand why Horner had no minutes (pretty sure on this - I did not see him). He always seems to bring a spark. I hope we see him against Davey Odom.
Our finishing skills need much work. Down the stretch, our 2 primary ballhandlers (Grant and Degand) went 5-14 from the foul line, plus an uncontested turnover when Degand dribbled the ball out of bounds off Gavin’s foot.
Most of this was in the original thread before Jeff started editing simultaneously!
20 feet and 7 inches. clang.
free Jim Black to check their vision.
This was the first time I’ve seen us play this season. I think Gonzales will eventually be the #1 PG. He’s a bit more under control than Degand. Both are serviceable, however, which is a major upgrade from having nobody behind Atsur. Gonzales also looks like the kind of kid who will get better.
I will repeat myself and say that you will be able to look at the 3-pt fg line in the box score for us and tell whether or not we won the game without watching any of the game.
It is nice to see Grant playing without having any responsibility as the primary ball handler. He is more active on defense and he’s able to pick his spots to break people down off of the dribble.
Why isn’t Horner getting Fergie’s minutes?
Is there a 2-3 combination in the country that turns the ball over more than Grant and Fells in the open court? With Gavin being a playground player from NYC, you’d think he wouldn’t continually have those problems.
Hickson looks a lot better than I thought he would. We have got to get our half court sets in sync better. If we can start to get points out of Costner and McCauley this will be a very, very good team. This is something I feel fairly confident we’ll improve on. Sidney just needs some time to work with Javi and Degand.
Thanks to the Wolfpack for a nice birthday present.
We are clearly struggling early on, but it is a long season. To me, there are really only two things to complain about today:
1) Why we continually don’t guard the 3. It was obvious the ONLY way this team could hang w/ us was w/ the three.
2) Rebounding. We looked much better in the second half.
Don’t worry, the scoring will come. Costner will somehow get a light fired under his ass, and we’ll all soon forget how lethargic he’s been. Fells will be up and down all year. Grant and Hickson will be solid and McCauley will find his place soon.
Oh, and I’m very encouraged by Javy’s play. He’s gonna end up our starting PG soon.
This was my first time seeing the team play in person, and I’ve got to say that I was dissapointed by Degand. He looked really green. Javi was much better when he was in, in my opinion. Someone also pointed out about Fergie, but it was a nightmare when he was in. His man hit a three, then he missed two WIDE open looks. We need him to never play during the game.
Watch the tape, it was Gonzalez man and not Ferguson’s who lost him in the lane and used a running pick from Ferguson’s man, who by the way was Mansell (the 70% from 3 guy). Ferguson did miss two wide open threes and was posted on the bench for it. If he can hit threes he can get some time, if not then bench him. He’s not the open wound you guys make him out to be, he’s just not adding anything to offense.
Gonzalez and Degand did look better, and Hickson showed leadership by coming off the bench like a beast. This allowed Ben to get into the game, and more often McCauley was the glue between Costner and Hickson. Since Ben has a good complimentary game, he can transition between the two different styles of player. Horner will not get Ferguson’s minutes, he is getting Gavin’s and minutes from the four spot, so between Grant and the 3 bigs, Horner is a liability on defense at the three, and not good enough to justify time over Costner, McCauley or Hickson. Sid chose to give Ben the minutes instead.
Fells was the key, if he can be a 10-15 and occasionaly creep up towards 20 and give the solid defensive effort we can be very good. Ferguson is only a spot duty option to rest Fells or maybe Grant at this point, as he appears to be unable to hit the outside shot.
hey, I’ll take it… for 15 or so minutes in the second half we looked like a BB team. Improve each game, and take the title in march
X-factor in my opinion is definitely Big Ben.
Though he didn’t have a big game, his fast break ‘and 1′ seemed to ignite the rest of the team
I was glad to see us win today…Degand and Fergie both hit some big shots for us in our key run in the second half. I thought that they both played well.
Here are my other observations:
*With 2 PGs we should put more pressure on the opposing PG.
*With better depth we should play harder on D.
*Our rebounding absolutely sucks. Our guys don’t box out enough and are usually in bad position when a shot goes up.
*Like others, I wonder why we saw no Horner today?
*Grant plays like our most experienced and reliable player.
*We had several possessions to put Rider away and failed to do so.
*If Degand can’t shoot foul shots better than that, we should play Javy late in the game when we have the lead.
*I thought Javy did a good job playing hard and scrapping on D.
*Lots of room for improvement.
*This team can be great - but it won’t be if we don’t learn how to rebound and defend better.
We won today….against a decent mid-major in a tournament. We learned some things along the way. It isn’t even December yet. We are going to get a lot better. The players still have to learn to work together. It will happen. This team has the potential to be better than last year’s team for sure. They have depth, quickness, and experience. They will succeed given some time.
This was the first game I’ve been able to get on TV this season. The first half looked alot the previous two games as described on previous posts and I was concerned. I saw a lot more effort in the second half on D and it helped that we started hitting some threes. I was impressed with most of the play today from Hickson, Grant, McCauly, and Costner. Fells made some good plays on D and some bad on O (fast break shot with three white shirts on him and no red help.) The blocked shots and steels helped us stay in this one during the first half. kudos to BC for going to floor on a loose ball. Looked like he was very determined today. I really liked how we came out to play in the second half. The extra effort was noticeable and I commend the team for that. I thought our FT % was a lot worse than 75%. This part of our game needs help (especially from our ball handlers.) It may not have been the prettiest win but we showed improvement and came away with the W. I’m looking forward to SC and am more optimistic we’ll see improvement with each game. I’m also looking forward to seeing Horner play. Congratulations to the TEAM on the win today. Way to bounce back after the UNO game. Go Wolfpack.
I thought Horner would get some minutes when they went to the zone since he is one of our more reliable 3 pt shooters.
I also agree that we need more intensity on defense, it seems to get our offense going and leads to more transition baskets. I remember some of the early games last year, we seemed to look to run off of missed shots much more than we do now.
I thought Degand and Javi both seemed decent at pg. I like Javi better, but Degand could be a great change of pace with his speed. If we can get into more transition offense he will be a big factor (if he doesn’t turn it over).
One final note, I just found out that Hansbrough has a younger brother at MSU (I think).
Check out this telling stat from the Box Score:
10:30 AM tip off! I guess they wanted the loser to get atleast a half day in at the magic kingdom before they hit the road.
Thoughts of the game goes like….pheeeeuuuuw! Good to slip away with one and get a chance to keep working at it. Intensity was good. Rebounding was better, and we defended the post agaisnt their big pretty well I thought.
Can Degand just get someone the ball where they can score? He looks clueless at times as to what a pg should do in the halfcourt. Often I noticed that GG has to revert to the PG position just so we can set up something. That isn’t just 4 on 5, that 3 on 5 since GG needs to be free on the wing. When GG has the ball on the wing he can shoot, drive or try an entry pass. This is not what he ends of doing most of time when Degand is in there.
The problem is that teams are going to see this on film and feast on it faster then Lowe can get Farnold to grasp the concept of running a half court offense. My prediction is that MJ will hit the ground running and Degand will be a reserve. Nothing personnel, it’s just that Degand plays PG like Fergie plays SG.
Costner is too good to keep this up. Yes there are problems, but he’s been off on his shooting and he is definitey slower then he was at any point last season. Supposedly added muscle to his frame so maybe it will take adjust. It’s early but he rarley looks to be one of the top ten players on the floor from either team night in and night out against mid majors.
As choppack1 said, I was cringing in the last few minutes of the game as Degand bricked almost everyone of his foul shots… if he’s going to be our primary PG then he’s going to HAVE to hit free throws when it matters. He has a good stroke for them and seems to hit them when it doesn’t matter, but when it’s crunch time he just can’t hit them back to back.
Javi is gaining my respect very quickly, If he can continue to be as steady at the point as he is now and hit some 3’s like he did tonight, he’ll grab the starter spot eventually.
Excellent 2nd half though, but I’m wondering what “Team rule” JJ broke to get in Sidney’s dog house ?
“Next up - Dave Odom’s South Carolina Gamecocks on Friday at 10:30am.”
We play at 12:30pm…here are the brackets:
http://www.oldspiceclassic.com/field.html
This was much better. I would like to see Horner more also, maybe instead of Costner.
Anyone watching the Kansas state/George Mason game? GM is destroying KS, they are running their offense as well as defense incredibly well… I hope we can get our teamwork completely together before that game if we manage to make it to the finals or they’re going to have a field day with us. They’ve thrown a few zone traps on kansas state that have just been deadly, I hope degand/javi can handle that sort of pressure.
some notes:
Costner is slumping, and looks like he’s trying to develop an inside game. But a couple times the defender was able to bother and slap the ball away. He’s an excellent shooter so I am not too worried, but his defensive speed is a concern.
I also noticed Horner did not play. Unfortunately he plays a position we are overloaded in, and Lowe showed from the beginning of the game he would be less liberal with substitutions. Fergie plays a position we are not overloaded in, which explains his playing time, which was not that much this time. I say he moves down in the depth chart once Johnson is activated. It’s like waiting for Anthony Grundy to start playing, all over again. I really wonder how the duties will be split between the three pgs. I suppose as Lowe says, they will determine that themselves.
Courtney Fells. Consistently inconsistent. You can almost anticipate mental lapses, turnovers at times. Provides a mid-range jumper game, like Grant, that can pleasantly take you by surprise.
Grant is becoming the leader, and needs to continue following that up with consistency. Right now would consider him our #2 option after Hickson.
I thought us surging to take the lead had a lot to do with our depth, and that we wore them down a bit. Of course McCauley had that steal, and Javi/Degand hit big threes. I usually cringe when Degand has to shoot it.
So far we are a poor three-point shooting team, this must improve to break the frequent zone. I also hope Lowe does not forget the importance of recruiter shooters. Anyway, need to do more penetrate and dishing. When they go in zone, we fall into this lame four corners predictable passing game. Opposition offensive rebounding numbers need to shrink more, please box out.
I was hoping that K-State would win so we could see Beasley, oh well.
A comment on the assists for Farnold and Degand - it’s hard to get an assist if you bring the ball up the court, pass it, and that’s the last time you touch it during that possession…
Let’s not all jump off a bridge about Horner not playing. Remember, this is (potentially) a 3 day tournament. I’m sure that we will see him today. Also, don’t look past SC. This could just as easily be a 2 day tournament.
^^ Oops. Didn’t realize the losers keep playing. 3 day tournament regardless.
Too many turnovers. FT shooting terrible. Defense awful.
Lots of work to do to get to our promising season…
No matter how good our frontline can be, slow team speed, shaky PG play, and poor outside shooting are MAJOR concerns. This team bears a frightening resemblence to the Bill Guthridge era Tar Heels.
I do expect us to make the 64-team field, but anything higher than a 7 seed would be a minor miracle.
the Rider win is looking a bit better… they are having their way w/ Penn State now. Penn St. actually has some good players; they took Ohio State to the brink last year (and returned most of those guys).
Anyone have a link to a website that streams NCSU basketball? I’m stuck at work and want to listen to the game. Thanks in advance.
If you take my halftime comments from yesterday and reverse them—that is exactly what we did to win and start finding ourselves a LITTLE bit.
The question today is: can we continue to come together and build on the 2nd half from yesterday?
We can still be pretty good this year. We just won’t be great because we don’t have a great pg nor do we have a great “heat it up” consistent outside shooter to free up our strong frontcourt (Courtney Fells could change the second part of that if he were to bring it every game, or most games, as he is capable of).
People forget how terrible we were throughout most of the season last year and especially before Engin came back. Engin was very solid but even he was not an elite, lead your team to a title pg—but missing his level of play has hurt this team’s start as much as anything else, including JJ-Ben-BC conundrum.
Based on our pg and shooting deficiencies in year 2 of the new era, REALISTIC goals for our team should be (1) to hold our own in the ACC (2) get back to the NCAA’s, and (3) hopefully get on a roll like we did late last year and make some noise in the ACCT and NCAAT.
IF (1) the team comes together and works in the new face(s) in the middle and at pg (2) Fells plays up to his potential on a CONSISTENT basis, and (3) we get improvement and average ACC performance out of our pg options…we will put ourselves in a position to make some noise and continue building the program toward being a contender when it matters rather than simply a participant as we “settled” for—or were unwilling to settle for—in previous years.
I think the word I’d use for yesterday’s game is “disjointed”.
Also, I’d just like to add that altough Trevor Ferguson hasn’t played well or contributed at all, we should all hope that a big “thus far” goes along with that statement. Either way, he is not the reason we looked unorganized for the most part yesterday.
Costner is looking pretty good in the first five minutes. Ben started, and Sid still hasn’t unleashed the BEAST.
Now Hickson comes in and is having trouble getting started. Nice 3 by Grant though.
Horner is in. Degand has driven the lane three times and has come up with 6 pts.
Thanks for the updates…I can’t believe Horner is actually playing. Let him play and keep Fergie on the bench.
Degand is looking solid.
Horner is playing well. Hickson is not at all. Ben is back in.
Did anyone watch Mike O’Donnell play last night?
They seem to be running more half court sets today and working harder for loose balls. McCauley is much more involved, but can’t buy a bucket right now. Every time State tries to pull away a little bit, SC hits an open three.
Gametracker says Hickson has yet to take a shot…and we’re still winning? That’s gotta be a good sign.
SC is playing really good defense, goes up by 2
Things are unraveling at the end of the first half after a decent start. Somebody needs to step up.
Big 3 by costner, then SC hits the buzzer beater to end the half. 29-25 SC. How many times is that gonna happen to us this season?
“Best frontline in the nation”
I do not understand the rebounding.
Uh oh, I seem to remember a long three at the close of a first half last season.
turnovers….. oh my god. sloppy sloppy basketball.
I hope we look a LOT better in the second half.
Hickson looks more like a freshman today. Degand looks much better than yesterday. Horner had a nice first half stretch. We need to wear these guys out by pounding the ball inside. No shots outside of 12 ft unless they are wide open 3’s.
We look awful. Simply awful. Our offense is a train wreck, except shockingly for Degand. Our guys had no concept of holding for the last shot (Costner released with 9 seconds left), and it bit us in the ass.
The effort is still not where it needs to be, and the execution is horrendous.
Costner and McCauley simply refuse to rebound. Pitiful.
Ugly, ugly basketball. We continue to struggle on the boards despite our height. Rebounding is nothing but heart and fundamentals. It’s really easy - you find a man to box out, and you find the ball. If you rely on athleticism you won’t rebound well. If you are constantly out of position - you will not rebound well.
Like yesterday in the second half - for several possessions, we had an opportunity to stretch a 4-6 point lead to something more substantial. Like yesterday, we didn’t do a good enough job executing in these situations. This is the difference between a close win and a close loss. A close win and a blowout win.
The good news is that it’s early in the year.
We are showing little heart and no killer instinct. USC is a physical team, and our bigs need to adjust and quit the finesse crap.
costner 3 fouls in 2 minutes to start the 2nd half.
ncsu had commited no fouls until the 9 min mark of the first half.
where’s horner?
BJD - I agree - would it kill our guys to play to the whistle? That last second shot reminded a bit of last year vs. GaTech - “If I attempt to guard you, I might foul - so I just won’t guard you.”
Costner continues his lazy play with a dumb clearout foul - his 4th. Gamecocks are getting at least 2 shots per possession, unless their first goes in. Disgusting play by the Pack.
would someone please guard the perimeter
We really need some perimeter defense. SH*@!!!!
The lead has grown to 9, and the team looks like it has quit.
wow. the shortest guy out there for state is 6′3″ and yet So Car has 16 off. rebounds?
Hickson’s looking alive.