Degand Tears ACL, Out For The Season

07-08 Basketball52

Merry Christmas, Wolfpack style.

NC State head men’s basketball coach Sidney Lowe has announced that sophomore point guard Farnold Degand will miss the remainder of the 2007-08 season after tearing his ACL last night in the win over Cincinnati. Degand will undergo surgery at a later date.

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07-08 Basketball

52 Responses to Degand Tears ACL, Out For The Season

  1. gopack968 12/24/2007 at 12:53 PM #

    Damn it. It was obvious from the video how bad the injury was. Best wishes to Farnold as he starts a long road to recovery. How crushingly dissapointing this must be for the guy, after waiting so long to play and then starting so well.

    On the here and now side, it is nice that Marques and Javi have a couple of games to get themselves ready for the real season. With Sidney and Monty to school them we should survive.

  2. Wulfpack 12/24/2007 at 12:55 PM #

    Bah, Humbug!

  3. burnbarn 12/24/2007 at 12:55 PM #

    we can not get through a season without a season ending injury…#2 for us this season so far.

    On a percentage basis, we may rival the FB team.

  4. MrPlywood 12/24/2007 at 12:59 PM #

    That’s really tough for Farnold. Here’s to a successful rehab and recovery. Santa owes him one.

  5. Rick 12/24/2007 at 1:04 PM #

    Good lands.
    We are finally starting to play well and then this. ARG

  6. ShootingGuard 12/24/2007 at 1:06 PM #

    This type of thing is exactly why I have debunked some folks for criticizing Sid about bringing Degand in in the first place and adding Gonzalez later…

    Sid put a lot of eggs in the Chris Wright basket, but he was also wise enough to know that you better take a few easy gets just in case in order to have a product to offer future recruits…

    You just never know…Some scholarships, especially scholarships at NC State with its injury history, are needed for contingency planning…

    Losing Degand really hurts from a speed and defensive standpoint…

    Fortunately, we have Gonzalez and Johnson to turn to to some extent, although what each brings is different from what Degand brought…

    Hopefully, this will lead the other guys to come together and step up to make up for a significant loss…

    Gonzalez stepped up on the free throw line last night. That’s a start…

  7. xphoenix87 12/24/2007 at 1:19 PM #

    “Merry Christmas, Wolfpack style.”

    QFT

    Grow up fast Javi

  8. Rick 12/24/2007 at 1:26 PM #

    This makes me despise Cincinaughty.

    You keep pounding people like they did and someone is going to get hurt.

  9. pacman23 12/24/2007 at 1:46 PM #

    From the N & O:
    With Degand out, NCSU coach Sidney Lowe will have to rely on freshman Javi Gonzalez and sophomore Marques Johnson, a transfer from Tennessee who became eligible after the first semester. Junior Courtney Fells also could be used at point guard.

    “This is a really tough break for Farnold individually and for our team collectively,” Lowe said today in a statement. “After not being able to play for two years, he was really enjoying being back on the court. He will definitely have the support of his teammates and the coaching staff throughout the rehabilitation process.”

  10. bTHEredterror 12/24/2007 at 2:12 PM #

    Truly an irreplaceable loss.

    Even though Javi did step it up afterwards, he still needs a LOT of work before ACC play. Most depressing as Degand played his best game on offense, and we seemed to be gelling.

    Now they may have to get used to MJ and the potential for more on court miscommunication and chemistry issues.

    We are snakebit like no other.

  11. ncsu96 12/24/2007 at 2:23 PM #

    just curious, what farnold pushed on the play?

    lets never play a big east team again, it aint worth it.

    gotta feel for degand, best wishes to him.

  12. ncsuftw01 12/24/2007 at 2:36 PM #

    That foul should have been intentional

  13. Stoner 12/24/2007 at 2:57 PM #

    Hope Farnold recovers and gets to play ball next year.

  14. Anthony Grundy 12/24/2007 at 3:34 PM #

    that’s a shame.

    On a side note, I really miss the old layout of the website. The new layout seems difficult to follow. I especially miss the old “StateFansNation” banner. I actually don’t mind the google ads, i think they are well deserved for the site administrator.

  15. HighRoller 12/24/2007 at 4:16 PM #

    Maybe this will be a blessing to us with MJ showing us that he’s the man…hey wishful thinking right??

  16. BJD95 12/24/2007 at 4:47 PM #

    This is bad on so many levels. A few thoughts:

    1) Farnold was a speed player. It was the basis of his entire game, offensively and defensively. I’m not sure he will play meaningful minutes on the D-1 level ever again. My heart breaks for the kid.

    2) True freshmen in the ACC tend to hit the wall in mid-February. If that happens to Javi, we could literally implode like Sendek’s 4th team.

    3) If Fells plays some 1, who the hell is going to play the 2?

    4) I would love to blame the Bearcats’ rugby style, but as I saw it, it looked like Farnold’s knee just gave out when he came to a jump stop. I DVR’d the game, so I’ll go back and watch again.

    The bright side – could this possibly be something that brings our kids closer together as a team? Remember how they came together after Atsur’s injury. Maybe “us against the world” plays out again. By all accounts, Farnold is well-liked by his teammates. Might it be harder to pout/gripe about one’s own minutes and role on the team, when you have to watch a friend who has waited 2 years just to step on the court, out with a season (and possibly career) ending injury?

  17. redfred2 12/24/2007 at 5:13 PM #

    I had a looong, drawn out post that kind of related to how Trevor Ferguson has “played” thus far. About how up until the injury to Degand last night, how maybe Sidney was trying not to press MJ into action before he was certain that he is really ready for it.

    I guess all of that is probably out the window now and MJ will be worked in sooner.

    It’s a shame because Degand was improving and gaining more and more confidence. I hope he keeps his chin up and comes back better than ever next season.

  18. Trip 12/24/2007 at 6:33 PM #

    Ugh, I knew this was the case as soon as I saw his knee give, but man was I hoping for the best. Javi needs to grow up fast, and we have to hope that MJ is as good as we hope he is, or atleast better than Fells/Grant. If he’s worse than Fells/Grant at PG then I don’t know why Sid brought him aboard, so he should atleast be equal to Javi, and probably just plays a different style because of his additional size which makes it hard to contrast/compare in practice.

    If we can pull a W away at Seton Hall then this team has a chance, Seton Hall is a bonafide good team, they don’t have any outstanding players but all of their players play hard, play well and almost never turn the ball over. They play at a much faster pace than us as well, so it should be interesting to see if MJ/Javi can force them to play our style. They have a pretty terrible defense rating and only one “Big” guy that gets a lot of minutes. Most of their team that gets a fair share of minutes are only slightly bigger than javi and smaller than fells, so we’ll have a decided size advantage.

  19. wolfonthehill 12/24/2007 at 6:46 PM #

    1 – The foul had nothing to do with this injury. The poor kid simply went to do a jump-stop on his way to the hoop, and his left knee collapsed inward. The foul was light and coincidental.

    2 – I hate this for Farnold… he’s almost like the Tramain Hall of our basketball team. He deserves to play… he’s sacrificed enough already.

    3 – I think this is the start of the Javi era. Given time, I believe that kid will be just fine. He’s just going to have to grow up FAST now.

    4 – If Johnson were a truly viable alternative, I think we’d have seen him for at least a few minutes. I hope I’m wrong.

  20. Primewolf 12/24/2007 at 7:05 PM #

    The foul wasn’t incidental from where I sat. p

    If the refs had called the game properly, the player that fouled him would have been on the bench by the end of the first half, as would their top10 players.

    It was not basketball.
    ACC refs are about as incompetent as they come.

  21. Noah 12/24/2007 at 7:51 PM #

    It looked to me like he stepped on the guy’s foot, but I’m going on memory. I didn’t think it was an intentional foul.

    Not a surprise that he blew it out. I wouldn’t be surprised if something other than the ACL was torn. The whole thing buckled.

    I had heard some stuff about Marques Johnson from someone outside the program (but a very reputable source) who has seen him play. I hadn’t posted it because it hadn’t really been relevant and I was waiting to see how it played out. It seems much more relevant now.

    “I’d be surprised if Johnson develops into a major player. That’s after talking with a lot of the gurus who saw him play in HS, as well as some folks at NCSU. The good news is, he’s probably an ACC-caliber player down the road. He’s just not a star, or even close to that.

    Just remember how excited the coaches were about Trevor Ferguson…”

  22. coppertop 12/24/2007 at 7:56 PM #

    When he went to the bench after the injury I swear I thought I saw him say the words, “I heard it Pop”
    Guess he knew how bad it was even then…

    I’d like to see javi step up and continue to improve, and have johnson fufill a backup role not a rotational situation like with degand and javi.

  23. wolfmans brother 12/24/2007 at 8:18 PM #

    Coppertop — I saw the exact same thing. As soon as i saw the way he clutched it and the way it bent inward I knew that wolfpack karma had struck again. And then when the camera panned to him on the bench he was gesturing with his hands and I could see him mouth the word “pop”.
    In my opinion, the foul had little to do with the injury. He simply planted hard with a lot of momentum and the knee buckled inward.
    I think that this injury could be the nail in the coffin. Sorry for the pessimism folks, but farnold was clearly our most competent PG. It had taken him thus far into the season to play with any semblance of success and this was largely against scrub teams. The other PG’s on our team are a clear drop off. Couple that in with the fact that the competition is about to be FAR tougher and we have a dire situation on our hands. Unless someone steps up and suprises the hell out of me (and i really hope that they do), we are in a grade A mess. Merry friggin christmas indeed.

  24. chilly water 12/24/2007 at 8:27 PM #

    Guys……….
    I gots a feeling. A feeling that MJ is gonna pick it up where degand left off, and kick some ass. Call it a hunch or call it crazy.

  25. lush 12/24/2007 at 9:14 PM #

    i saw the game from a bar in NOLA. they showed the replay numerous times and it didnt look like a foul at all. he landed funny on his move to the rim and his knee went the opposite way he was intending it to. we were lucky that a foul was called b/c it didnt look like any contact was made (probably the first time of the night)

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