2007.03.20_ Big Dose of Bytes

The last week or so has been very good for NC State. We’ve blogged a ton of items and hope that you will take some time to scroll through the blog and make sure that you haven’t missed anything that of interest. Just this weekend we had almost a dozen entries that looked forward and looked back.

Even though we have been quite busy, a lot of comments/observations have fallen through the cracks. The following are some quick bytes that haven’t been shared since the ACC Tournament:

* Much is being made about the ACC’s poor performance in the NCAA Tournament. Although I think the ACC was the most competitive and deepest conference in America (as highlighted by the RPI), the conference’s failure to advance more than one program into the sweet sixteen does not surprise me. We were very deep this season, but it was never a secret that we lacked the “star power” at the top of the league to advance a lot of teams deep into the tournament.

* Despite the league’s struggles this season, you can always turn to history boost the ego. Dave Glenn logged an entry focused on the ACC’s dominance of the modern tournament history that will make you feel better. Just a couple to wet your whistle:

The ACC’s all-time NCAA Tournament winning percentage (.674) is significantly better than any other conference. The Big East (.625) is second, the Big Ten (.621) third and the Pac-10 (.609) fourth. Nobody else is over 60 percent.

Since 1980, when the NCAA lifted its limits on the number of participants per conference, the ACC has had just one losing season in NCAA Tournament play (5-6 in 1987) and has a success rate over 66 percent. Again, nobody else is close.

Since the field expanded to 64 teams in 1985, the ACC has had 111 teams in the NCAA Tournament, about the same as the Big East (116). Yet the ACC has 221 wins in that span — 35 more than the Big East. The Big Ten has had 124 participants since 1985 yet has 42 fewer wins. The SEC, with 110 participants, has 61 fewer wins. The Pac-10 has less than half as many NCAA wins as the ACC in the modern era. Since the Big 12 formed in 1996, it trails the ACC 96-72.

The ACC has won three of the last six (50 percent) national championships, with three different teams — Duke in 2001, Maryland in 2002, and North Carolina in 2005. The league also has won six of the last 16 (37.5 percent) NCAA titles, and eight of the last 25 (32 percent).

* UNC-CH had to play ABOVE their normal game to beat us in the Atlantic Coast Conference Championship. That’s a compliment, folks.

* The selection of Brendan Wright over Brandon Costner as the ACC Tournament’s MVP was ridiculous. I realize to the victor goes the spoils, except that I remember in 1983 when NC State won the NCAA title and yet Akeem was the Final 4 MVP. I guess only NC State gets a shaft like that.

* It was interesting to hear that many, many VT fans were pulling for UNC in the ACC. Tells you that they are indeed a newcomer and don’t understand basketball in their new league. I had heard that many VT folks were ‘VT football fans but UNC basketball fans’ – guess that was true.

* If I could have chosen the (non-Big Four) team for NC State to sweep this season then it would have been Virginia Tech. As I said in a comment on February 1st:

As likable as Seth Greenburg is, his propensity to publicly comment on NC State’s coaching situation (Herb Sendek) last year really rubbed me the wrong way. He talked A LOT on Fox Sports radio, etc about the situation in Raleigh and was too critical of Wolfpackers for my liking. IMHO, he would have been better served to have kept his mouth shut. In 2005, Greenberg defeated a deep and experienced Wolfpack coached Herb Sendek in their first battle in Cassell Coliseum. In 2007, Greenberg lost a thin and inexperienced Wolfpack team coached by Sidney Lowe. I guess I don’t blame him for loving Sendek so much.

* One of the biggest winners of the last two weeks has been Dennis Horner. The kid is making some clutch shots and is learning how to create his own shot more easily in the flow of the offense. Costner is a given, but Horner will be a critical role player over the next few years.

* The other big winner is obviously Sidney Lowe. Some are comparing Sid’s run to Herb’s in 1997 in believe that this will put some additional pressure on Sidney to produce better results more quickly. That may be true, but I also think that Sidney is more prepared to elevate the program more quickly because of his recruiting philosophy differs from Sendek’s. In addition to his communication style with players and his inability to coach offense, Sendek struggled for his next 4 years because he effectively ignored North Carolina High School talent and opted to cash his ‘rising star’ chips on kids with no local ties like Adam Harrington. When something goes wrong for kids like these, their first instinct is to transfer as they have nothing binding them to the area or the school. This created significant turmoil and trouble in Sendek’s tenure. Coach Lowe has already shown that NC kids are an important cog in his philosophy (Johnny Thomas, CJ Williams, and even Tracy Smith). Te stability that these kids will create in addition to huge marketing boost fromt he last couple of weeks will serve Sidney well.

* Sidney became THE story over the last few weeks, which is much different than when Herb did this in 1997. College coaches are stars, they are mega-stars when they win big (Roy, K). Lowe has elevated himself in the national media tremendously over the past 4 days. His exposure and recognition factors have grown exponentionally – its not a Amex (K) or Coke (Roy) commercial, but the red jacket and Sid Lowe scored major points in the visibility factor.

* That will help tremendously in recruiting. We arent going to be stealing players from Roy and K, but many of those will at least look at Sid, and I think he’s already elevated himself to the #3 or #4 in the ACC in terms of visibility.

* Its funny, Gary Walters talked about the unbalanced Big 12 schedule on why Texas Tech got into the NCAA over K-State. I don’t give a shit about either team, but did the committee look at UVA’s unbalanced ACC schedule when they gave them a 4 seed despite their RPI that indicated they would be somehere around an 8 or 9 seed? They had the EASIEST schedule within the ACC. They completely folded down the stretch, losing to Miami, Wake and NC State in 3 of their last 4 games. (All 100+ RPI teams). Yet, they get a 4 seed? With an RPI if 52?

* Piece of advice – if you use a computer program (Yahoo, ESPN, etc) to track your NCAA Tournament brackets, ALWAYS re-check to make sure that your edits/changes have been saved properly. I made some changes to be bracket in SFN’s Yahoo Group that ultimately did not save. Of course, most of the changes would have been positive for me and would have put me tied for first place. Oh well.

* F- Wes Miller and Ty Lawson

* The ACC’s poor performance in the NCAA will hurt all of our checkbooks in the coming years. This is a GREAT article explaining he NCAA’s impact on ACC finances.

* Of course, what would a game day be without Section Six’s preview?

There is a certain amount of comfort that comes with playing West Virginia, comfort that is derived from this fact: the Mountaineers suck at rebounding just as much as we do. It’s like finding a familiar face in a foreign town. “Boy am I glad to see you!”

Those other teams, they’re tough. But not you, sweet, sweet West Virginia. Not you. You kindly offer opponents their missed shots while keeping none of your own for yourself.

When we played WVU back in early December, we had one of our best offensive rebounding performances of the season, grabbing 37% of our misses. Mountaineer opponents have posted an OR% over 40.0 eleven times this season (Wolfpack opponents have done it seven times). West Virginia has at least managed some improvement at the offensive end, upping its OR% from 21.3% to 30.4% this season. That’s still terrible, but it’s a step up from inept (and it’s better than our OR%).

With the two teams shooting and rebounding about the same in the first meeting, turnovers meant the difference. NC State turned the ball over 17 times (nine of those were Gavin’s) while WVU gave it away seven times

06-07 Basketball General

200 Responses to 2007.03.20_ Big Dose of Bytes

  1. joe 03/20/2007 at 8:52 AM #

    Saying it’s hard to recruit against UNC and Duke is not “being afraid” – it’s just stating reality. 99% of schools think it’s hard to recruit against UNC and Duke.

  2. CaptainCraptacular 03/20/2007 at 8:52 AM #

    *Defensively, they’ll play a 1-3-1. If we don’t turn it over and play at the pace WE WANT to play at, we’ll be fine.*

    Ack, I forgot about that… hope they learned something from the first game. I don’t know that they’ve faced the 1-3-1 since.

  3. Texpack 03/20/2007 at 8:53 AM #

    Playing Marist was good practice for the perimeter game of WVU. There is no question that the best part of our late season run with respect to our future is the confidence boost it should provide Dennis Horner. He went through one stretch this season where it seemed like he was averaging 1.8 fouls/minute played. I am glad to see him have some success. He may win the “Ben McCauley Award” next year as our most improved player.

    I’ll be curious to see how well we attack the 1-3-1 this time. I really felt like we looked unprepared for it during the first game, but I attributed most of our problems to Atsur having just been lost. Horner may well be a key to the 1-3-1 attack tonight since wing jump shots are what it really gives up. If Courtney Fells twin “Deadeye”, who played against UNC-CH and @WF, shows up tonight that would be nice too.

    Lastly, when the ad for advance ticket sales to next year’s South Regional at Reliant Stadium came on the radio Sunday, I told my 11 year old that the Final Four was going to be here in 2011. His response – “State should be good enough to be in the Final Four by then with Sidney Lowe and all.” The feeling is back and I like it.

  4. beowolf 03/20/2007 at 8:59 AM #

    Yes, Valvano won some recruiting battles against Dean and K. Wonder why this is such a talking point this morning from, oh, joe.

    Dean was also a master of the sour grapes, “we weren’t really recruiting him anyway” approach afterwards to look as if he wasn’t going after someone that V or K or someone else got. Media were complicit in this approach, because they wanted to believe it, and because there wasn’t an Internet to keep track of these things. We know about Dean’s pursuit of Washburn because of the “Dear Chris” article in Sports Illustrated.

  5. Gene 03/20/2007 at 8:59 AM #

    We have not recruited well, compared to UNC, for in-state talent, after Thompson and Burleson. We lost out on Phil Ford, Michael Jordan, Brad Daugherty, etc. UNC has won most of the recruiting battles against us, in recent decades. Thinking about Stackhouse still makes me sick.

    I’m glad Lowe is going aggresively after anyone in the state, who has ACC talent. You never know when a kid is going to blow up, like Jordan did, late in his high school career and attract a lot of attention.

    I also noticed schools, who were not loading up on McKieD’s AA’s, like Va. Tech, Maryland, and Boston College have been able to have some very good ACC caliber players on their rosters.

    Maybe those guys might take a couple of years to develop, but it seems the gap between a highly rated kid coming out of high school and barely top 100ish player can be closed, if coached properly.

    I think McCauley is a good example of a kid, who really has developed to be one of the better players in the ACC this year and can compete with players, who were much more highly rated coming out of high school.

  6. joe 03/20/2007 at 9:02 AM #

    Which recruits did Valvano get from UNC and Duke? They must be easy to name, in his 10 years Valvano only had around 30-40 guys total he signed.

  7. CedarGroveWolf 03/20/2007 at 9:03 AM #

    “That was the attitude Sendek took into recruiting, that he couldn’t compete with UNC/Duke so why even try”

    no, that’s the truth. Why go head/head with unc/duke when there are many top prospects out there that the chances to land are better?

  8. skywalkerdt 03/20/2007 at 9:08 AM #

    by the time they come around to offering the overlap in who is still being recruited by each of the schools is greatly reduced but why should we be afraid to go after a player that sid thinks would be important for ncstate basketball just becuase k or roy is going for the same kid????

  9. joe 03/20/2007 at 9:09 AM #

    Who said NCSU should not go after a guy UNC or Duke wants? I just said it was hard to beat them , but it’s certainly possible.

  10. RedTerror29 03/20/2007 at 9:16 AM #

    ^Cedar (and Sendek).

  11. branjawn 03/20/2007 at 9:17 AM #

    I think too much is made about recruiting against Duke and UNC. Does Florida recruit against them? LSU? Maryland? George Mason? All schools who have had great success in the NCAAT the past few years. Duke recruits so much across the nation, I feel like we would rarely go after the same players anyways. I’m not saying we don’t recruit against them ever, or that is doesn’t matter. But I feel like too much is being made of it. Heck, even WF had Rodney Rogers, Randolph Childress, and Tim Duncan. Or what about Bret Blizzard at UNCW? Ok, have at it…

  12. RedTerror29 03/20/2007 at 9:18 AM #

    When you’re talking about NC kids (and NC has produced some great ones over the years), UNC’s recruiting advantage over us isn’t nearly as great, and Duke’s may be nil. We should definitely go after those kids. State and Carolina have both offered the top rated junior center in the state. I don’t know how hard UNC is targeting him though, and we appear to be more interested in Bacliu (who is ranked right behind him).

  13. Dan 03/20/2007 at 9:18 AM #

    All great points, but if you think you are getting away with “the website didnt save my changes” you are crazy. ;o)

  14. SCpackfan 03/20/2007 at 9:19 AM #

    my dad told me that after choosing to go to state thompson played in a pickup game with a state assistant coach, and was turned in for to the NCAA by dean smith resulting in probation and leaving the undefeated ’73 season without a tournament appearance. I was born in 82 so i don’t remember either championship, but have been taught a healthy disrespect for dean and all of his minions.

  15. redfred2 03/20/2007 at 9:19 AM #

    I have to say that I think that the wide difference between the persona of the two schools back in the 1970’s, NCSU and unc, worked much to more NCSU’s favor than it does now. You were always going to have certain kids who were powder blue, died in the WOOL, unc’ers, but then you had these kids who wanted nothing more to beat that uppity mentality into the ground, and NC STATE was THE place to do it.

    Too bad that NCSU/alums/fans have blurred those lines and shoved the past aside themselves, in a silly effort to be more like…well…unc. It is truly a shame, but it fit’s hand in hand with NCSU’s own administration philosophy since the year 1990, along with that of former basketball coach. All of those influences have almost insured that we would be headed DOWN in that direction.

    But no more.

  16. skywalkerdt 03/20/2007 at 9:21 AM #

    Think about the fraction of mcd’s all americans duke and unc get every year. Every school in the country that wants to be at the top levels of basketball every year recruits against duke and unc. NCSU recruits even more so against unc over in state prospects

  17. noah 03/20/2007 at 9:26 AM #

    “Sendek struggled for his next 4 years because he effectively ignored North Carolina High School talent and opted to cash his ‘rising star’ chips on kids with no local ties like Adam Harrington.”

    Is that really true?

    1998 – I remember us making a big push for Kris Lang, Ervin Murray, Craig Dawson and Antwan Scott and getting shut out on all of them.

    1999 – We took Cliff Crawford pretty early in the process (despite being in the running for several other PGs). We went after Ray Henderson from Charlotte really hard. I don’t think we were ever under consideration from Jason Parker.

    2000 – We went after Chris Wilcox and Chris Hobbs and we landed Michael Bell, Marcus Melvin and Scooter Sherrill. I can’t remember if we ever involved with Michael Joiner.

    Maybe we didn’t land many in-state recruits and that’s certainly something we can put on Sendek, but I remember us chasing plenty of guys.

  18. skywalkerdt 03/20/2007 at 9:26 AM #

    i’ve heard many stories as to the exact nature of the infraction involving dt but yes there was a minor penalty involving the skywalker for which the ncaa removed state from post season play for the 72-73 season. its a shame because you know school’s have gotten away with much worse (go to chapel hill and look at the vehicles the athletes are driving) or on similar level infractions have received much lesser penalties. I will argue till the day i die that should be the third (first) ncaa banner in reynolds.

  19. noah 03/20/2007 at 9:33 AM #

    The NCAA maintains an infranctions database. You can go and look up EXACTLY why a school was punished. You don’t have to rely on stories or rumors.

    WHERAS, the Council has found North Carolina State University to have violated the provisions governing recruiting [NCAA Bylaw l-l-(a)], in that:

    1. While working at a summer job during the period July 31 – August 6, 1971, a prospective student-athlete stayed cost-free in a University dormitory room which was utilized at that time to house counselors in the summer basketball camp operated by the University’s head basketball coach.

    2. On August 6, 1971, a prospective student-athlete was transported cost-free from the University’s campus (site of a summer camp) to his hometown in an automobile used in the summer basketball camp operated by the University’s head basketball coach.

    WHEREAS, the Council has found North Carolina State University to have violated the provisions governing recruiting [NCAA Bylaws l-l-(a) and 1-3], in that:

    1. During the summer 1970, three prospective student-athletes served as counselors in the summer basketball camp operated by the University’s head basketball coach; these three young men had just completed their senior years in high school and therefore were ineligible to serve as counselors under the Association’s summer camp interpretations;

    WHEREAS, the Council has found North Carolina State University to have violated the provisions governing recruiting [NCAA Bylaws l-l-(a), l-5-(b) and l-5-(c)], in that:

    1. On June 13, 1971, a prospective student-athlete was transported to the University’s campus by a representative of the University’s athletic interests in order to attend freshman orientation. This was the second visit at the expense of a University athletic representative. After it was determined that he was not eligible for the orientation, he remained on the campus for five days staying cost-free in a dormitory room which was utilized at that time to house counselors in the summer basketball camp operated by the University’s head basketball coach.

    WHEREAS, the Council has found North Carolina State University to have violated the provisions governing recruiting [NCAA Bylaws l-5-(b) and l-1-(h)], in that:

    1. During August 1970, a representative of the University’s athletic interests transported a prospective student-athlete between his home and the institution’s campus, and was reimbursed by the University for the cost of this transportation.

    2. During May 1971, a representative of the University’s athletic interests transported three prospective student-athletes between their homes and the institution’s campus, and was reimbursed by the University for the cost of this transportation.

    WHEREAS, the Council has found North Carolina State University to have violated the provisions governing recruiting [NCAA Bylaw 1-3], in that:

    1. During the period August 1-6, 1971, an assistant basketball coach participated in at least one informal basketball game with five prospective student-athletes during which these young men revealed, demonstrated and displayed their abilities in the sport of basketball,

    WHEREAS, the Council has found North Carolina State University to have violated the provisions governing recruiting [NCAA Bylaw l-6-(a)], in that:

    1. During the summer 1970, the University awarded financial assistance to two prospective student-athletes in order for the young men to attend the second session of the institution’s summer school.

  20. redfred2 03/20/2007 at 9:33 AM #

    skywalkerdt

    Take comfort in the fact that anyone with any sense knows that for a fact already. But more than that, don’t listen when our own fans still try act like NC State did wrong and deserved to be on probation back then, or in 1990.

  21. Redblogger 03/20/2007 at 9:33 AM #

    Tonight: State 76 – WVA 68

    Bank on it!

  22. choppack1 03/20/2007 at 9:34 AM #

    I believe we beat the Heels for Walker Lambiotte, Brian Howard and Washburn.

    I think Chucky and Shackleford were early commits to us who weren’t offered by UNC.

    I’m not sure if the Heels offered Monroe, but when he signed w/ State it was a big deal. I still remember Monroe firing up the crowd at Broughton when he played in the Christmas tourney there. (Also at this tourney was Rodney Rogers and Shawn Bradley.)

    Duke hadn’t beaten UNC for many players until they signed Danny Ferry.

    There are certain situations that make it hard to recruit against UNC – the main one is if the kid dreamed of playing there. Unfortunately, w/ a lot of kids now, the same kind of dreams are included w/ Duke and Coach K too.

    I think there’s a good chance that Sid can make kids want to dream of playing for state.

    Perhaps it’s the wrong thread but why doesn’t State get credit for hiring the first minority men’s basketball coach in the Big 4? Also, why aren’t the other institutions accused of being racist for not considering minority candidates for the Basketball HC position?

    I don’t think that any of these schools are racist, but it’s exactly the kind of thing WE’D be taken to task for.

  23. noah 03/20/2007 at 9:34 AM #

    Let’s see if I can link to the report

  24. noah 03/20/2007 at 9:38 AM #

    Nope…apparently not.

    Anyway…on the topic of players that we beat UNC for…off the top of my head, I know V beat Dean for:

    Chucky Brown
    John Thompson (top 25 power forward from Lawrenceville, VA)
    Brian Howard

  25. BoKnowsNCS71 03/20/2007 at 9:39 AM #

    HwSnbn was a great recruiter. Rick Pitino said that when we hire his former assistant. Problem is the prior coach could never quite manage the egos and the expectations of his recruits so they often left.

    Most of his tenure is represented by the trail of kids leaving each year (more so early on). Some did well afterwards and some did average. (The irony of playing Mejia with Marist comes to mind as do other games with past recruits/diffferent teams).

    While this year his incoming recruits stood us up (and I blame the Foulup Cirus for that) and his better players pursued other options (Brackman to BB and Simmons to NBA) — Sidney appears to have some great talent in the fold — just not as much as we would prefer and he has developed them excellently. And what Sidney does with talented kids makes it less likely that we will see the kids leave as much (unless they are so good they go to the NBA early). But the prior coach never seemed to get those kids who could go early and never IMHO let them progress early on with play to build their stock up. And when he had a star — he went to the development league.

    I think that was the intangible that was missing with HwSnbn — he could recognize talent, he accepted limitations (that he could not get UNC/Duke recruits so why try?) so he went with good talent and then frustrated the hell out of them.

    It takes something very special to be a successful coach. I see that spark in Tom O’Brien and his people skills. I saw it in Sheridan. Along with the x’s and o’s, the ability to manage people and amass good assistant coaches and players is the same way that companies become sucessful (with managers and staff). Leave out one piece and a good company will fail to achieve. I never saw that in HwSnbn.

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