NC State’s Trevor Lacey hit a game winner with .01 on the clock. The replay confirmed it. The only problem was that the replay was wrong. FoxSport’s clock on-screen was a frame behind. Realtime told a different story. After NC State celebrated, the refs went back to the monitor to see that the ball was on Lacey’s fingertips when the clock hit 0. Another chapter to add the the “You’ll never see that again as long as you live” type back luck that the Wolfpack has endured over the past 25 years. Now, it’s been happening less and less lately, but tonight was a simple reminder that the players have changed, the coaches rotate, but you’re still watching NC State basketball.

At this point your probably wondering why State was even in a close game with Wofford. We’ll get into that in a second. First, I think it’s important to realize that this, while still a loss, is not a loss that is going to really hurt the Pack. This Wofford team won the Southern Conference Tournament last season and returned all of their starters. This is a veteran group that is going to be right up there again and should have a pretty healthy RPI this season.

Now, let’s get into tonight game.

– State’s bigs were just bad tonight. They combined for only 11 points in this one and although they finished tied on the glass with 33 boards, they were beat on the offensive glass 9-3. That was huge. State had very few second chance points and just seemed timid against the Wofford bigs. Kyle Washington couldn’t hit a shot, Beejay got his blocks and rebounds but that was it, and Freeman just was plain off tonight.

– Turnovers. State only coughed it up 11 times, but that’s not very good when you only turn the other team over 4 times. Now, Wofford is a veteran team and a calling card to most veteran teams is the ability to protect the basketball, but the Wolfpack is long, strong and should have dominated Wofford on the defensive end.

– Speaking of defense. The Pack was decent at best in this game. They were pretty good on the ball, but their help side was weak and they allowed far too many easy baskets in the paint. Again, A lot of this had to do with the bigs just not showing up tonight.

– No reinforcements. I’m not sure what happened tonight, but Gottfried just did not seem to want to explore his bench when his starters weren’t getting it done. Caleb Martin, who scored a career high 17 last time out only logged 11 minutes and was never allowed to get into any sort of rhythm. We didn’t even see any of Cody Martin in this game.

– Karl Hess. Who let this guy back on the floor? Hess was banned from reffing State games after throwing out Googs and Corch at a game a few years back. All of the sudden he’s back and within 5 minutes of play he gives Gottfried a technical foul for what just seemed like normal coach/ref banter after a questionable call. Quick-Whistle Karl obviously was trying to establish some sort of dominance again and put the Pack in the hole early. Those 2 free points that Wofford got ended up costing State this game.

– Now for the bright spots. Trevor Lacey was once again awesome down the stretch. He finished with 18 points and hit a huge jumper to put State in the lead after Wofford took the lead in the last minute then the would-have-been game winner. The kid has ice in his veins and you just wish he’d have taken over sooner. This kind of is reminding me of Warren last year. During the beginning of the season he tried to play as unselfishly as possible until he realized that he needed to be the offense for this team to win. Lacey is in the same situation. Sure, he has other weapons but he needs to realize that he is option A-1 and should be getting up 16-20 shots per game.

– I also thought Cat improved in this game. He still had a few moments of indecision which resulted in poor shots, but overall he played better basketball. He is trying as hard as he can to pick his spots and to run the offense and I think  you’re seeing that. Remember, he’s still only a sophomore in the beginning of his second season. I just think people, us included, thought he’d be coming in here college ready. Athletically he was ready, but he’s learning how to play PG at this level and there’s certainly been a learning curve there. His line wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad either. 10 points, 3 assists and 5 boards…all with no turnovers.
____

State better shake this one off because Tennessee is up next this Wed. at the PNC.