The one where NC State beats a ranked team and Scott Wood becomes my hero

09-10 Basketball87

Did that really happen?

So it definitely wasn’t a perfect performance by any stretch of the imagination, but I must say watching NC State beat FSU Tuesday night was just what I needed. Tuesday’s performance by the Wolfpack proves what I’ve thought all season, NC State does in fact have the ability to compete with pretty much anybody in the ACC if it plays well. Combine that with the fact that the ACC is down, and you have the opportunity for NC State to win some games (even on the road) that some people think it shouldn’t.

That being said, here’s some highlights from the game.

  • Scott Wood poured in a career-high 31 points while going 7 of 11 from behind the arc. He also pulled down seven big rebounds during his 37 minutes (wow!). If Wood can keep his shot going and start to score more consistently, it could be huge for the overall success of the offense. As teams continue to try and shut Tracy Smith down, Wood and others on the outside are going to have to continue to shoot well.
  • NC State shot nearly 83% from the free throw line. Didn’t think I would ever see that this season, but once again this proves that the ability is there. Not a ton of excuses moving forward.
  • Jordan Vandenberg and Richard Howell combined for 11 rebounds off the bench and Howell scored seven points.

Although most of what you can say about Tuesday’s win is positive, there are some points where NC State can improve. The most important one is turnovers. The Pack had 18 TOs Tuesday and Javi Gonzalez had six. This has to stop, soon.

One other thing I’d like to see is the ability to get the ball to Tracy Smith in different ways because teams are going to continue to double and hope other guys don’t make shots. Smith went 1 of 8 from the field and only scored seven points. Eventually there will come a time when Smith is being doubled and Soctt Wood or someone else is clanging shots off the backboard. Versatility is always good.

For those interested, here’s the box.

Also, thanks to those of you who joined the LiveBlog chat we did via Cover It Live. We had nearly 300 readers in the chat room and it seemed like there were about 50 guys typing feverishly during NC State’s win. It makes the game fun to watch, IMO. I’m going to keep working at trying to integrate the chat box into the main site rather than having a link that takes you somewhere else. We’ll do it again.

It’s amazing how much better winning feels. Especially compared to this…

Sorry, couldn’t help it.

09-10 Basketball

87 Responses to The one where NC State beats a ranked team and Scott Wood becomes my hero

  1. Wolfy__79 01/13/2010 at 7:12 PM #

    also, to this point… someone praised vandenburg and howell.. i would also like to shout out to josh davis. i’m really excited about this kid down the road. he seems like a more athletic marcus melvin!?!

  2. tjfoose2 01/13/2010 at 7:17 PM #

    I’m not just talking basketball, I’m talking all things NC State.

    But of course I’m hoping we win, and am happy when we do. I’m just not investing. It would be like buying stock at $100/share and selling it for $20, continually, over a 25 year period.

    Leadership has abused us for too long. I’ll reconsider when we replace the CEO, display capable leadership, show sustained growth, and start paying dividends.

  3. bradleyb123 01/13/2010 at 7:19 PM #

    Wolfy__79, careful! You’re treading dangerously close to saying WTNY! And you’ll get ripped apart if you say that here. Never mind that we DO have a great PG coming in, and 2-3 blue-chippers. If we have to wait til next year, at least we finally have good reason for saying that this time.

    I’m still not singing the WTNY blues just yet, though. We’re not out of the running for the postseason just yet. But if we get to that point, I’m like you. It’s not like we have nothing on our team, and nothing coming in next year. We certainly have every reason to be hopeful for next year.

    We just can’t say that out loud. 🙂

  4. bradleyb123 01/13/2010 at 7:21 PM #

    Speaking of next year, is there any talk of CJ Leslie possibly coming here? I haven’t heard anything about him much lately. Has anyone heard anything about him?

  5. Wolfy__79 01/13/2010 at 7:36 PM #

    also i tend to criticize our upperclassmen very harshly… well, also the coaching along with that subject. in most cases this year, its horner that carries most of the burden of my scrutiny. i do like the kid, just not what i expect from a senior forward from NCSU. but this trend will undoubtably end with him. i’ve been seeing wasted talent at the senior level, last year was courtney fells. that kid should have been a nightmare for the ACC. costner to boot. when seniors like mcclinton make each game winnable, and our seniors never can come close to the kind of impact others have. thats my beef. sounds alot like chicken huh. i never fully “wtny.” but i do look forward to these additions coming in. trust me, if i had my way our seasons would be longer and more enjoyable. despite what our program has “fowled” up, there is alot of positive energy amongst the alumni. i can’t say the same for the students, they need a swift kick in the balls. we’ve got a young energetic wbball coach, obrien in football and sid at the helm on basketball. maybe not some’s ideal team but still already improved from just a few years ago.

    i think the most consistency we can find with our somewhat young team is probably on the defensive end 1, and 2, turns at the point. javi is surely slow to mature, but we knew coming in that it was a three headed monster. it appears that we can see more of javi/degand in the first then that fades into javi/degand/mays to finish the game.

  6. Wolf74 01/14/2010 at 8:25 AM #

    “Speaking of next year, is there any talk of CJ Leslie possibly coming here? I haven’t heard anything about him much lately. Has anyone heard anything about him?”

    Yes, there is talk of CJ coming to NCSU. We are recruting him hard but so are several other schools. Kentucky, in particular, is interested in him and I personally believe CJ is very highly interested in them with them most likely out in front BUT from what I hear, Calipari is slow recruiting CJ. From various bits of information I have compiled I take it that UK would prefer to land Terrence Jones (a 6’8” 220lb forward) due to him having a more complete skill set and consistant intensity. They are also really want Doran Lamb (SG thats a dead eye outside shooter) and Josh Selby and Brandon Knight (both PGs) and they already have Stacy Poole (6’5” SF) committed. All these would be in the 2010 class. In addition Calipari is really hot after Quincy Miller (5* PF), Michael Gilchrist (5* SF) and Marquis Teague (G) in the 2011 class. So you can see that he is running out of playing time and scholarships if he is successful and so in the 2010 recruting class he is looking for immediate contributors that need little or no tweeking, for players that have an outside jump shop, and for PG help when Wall goes NBA.

    From what I have seen and heard, Leslie is a great athlete but needs soome work on his outside shot and intensity. He needs work and that is something NCSU could give him and why NCSU would be a great fit for him. Calipari may just not want to go with CJ until Jones, Lamb, and Knight/Selby decide as I keep hearing that they are his top priority in this class. Hopefully Cal holds him off long enough for him to come back to NCSU.

  7. Pack05 01/14/2010 at 11:46 AM #

    Thanks for the CJ update 74, that was good information. I believe (pray to god) in the end it will be Harrow, Brown and CJ .. with LC going prep for a year (seems to be the latest word regarding him but he still has time).

  8. bradleyb123 01/14/2010 at 12:39 PM #

    Yeah, thanks for the update on CJ, Wolf74. I just had not heard much of anything in a while. Last thing I heard was he was in attendance at one of Luke Cothron’s games (reason for hope), but was wearing UK earrings (what’s that about?) I was just hoping he wanted to wear some good bling, and didn’t have a good pair of NCSU earrings yet. 🙂

  9. Class of 2009 01/14/2010 at 4:58 PM #

    I actually don’t want to try using sports-slang involving my preference for the earings my men’s basketball players want to wear. Let’s just leave it at “I hope CJ joins us at State.” 🙂

  10. fullmoon1 01/14/2010 at 5:45 PM #

    I am disappointed about the uk earrings, i pegged him for more of a diamond stud guy. NCSU is hard to fit on an earring and would look kinda gauldy. Maybe the uk is for United Kingdom, hes a footballer or something. I wouldn’t read to much into the earrings afterall, Roy wears Kansas stickers on his Jackett and he is unc thru and thru…or is he

  11. Wolfy__79 01/14/2010 at 9:30 PM #

    …with interest with recruits such as leslie and cothron. the arrival of lorenzo and ryan harrow. scott wood with a year under his belt. tracy smith in his senior campaign. amongst the other young players having a year under their belt as well such as howell, painter, Davis, and mays hopefully getting his game together. how would yawl rate next years team as far as talent on the floor… considering all/most of the new additions “pan out,” rates versus some of our better teams of the past?

    i was giving it some thought earlier and can’t think of many teams certainly within the last fifteen years that had this high of an upside. of course, the key to all this being solid, mistake free play from the point!!

  12. Class of 2009 01/14/2010 at 10:51 PM #

    ^I would say Sid, for the first year, has about as close to a 10-man rotation as he is going to get and basically has to put some wins on the board. The singular reason I have been patient with him is because he hasn’t had the people he wants (call it an excuse… but he’s wanted this sort of gameplay since day 1 and been pretty obvious about it) so I figured it would take about 5 years for him to get his chess peices set up. Lo and behold, 5 years later, I think he has an extremely dangerous team, especially gaging off what “should be happening” this season and what is really happening.

    You really hate to get excited (reference: that UF video clip in the blog post), but it’s hard not to.

1 2 3 4

Leave a Reply