Analyzing NC State’s Path to Making the ACC Tournament After Losing to UNC

After being obliterated by UNC last night, the NC State Men’s Basketball team now occupies 16th place in the ACC with a 3-12 conference record.

With the ACC’s expansion adding three new teams (SMU, Cal, and Stanford) this season, only 15 of the 18 conference teams will qualify for the 2025 ACC Tournament.

Currently, the Wolfpack is 1.5 games behind Syracuse, which holds the 15th spot with a 5-11 ACC record. NC State also trails Cal and Notre Dame, ranked 14th and 13th respectively, both with records of 5-10.

For the Pack to have any chance of overtaking these teams, they must win at least 2 of their next 5 games. According to KenPom’s latest projections, NC State is favored to win only their regular season finale against Miami. KenPom predicts losses against Wake Forest, Syracuse, Georgia Tech, and Pitt, giving NC State a mere 51% chance of defeating the Hurricanes with a projected score of 76-75. Furthermore, the projections give them a 41% chance of defeating the Demon Deacons and the Orange (by 2 and 3 points respectively), and a 36% chance of overcoming the Yellow Jackets and the Panthers (both by 4 points).

ESPN Analytics’ Matchup Predictor expects NC State to lose all their remaining games, assigning them a 49.9% chance of victory against Wake Forest, a 44.2% chance against Syracuse, a 43.3% chance against Georgia Tech, a 42.2% chance against Pitt, and a 49.8% chance against Miami.

For perspective, KenPom predicts that the Orange and the Fighting Irish will each win two more games, and the Golden Bears one more.

One advantage for NC State is their upcoming home game against Syracuse next Wednesday night.

While projections and analytics ultimately mean nothing, it’s noteworthy that the Wolfpack have not won a single game all season when playing as the underdog, with a record of 0-14 in those games.

It would be an abysmal turn of events to win the ACC Tournament in 2024 to potentially failing to qualify in 2025.

We’ll have to wait and see if the Wolfpack can conjure some late-season magic in the next two weeks.