Former Wolfpack PG LJ Thomas is becoming a scoring machine for Austin Peay

I know, I know. Why the heck would we report on a guy who left NC State? Goodbye and good riddance, right?

Well, first let me say that I really liked LJ Thomas and I’m not sure what all went down that resulted in him leaving NC State, but he was a good kid and he was really proud of his commitment to NC State in late 2021.

Last year he decided to enter the portal and leave Raleigh. He chose to play at Austin Peay in Tennessee. Because I thought he actually had a really solid skill set, I was interested in seeing how he’d pan out. Low and behold, Thomas is cooking down at his new home. He’s averaging 19.4 points per game (tied for 34th best scorer in the nation), dropped a 20 spot on #3 Tennessee, and put 29 points on Butler. He’s also averaging 3.3 assists and 4.5 rebounds per game.

LJ Thomas a big-time performance to help Austin Peay knock off Butler 68-66:

29 points
8 rebounds
3 assists
13-27 FG@mid_madness pic.twitter.com/zgwmfkGywn

— Rising Ballers Network (@dylan_lutey) November 9, 2024

Good for LJ and sad he didn’t stick around long enough for us to see what he really could do. However, I will say that I publicly proposed him getting into the mix a lot more last season…

Pick and Roll Problems: Is it time to hand PG reins to LJ Thomas?@wolferetti thinks so. Read his breakdown…https://t.co/8Wm6NpUGCr

— Pack Insider (@PackInsider) January 28, 2024

Now, I get it, We went to the Final Four and won the ACC Tournament last year, so all the moves Keatts made have been proven correct. But I just would have loved to see LJ carve out some sort of niche with that team so he could have felt more involved and maybe wanted to give it another year here in Raleigh.

Now, the other thing I think that is worth pointing out, is that this is another Keatts recruit that nobody knew about prior to his signing with NC State. He was 3 star kid who wasn’t all that highly recruited and Keatts jumped on his very early. I remember at that time thinking that he must have massive upside if Keatts was willing to burn a scholarship on a 3-star very early in the recruiting process.

You have to give it to Kevin Keatts, the guy has an eye for talent. He’s been able to get in early on a number of guys who eventually exploded. One was Terquavion Smith, a 3-star kid from a small high school, and don’t forget Josh Hall and Jalen Laque, both of whom were 3-star recruits when Keatts got involved and ended up being so good that they skipped college entirely and went on to play pro. LJ Thomas was another one of these guys. Great body, a great skill set, high IQ, silky shot, but not an explosive athlete, so he slipped through the cracks. Keatts jumped in and as we now see, he found a star.

Unfortunately, we’re in the free transfer/NIL era and we didn’t get to see him mature into his final form here at NC State, but glad to see him finding success elsewhere.