NC State is 4-0. They beat Elon. But this one wasn’t pretty.

First off, Elon played a lot of zone vs. NC State, making it the first time NC State saw a team well-versed in zone, sit back and make the Pack shoot them out of it. Unfortunately, the Pack didn’t shoot all that great, and it kept the game close throughout. Is this a sign of things to come, or a great learning experience? Let’s take a closer look.

Here is ‘our take’…

– You might look at NC State’s first 4 games and see cupcakes, and you’re not wrong,  but really I’d like to applaud Keatts for the type of cupcakes he scheduled. Austin Peay was kind of a “Hey, let’s slaughter someone and get off on the right foot with this new roster.” Then you had Campbell, which is a local team who had this game scheduled and was invested in trying to knock off the Pack. So you get a less talented but motivated and feisty team, who just so happens to play a 5-out offense that gives you a look you likely won’t see during the regular season, but may run into in the post season. FIU was team that was going to play as physical as they can and not back down, and finally Elon, another local team that was going to be focused on knocking you off, but also going to throw a zone at you, a defense you might end up seeing a lot of this season. These were 4 winnable games that State won. No one is going to hold a parade for this run, but it was well structured, gave the new Pack roster a lot of variety to play against, and had them going up against a couple of pretty hungry teams. Well done, staff.

– NC State tried to shoot Elon out of the zone. Unfortunately, Smith, Joiner, and company weren’t hitting enough to do that and that is going to be the case at times this season. The Pack has shooters, but playing against a zone doesn’t mean you should just be hacking it up. Players shoot a much higher percentage when catching a pass coming from inside, with their shoulder squared to the basket. After settling down they did a better job of getting Jack Clark and Dusan Mahorcic involved, which allowed them to hold off Elon. This is something that Keatts will focus on. This team likes to play fast, but against a zone you need patience and to work the ball inside before settling for an outside shot. You need to flatten out that zone and allow your shooters some space. State was only 11-33 from 3pt range.

– NC State’s defense didn’t look great. I know they held Elon to the lowest % shooting of any team they’ve played this season at 38.3%. That said, NC State had more talent, length, and athleticism at every position, but they aren’t really able to exploit that because as a team they don’t lock down and play position defense. Like I’ve said a million times, this team gambles too much and goes for too many steals. It hurts them against these weaker teams, but at times it kills them against better opponents. I get that they want to create turnovers, but picking your spots to gamble yourself out of position is extremely important and this team seems to just throw caution to the wind and jumps everything.

– NC State really needs Terquavion Smith to sure up his off-the-ball defense. And by sure up I mean learn how it even works. This is an absolutely glaring problem with his game. Run back the game and just watch Smith on defense. When he is in help-side he completely locks in on the ball and loses his man. This cost NC State 8 to 1o points in the second half alone. Almost all of those absolutely wide open buckets on the block that Elon was getting, most of the time those were on Smith. This kid is the best offensive weapon NC State has had in years. He’s a good on the ball defender. But, this type of stuff has to be cleaned up if State is going to be competitive. And for those of you at home wondering what I’m talking about. Remember when your coach told you to “see man and ball!” when you’re playing off the ball defense. This means keeping both in your peripheral view at all times. Positioning yourself so you can see both AT ALL TIMES. And if there is a off-the-ball switch, make sure it’s communicated LOUD. It’s not that hard. If you’re not doing it it’s because you don’t want to. It’s that simple.

-Jack Clark showed a little aggressiveness. He was 9-18 shooting and added 9 boards. Clark needed a game like this, but he still shot just 3-10 from 3pt range. He finished with 21 points. It was good to see Clark being a little more aggressive offensively. He’s a big piece to this team’s offense, but we haven’t really seen him push the issue lately. The shots will fall for him eventually, so he needs to keep shooting. But what was bigger was the fact that he was successful in playing in the middle of this zone.

– DJ Burns didn’t have a great game, and he’s just struggling right now, but usually, he’d be the type of guy who can fill some gaps in the zone and attack them from inside. They’ll need him if they’re going to beat Kansas, so you gotta hope the increase in competition kicks him into gear.

– Ross, Pass, and LJ Thomas didn’t look great against the zone. Again, seeing this team play a zone was concerning. They looked sloppy and out of control and it didn’t allow them much depth. These guys didn’t look great against the zone, and if I’m playing NC State this year, this is something I key in on.

– State looked disinterested. Honestly aside from Morsell, Mahorcic, and at times Clark, State looked like they didn’t really feel like playing. Sure, it was kind of a trap game. Easy opponent before the big Kansas matchup. Opponent then lulled you to sleep using a zone. Made you frustrated and started forcing stuff. I get it. And at the end of the day, you walk away with the win. But you definitely hope these things are cleaned up soon, because good opponents will exploit them.