NC State has two more games left on the schedule before the ACC tournament and they are looking to make one final run. Can they do it? Here are the reason we think they just might.
1) Moving Markell Johnson to the point
It was pretty obvious during ACC play that NC State wasn’t really even trying to run their offense. Dennis Smith Jr was putting up big time numbers, but his insistence to dominate the ball at the top of the key led to NC State looking stagnant and confused.
Tuesday night the NC State offense looked much better. The ball was moving from side to side, guys were getting open shots and it seemed as if this motivated them to cut harder and set better screens in order to get open. You can credit this to Johnson’s play. He gets the ball down the court and immediately moves the basketball to the wing. When he does make a move he’s always looking to penetrate and pitch, allowing shooters to get clean inside-out looks.
Having Johnson on the floor didn’t hurt Smith’s game either. in fact, he shot 6-13 on the night (46% – right on his average) while dropping 18 (again, right on his average).The other argument we’ve heard about playing Johnson at the point and using Smith as a 2 is that you’d either have to go small with Henderson and Rowan, or you’d have to choose between the two. Against GT, Rowan logged 37 minutes, while Henderson had 26. And as for ‘going small,’ it didn’t seem to hurt at all when the Pack did that. They ended up with a 40-28 edge on the boards.
2) Kapita stepping in
Say what you want, but Omer Yurtseven simply is not ready for the physicality of ACC basketball. Gottfried finally realized this and decided to decrease his minutes significantly. This opened up time for Kapita who has played a major role in most games that NC State has shown their potential.
I’m not sure why Kapita has seen such a fluctuation in playing time this season, but you could point to the fact that he doesn’t really seem to grasp the offense and he gets lost on defense occasionally. At this point, those are things that really don’t matter as much. NC State needs guys on the blocks who want to play hard and want to body up. Kapita plays with passion, fights for rebounds and is very aggressive on both ends. Simply put, NC State needs to put the five guys on the court who are willing to battle every play. Kapita is one of those guys.
3) Nothing left to lose
You want us against the world? Well, you’ve got it. Not many people believe NC State is going to make a run. Not at this point. Not since they’ve failed to really improve as the season has progressed. But don’t count them out just yet. They really have nothing left to lose. They aren’t going to the tournament without an ACC Tourny title. They aren’t playing for Gottfried’s job since that is out the window. What’s left other than pride and proving to the nation that they are in fact who everyone thought they’d be at the start of the season.
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I know the comment section is going to be filled up with snarky remarks on how we’re living in a dream world and how NC State is cooked. We get it. People have been severely let down and it stings, but this team showed at GT that with a few small changes, they might be able to muster up one more run. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
Poised to make a run. Yeah, after visiting Taco Bell too many times. Over hype as always from PackInsider Staff.
Too many ppl talk about this team being young? Problem with this team is that there are upperclassmen but they didn’t improve. That will pretty much kill any team when 3-4 year guys aren’t playing any better than year 1-2.
#1 in particular was a glaring problem for me. As talented as DSJ is… he seems to enjoy killing about 10-15 seconds of clock just dribbling the ball. Lack of ball movement definitely hurt the offense. Kapita hurt himself early in the season by picking up quick fouls. But that doesn’t explain why he was basically relegated to the bench in so many games this season?
I have my doubts but by deep run if you mean losing in the 2nd round then I may buy that swamp land. There were numerous occasions during the year where the team’s offense worked better with Markel at the point. Dennis “Dribble,Dribble” Smith took the motion out of the team like Kyle Washington did when he played. Insert Lennard Freeman and you have a sweet 16 team. Too little too late.
Yeah but that’s all on coaching. Kyle W. is playing pretty well now that he’s actually being coached. I’m sure dribble loving DSJ could also have improved under better coaching. It’s almost like Gott didn’t know what to do so he put it in DSJ’s hands and hoped he would just take over.
Yes – Washington is another black mark on Gottfried’s record. Reduced his minutes and ran him out of town instead of coaching him up and recognizing his talent. He should have been a perfect high post player. Now he’s a star at Cincinnati. I like Freeman but I don’t believe he would have had a magical impact on this team – same big man coaching problems apply to him.
Add the Martin twins to that list.
I would think coach knows better. He was the point guard on a team that made several consecutive deep runs in the NCAA tournament. Some of this could be the player not wanting to be coached? Look how good Lorenzo Brown did, and he was not a “true” point guard.
Remember Zo was there during the Lutz era. I don’t think coach Lutz is getting enough credit for what he did behind the scenes. The last 2 seasons were Gott’s worst and that coincides with Lutz changing titles and this season with him leaving. One could surmise that it was Lutz working with Zo, CJL, Howell and company. Maybe the story will come out one day from one of the players.
Nothing would make me happier, but that was pretty exhausted Georgia Tech team we barely beat the other night with us having a much deeper bench. Granted, it was on the road and Gottfried made some changes I think he had been scared to make earlier. Here’s hoping your right.
Hope you are right