A View from the Cheap Seats

06-07 Basketball General Sidney Lowe78

I was wrong.

Way back in November, before teams were playing in Maui or Anchorage and March Madness was still nothing but a distant idea, I wasn’t a complete believer. I had begrudgingly offered my support for the new coach that I had, admittedly, felt was simply the guy that we knew would say yes. And I wasn’t exactly pumped for a season in which we had returned a mere 36% of our scoring and 34% of our total minutes. Three of our starters – Costner, McCauley, and Fells – had combined to average seven points and six minutes in 2006.

Back in the fall, our hopes and dreams were simply romantic; we’d have to settle for those hard-fought intangible moral victories this season. But somewhere along the line all that changed: for Lowe, for the players, for us. In March, it’s suddenly a not-so-distant reality.

Believe it or not, it started way back in November against Wofford in a game that would prove to become a microcosm for the entire season, a prelude of what we could expect in the months to follow.

[If] this team continues to play with the passion and intensity every night that they showed against Wofford, then it will be very tough not to get behind this team. It’s not something I’ve said a lot in the past decade, but this could be an exciting State team to watch. And the dreamer in me can’t help but think Lowe’s first team has at least a couple big upsets, defining victories, in store.

And whoa, did it ever. We beat Carolina in Raleigh and Duke in the ACC tournament, and then proceeded to storm past the co-regular season champion, Virginia, and then completed our season sweep of tournament-bound Virginia Tech.

Just for emphasis: we beat Carolina and Duke. That’s poetry, folks.

But the defining moment for me wasn’t even during a State game. Appropriately enough, it was during the final minute of the Big XII championship game. For the second straight weekend I had watched Rick Barnes mismanage his team in the final minutes of a close game, losing both times to Kansas – in the final minutes of that championship game, not only had he directed his team into a zone defense against a team that had been shooting lights-out in the second half, but inexplicably he had failed to get the ball into the hands of the best college basketball player of the past decade.

It was one of those clairvoyant moments of complete enlightenment. Suddenly, it hit me: we could have gotten Rick Barnes, gained instant credibility and notoriety in the basketball world, and then watched our season end after a second-half collapse against Duke on Thursday night of the ACC tournament because we lacked passion.

That’s when I realized just how wrong I had been.

As a lifelong State fan, it’s my nature to be cautiously optimistic, especially in regards to recent first-year coaching successes. But in his first season, Lowe did everything that we required of him. He played to our strengths and inspired this team to play with unflinching passion, to which they responded in kind. Coaches, players, fans – we all embodied that cherished “Don’t give up, don’t ever give up” persona that defines NC State basketball.

Oh yeah, we beat Carolina and Duke. Never gets old.

Meanwhile, this team just kept improving; we finished a better, stronger, smarter team than we started, and most importantly, we built a solid foundation for next season and beyond. The three players that collectively started this season as one big question mark – McCauley, Costner, and Fells – will start next season as the nucleus of this team. In addition, Grant will be our piston on offense while Horner, whose maturation is something akin to Gugliotta’s as a freshman, has become an outside-in threat that every team now has to respect; I love how fearless that kid plays.

And now that 2007 is over for us, after another remarkable run, I say this: K can have his card, his life and all the so-called recruiting advantages that come with it, and I’m so deeply moved that Roy’s mom ironed extra clothes every night so he could have a dime to buy a Coke every afternoon; even more importantly, I’m absolutely teeming with glee that Carolina fans can no longer complain about those unfair recruiting advantages K’s commercials created (I think Coke easily closes that gap created by American Express).

As for me, I’ll take the Red Blazer any day – all it did was make us believers once again.

Sometimes it feels good to be wrong.

About LRM

Charter member of the Lunatic Fringe and a fan, loyal to a fault.

06-07 Basketball General Sidney Lowe

78 Responses to A View from the Cheap Seats

  1. wallacepark 03/23/2007 at 6:46 AM #

    Although I was embarassed about the public nature of our coaching search, I was never skeptical about Lowe’s ability as a coach. I certainly didn’t know he would be THIS good, but after I heard the man’s job acceptance speech and what he wanted to run and what he wanted to do with this program, I had a feeling he would excel in the college game. And he is PERFECT for NC State.

  2. Jamie 03/23/2007 at 6:58 AM #

    Another beaut’, LRM

  3. Sw0rdf1sh 03/23/2007 at 7:03 AM #

    Great piece.

    Great coach (crazy coach search though).

    Great year.

  4. CaptainCraptacular 03/23/2007 at 7:14 AM #

    Lowe is truly the right guy, but its pure speculation and complete fabrication to determine what Barnes as State coach would have done against Duke. Remember, he directed Clemson’s first ever win against Carolina in the ACC tournament, a game that was decided in the last few seconds.

  5. WolftownVA81 03/23/2007 at 7:37 AM #

    My daddy use to always say “even a blind squirel finds an acorn once in a while.” I think that analogy fits perfectly with our coaching search and the results. We truely have a gem and I agree with wallacepark, the acceptance speach is what did it for me. After that, I knew we had a guy that would try to delivery what the Wolfpack Nation deserved. We have been blessed with good coach who is poised to restore the greatness of our program.

  6. tractor57 03/23/2007 at 7:57 AM #

    A year later the issue turned out in the Pack’s favor due to Low and the coaching staff (and never forget the staff – they have been very important over the year).

  7. choppack1 03/23/2007 at 8:02 AM #

    Good article.

    A couple of thoughts:
    1) Before the season, I thought that we were going be tougher than most folks thought. I thought that we’d be servicable down low and decent wing play in Gavin and Fells. At the PG spot we’d be solid.

    2) The Michigan game and the UVa game that followed gave me hope that even w/out Atsur, we had a shot.

    3) After the Wake Forest game, I thought we’d found something special. I went into the Duke game pumped – we didn’t bring our A game for that one.

    4) We went 3-5 in the first half of the ACC, 2-6 in the second half.

    5) The game (in the second half of the season) where we seemed to lose our mojo was the GaTech game. We played fantastic basketball for 30 minutes, then we hit a wall. I didn’t walk away from that game frustrated or questioning our kids hearts or effort – I could deal w/ losing every game that way. We simply didn’t have any gas in the tanks.

    6) Starting w/ the Duke game – we played fantastic basketball until the end of the year. Each game had a gut check and each game we responded. That was the most important thing I saw.

    7) I’ll take 4-3 vs. the Big 4 every year.

    8) Who knows how the lack of depth and injury to Atsur impacted our psyche most of the year? I think if we had a healthy Atsur we’d have an NCAA bid. We were all cheated….I would have loved a healthy Atsur run pick and rolls this ACC season w/ McCauley and Costner.

    9) Costner and McCauley exceeded my expectations. Atsur had a gutty year. Fells didn’t meet expectations initially, but by the end of the year, he had grown how I had expected him to. Grant didn’t meet my expectations. Like Fells, at the end of the year he came close to meeting them.

    10) Sid exceeded my expectations. He demonstrated that he learns from mistakes, preps a team, and makes in game adjustments. I feel good about our chances at the end of the game. I think Sid has a feel for when to call a timeout and when to avoid it.

    For next year, the thing I’ll be looking for is how we play from the get-go and how we do in our conference games vs. the middle of the road teams. I think our starters now know just how much effort they have bring to the table every game. Next year, they won’t have the excuse of pacing themselves. Next year, Sidney will be able to aggressively defend the opposition.

  8. noah 03/23/2007 at 8:15 AM #

    I was definitely wrong about Lowe. I thought he’d be a terrible college coach.

    I’m very glad we didn’t Calipari. I’d still be happy with Rick Barnes (sorry, I think he’s a great coach). Chris Lowery would have been really nice. So would Billy Gillespie (he was never coming here, of course).

    And had Lon Kruger or Mike Montgomery come, I’m sure they would have been fine.

    Very happy that Calipari, Beilein, and Lavin (I’m still in shock that he was even CONSIDERED…let alone interviewed) said no.

    And I’m very happy, of course, that Sidney Lowe said yes.

  9. ncsubch2000 03/23/2007 at 8:16 AM #

    Amen Brother

  10. tractor57 03/23/2007 at 8:24 AM #

    I like Calimari – on my plate that is. I had a real problem with Calipari, Beilein and especially Lavin. I would have been happy with Barnes, Kruger or Montgomery but I think in Lowe the Pack has a real winner. Is the team “over the hump”? No, and next year might be a set back but I like the chances of progress. The fire and passion has returned after a long absence – that is one of the big things the coaching change brought. The passion is there for the fans which is nice to see.

  11. TNCSU 03/23/2007 at 8:36 AM #

    Nice post…I think we’ve gotten a guy who will do great things for our program. I really look forward to how we compete next year. I think the entire Staff and built a great foundation. I don’t think we should be overly confident that we’ll be the ACC Champions next year, but I do think we can be cautiously optimistic that NC State Basketball is back, and we will be competing in (& winning most) every game next year. BTW, anyone know when the Spring signing day is?? I think it’s in April sometime.

  12. RickJ 03/23/2007 at 8:37 AM #

    After this year, I am pretty sold on Lowe’s ability to coach offense. In fact, he may be something of a guru. I couldn’t believe Rick Majerus actually picked us to beat UNC in the ACC tourney final. Majerus is a great offensive mind and this told me he thought Lowe could game-plan State to a win. He was almost right.

    The Kansas – Southern Illinois game featured the best defensive game I’ve seen in a long time. I am looking forward to seeing what style of defense Lowe wants to play in the future. We were so limited in quickness and depth that I don’t think you could tell much this year. Lowe was considered more of a defensive specialist in the NBA. If he can coach defense as well as he can coach offense, well let’s just say I am having some pretty delusional thoughts.

  13. CarnifeX 03/23/2007 at 8:40 AM #

    it would suck to see Beilein here; HwSnbn version II (with maybe better in game mgmt.)

  14. BJD95 03/23/2007 at 8:40 AM #

    One of the things I liked about the Lowe hire (after we got past the Barnes/Calipari/Montgomery tier) was that I thought he would either do very well or be a colossal disaster. No more “pretty good limbo.” I would rather roll the dice than get a guaranteed B-.

    I started having some guarded optimism once I heard all of the good things Larry Brown said about Sid. Brown is one of the best coached of the last 20 years, IMHO. I see alot of Brown in Sid (without the shadiness).

  15. choppack1 03/23/2007 at 8:51 AM #

    “Lowe was considered more of a defensive specialist in the NBA. If he can coach defense as well as he can coach offense, well let’s just say I am having some pretty delusional thoughts.”

    Wow – that does give us something to look forward to, doesn’t it? Like I said earlier, I’m really excited about seeing how Lowe will choose to defend. It looks like we’ll have much more depth and quickness next year, so we can see what Lowe wants to do on this side of the floor.

    BJD – Larry Brown is one of the best coaches of all time at any level. If he stayed at KU he probably could have hung another banner or two. I knew that Sidney knew the game. My main concern was the day to day operations of a college program, how he’d related to college kids and finally, how he’d handle the dual responsibilities of the student athlete.

    On a sidenote, I know I’m in the minority, but I’m a huge Beilein fan. His version of the PO is much more fast paced than Sendek’s – and his team seems to have more of a mental toughness than Sendek’s did.

    Now, if WV is still in the same place they are today 5 years from now, I’ll change my tune a little but I don’t know if any other coach in America could have gone to consecutive Sweet 16s w/ the players he did in 2005 and 2006.

  16. PurplePeopleEaters 03/23/2007 at 8:56 AM #

    Coming into the season I didn’t think we would be all that great. The early games reaffirmed that assumption as we were coming really close to losing to second tier teams. The first half of the Alabama game I still had this mindset however in the last 10 minutes of the game I saw a team that fought back like no other. That gave me my faith in Lowe and so far it’s paid off. As others have mentioned he seems like somewhat of an offensive genious and his recruiting has been great thus far. I see a team that will do VERY well in the ACC next year barring terrible PG play.

  17. PackMan97 03/23/2007 at 9:02 AM #

    I wouldn’t have been nearly as upset about Belien as others would have. He did wonders with a very young WVU squad this year. They lost pretty much EVERYONE from last years squad. Frank Young was the ONLY guys they returned and he wasn’t even an 8ppg player last year. I really think folks do Belien a disservice to consider him a similar coach to Herb. He easily did as good a job this year as Lowe, perhaps even better! The biggest difference for both teams was depth. WVU has something like 7 freshman on their team…well…we had one.

  18. newt 03/23/2007 at 9:09 AM #

    Lowe won me over in his introductory presser when he joked with Ced that “If we have a big man, inside, we have some plays where we’re going to get the ball to the big man. He’s gonna get a lot of shots, a … lot … of … shots.”

    That told me:

    1 – He had total confidence
    2 – He could relate to the kids
    3 – He could relate to the press and fans
    4 – He knew how to coach winning basketball

    That said, we almost have more questions next year than this year. We are going to be starting a freshman or inexperienced transfer at PG.

  19. redfred2 03/23/2007 at 9:18 AM #

    Nice LRM.

    I’ve said it all before, I knew the intangibles were the most important ingredient missing around here. But what I did not expect was how quickly, and what an immediate impact, these coaches would have on the kids/players already in Raleigh, or those HS players that will make up the future of Wolfpack basketball.

    LRM mentioned the Wofford game, I was there, and it did show early signs of a team that was already very much on a different awareness level. Even though the crowd was sadly sparse for Sidney Lowe’s debut, and the PA address of his first ever game in Raleigh was very mundane and less than exciting, there was still a young and experienced basketball team on the court playing with a scrappy urgency that I hadn’t seen years.

    Right then I knew my earlier intuition and hopes had been confirmed. But I left the RBC that night feeling disillusioned, five rows in front of me were empty and there was almost no one there to witness it. I was walking out, just me and eight year my daughter, with almost no one else around to even say “How about that PACK!!!” I was thinking, it’s been too painful for too long, and that maybe time had passed Wolfpack basketball by. That no matter how hard Sidney Lowe and his staff worked with this group of mismatched parts, they just weren’t going to get any attention or be given any benefit of the doubt when they stumbled later on in the season.

    So basically, with that all said, I was just as wrong as anyone here. I was wrong about the fans and the spirit, and even though Sidney Lowe had to struggle through an early season without much notoriety or fanfare, the fans did come out to show their appreciation in the end. That is why the games are played to begin with, Sidney Lowe knows that, and that’s what he came back NC STATE to restore for us fans.

  20. redfred2 03/23/2007 at 9:23 AM #

    ^inexperienced

    I know…I need to proofread my stuff.

  21. Mr O 03/23/2007 at 9:25 AM #

    We had questions at four of five positions going into this year. Next year, we have four players who have all-ACC potential(obviously all four won’t make it, but anyone of them could) and Horner who was fabulous all season. We can start five known quantities next year if Lowe wants. With Fells improvement in ballhandling and the cutting down of his bad passes, I won’t be surprised at all if we see him running some point next year. And if Horner continues to improve, then we may see Fells and Grant as primary ballhandlers so that we can have the five best guys on the court.

    Personally, I am not worried about our defense. Our defense has suffered over the years of recruiting for the Princeton offense. It also hurt our rebounding. I think we will see improvements in these areas by recruiting more traditional basketball players though I hope we don’t see a drop in offensive talent at the same time.

    It is so refreshing to hear guys after the season make comments that show how happy they are playing for NC State instead of worrying about transfers or players being unhappy that remain in the program.

    Next year should be exciting. Making the tournament will be a very, very important step for Lowe. Not essential to his long-term success, but important in building the momentum he needs to recruit at even an higher level.

  22. Mr O 03/23/2007 at 9:26 AM #

    Choppack: Lowe prepared the Pistons defensively for each game IIRC.

    Also, agree on Beilien. His defense impresses me as much as his offense.

  23. BJD95 03/23/2007 at 9:32 AM #

    Beilein is the best PO practitioner out there, and a very good coach. But, he would have been a bad fit here (as much as he is PERFECT for WV). You are never going to win a national title with a team that (i) can’t rebound; and (ii) is so dependent on the 3. When WV is cold from 3, they basically can’t win. There’s no “Plan B” available.

  24. westwolf 03/23/2007 at 9:36 AM #

    Excellent article. Thanks.

  25. lush 03/23/2007 at 9:41 AM #

    I totally agree with hindsight being 20/20 as far as Rick Barned is concerned. I wanted him the most during the search, mostly becuase he almost beat up Deanie Weanie while he was at Clemson. But after watching a lot of texas games this year, and a lot of NCSU games, C-Lowe is definatley the better coach.

    Barnes had no idea how to take advantage of the having best scorer in the country on his team. Durant is unstoppable and yet barnes couldnt even find ways to get him the ball. Durant should have 30 shots a game and if he did they would still be in the tournament and would have won the big 12.

    Look at what C-lowe did with our talent, and imagine what he could have done with the second best recruiting class in the country.

1 2 3 4

Leave a Reply