Louisville Transfer Guard Mike James (6’5″/200) is a priority for NC State, according to a source.
News broke about James entering the Transfer Portal back on March 25th, and NC State was quick to reach out. Kevin Keatts and his staff recruited the former 4-star prospect out of high school heavily, but he ultimately chose the Cardinals.
After redshirting his first year in Louisville due to torn achilles, James has been a starter for the Cardinals the past two years.
This past year, James averaged 12.6 points per game (3rd on the team) and 5 rebounds. He’s extremely physical and aggressive, taking 47% of his field goal attempts at the rim (making 46%). As a result, he draws a lot of fouls, ranking 10th in the ACC in Fouls Drawn, and 4th in Free Throw Rate. James made opponents pay this year when they put him on the line, making 81.8% from the charity stripe, which ranked 15th in the ACC.
James shot the ball better as a Redshirt Freshman, than he did this past season. His Effective Field Goal Percentage in 2022-23 was 55.8%, which ranked 19th in the ACC, and his True Shooting Percentage of 59.6% ranked 14th.
He does have the ability to knock down a three, making 34.8% for his career.
NC State already hosted Indiana State Transfer Guard Ryan Conwell last week, and while the Wolfpack coaches like both players, from what I’m hearing, James would be their preference.
NC State hasn’t had James in for a visit, but that could happen soon.
James has 2 years of eligibility remaining.
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Yurtseven not fitting in well enough to defeat Miami. Mav looks to be coming around quickly. Love the jumping ability of Kirk. He needs to work with the first team more. His defense is picking up but looses focus sometimes.
Kirk won’t get better coming off the bench with a minute left in the game. Luckily the large lead allowed him to get in early this game but yeah he should be getting more minutes. It was funny to see him jack up a 3 as soon as he got in with no rebounders under the basket. That’s what guys do when they don’t know when they’ll see the court again.
I liked how Mav played this game. The big difference was that he was getting clean looks at the basket. Last season he had to force up a lot of contested shots and I think that led to some inconsistent shooting nights.
I feel like even when Yurt7 isn’t filling up the stat sheets his presence on the court helps spacing and gets guys better shots. He also got his hands on a lot of rebounds and tipped it to another teammate. That ball entering the paint and not immediately becoming a turnover has been a huge difference since Yurt7 became eligible.
Honestly the bench could have won this game. ACC can’t start fast enough.
The key for me is Yurt7 staying out of foul trouble and staying in the game. Like the last game if the Pack can swing the ball side to side and down into Yurt7 it will expose the holes in the defense as it collapses. What I don’t want to see is too much dribbling and lack of ball movement. The Yurt will create opportunities for others and everyone just needs to seize their opportunities.
Yea i hate seeing less than 15 team assists int he Box score and it should be around 20 a game with the personnel that we have.
Anthony don’t be a troll now.