NC State Basketball
Duke Slays Pack 77-53
Bowling Green Transfer Guard Marcus Hill (6’4″/185) has committed to NC State!
Hill took an Official Visit to NC State this past weekend.
This past season, Hill averaged 20.5 points and 5.0 rebounds per game for the Falcons. He earned 1st Team All-MAC honors. Even though he was only at Bowling Green one season, he had one of the best seasons in school history, scoring 698 points, which ranks 5th all-time in program history for a single season.
For his first two years of collegiate ball, Hill played for Southern Union State College (JUCO) in Alabama. In 2022-23, Hill earned 3rd Team NJCAA All-American honors, and ranked as the #32 overall Junior College prospect.
247Sports ranks Hill as a 4-Star Transfer Prospect, and the #81 overall player in the Transfer Portal, and the #11 Shooting Guard.
Even though 247Sports and ON3 consider Hill a Shooting Guard, NC State is recruiting him as a Point Guard.
Hill is the 4th player to transfer to NC State this offseason, joining Louisville’s Brandon Huntley-Hatfield & Mike James, and Georgetown’s Dontrez Styles.
With the addition of Hill, NC State now has 1 scholarship remaining for next season.
NC State Forward Mohamed Diarra will not be returning to NC State for his final season of eligibility. Rather, he will give 100% of his focus to pursuing his professional career.
Diarra is declaring for the NBA Draft, and will explore that possibility as far as it goes, but the likelihood of him playing professionally in his home country of France are high.
Diarra was a significant player for NC State all season long, averaging 6.3 points and 7.8 rebounds (team high), but his impact in March was tremendous, recording 10+ rebounds in 7 of the Wolfpack’s 10 postseason games, and five of those performances were double-doubles.
Wolfpack fans will always remember the grit and mental toughness that Diarra put on display in the NCAA Tournament, playing game-after-game while fasting for Ramadan.
The Wolfpack’s frontcourt just got a little bit thinner. In the past two weeks, NC State has lost Diarra and Ernest Ross. Ben Middlebrooks is returning, and Brandon Huntley-Hatfield transferred in from Louisville. Dontrez Styles transferred in from Georgetown, and while he is more of a Small Forward, in certain lineups, he could play the Small 4 position. With all that being said, I fully expect NC State to try to find another post player in the Transfer Portal with Diarra’s exodus now official.
With Diarra not returning in 2024, NC State now has 2 scholarships available for next season.
Louisville Transfer Guard Mike James (6’5″/200) has announced his commitment to NC State!
View this post on Instagram
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.
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.
He does have the ability to knock down a three, making 34.8% for his career.
James has 2 years of eligibility remaining. With James’ commitment, NC State currently has 1 scholarship available for next season.
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gdtann wolfpack74 Yeah, maybe second round picks in the D league overseas. Caleb has a shot motion that needs to change and his mental game is nothing but AAU street ball. Caleb was 60 and Cody was 81 according to Rivals. Anya needs to dump another 40 lbs because his numbers are impressing no one. His points and block have doubles but so has his minutes. Abu can leap out of the building, but NC State does not have anyone to teach the bigs how to make moves around the basket. So we made the tournament again. Big deal, starting to… Read more »
truewolf wolfpack74 Wolfer96 You know what’s embarrassing… not showing up for a tournament game. That’s what’s embarrassing. Playing one on one basketball, not playing any D, not having any basketball IQ. That is unacceptable at this point in the season. Celebrating a win against a horrible Pitt team and thinking that’s going to prepare you for a duke team that brings it every game. You come out like that and you deserve criticism. And enough of the if you don’t say nice things about the Pack go root for unc crap. What are you 5 years old? Let me teach you a… Read more »
wolfpack74 gdtann What is wrong with you? Caleb isn’t a disappointment at all. Caleb will get more time next year…. as a sophomore like its suppose to be. Caleb wasn’t some top 25 recruit that was expect to come in and compete for a starting job right away. He was a top 75 guy, a four year player. Cody was barely in the top 100 if at all at times. What do you think this is, just add players and stir and bam you get to greatness? No thats not how it works unless you’re Kentucky and you get 5 of… Read more »
I’ll give it that its going to be tough to face a prepared Duke team with really only one morning to prepare for them. With the being said, we still came out and looked downright rattled by a 1-3-1 zone. We continuously tried to dribble through and around it instead of kicking the ball to the middle and too our post players. Gottfried also didn’t seem to recognize where our openings where keeping freeman in when we needed someone who could attack from the middle or could knock down a midrange jumper. Too many times that ball went to the… Read more »
wolfpack74 Wolfer96 both of you can go pull for unc. Cat did not have a great game but it’s not like he didn’t get blasted on a screen and have to leave the court. oh wait yeah he did. the last part of the season he’s been consistent on offense and defense and a main reason we are going to the NCAA. the game was tough to watch but you keyboard warriors are what’s really embarassing
That was one embarrassing game. First of all, our guys actually played hard and wanted to win the game. Some of the plays were just not in our favor. However, Game plan and execution were horrible. Duke basically demolished us. It was all about defense failure. every wolfpack player got beat up on one on one defense (even Cat and Lacey). Duke’s screen killed us all night. team defense was even horrible. everybody was looking at the ball only. when one penetrates 3 guys try to stop him and leave two guys open all night. Our defense was just so… Read more »
gdtann If we need the depth, then play the guys. They are just as good as the ones he is playing. Caleb Martin is a disappointment and Cody doesn’t get chance as well as Kyle.
As much as I thought this would be a better game, I can’t be mad at this team. When K has days to prepare for you and you don’t well this is what happens. We had no answers for Duke’s zone, none whatsoever and they had figured us out defensively. That is why K is the best. No shame in that really. This has been a heck of a season. We beat UNC and Duke. That doesn’t happen very often, especially this year when no one expected much from this team. They are solidly in the tournament and things are… Read more »
Caleb Martin needs to understand that he is not a scoring machine at 36%. With Henderson coming to play the two, Cody and Kyle will see about the same amount of time next year as this year. If I was them, I wouldn’t waste another year at State. They need to play more.
That was embarrassing. They looked like they didn’t want to be there. If they play like that again, then it’s one and done and we will be left waiting to see whom leaves or transfer.
Wolfer96 You’re tough on CAT. You do know that CAT stands for catatonic schizophrenia.
I’m not too disappointed because I saw this coming. Any game where Cat scores 30+ points is going to be followed by a lot of pats on the back and thinking they got the world figured out. And then reality smacks you in the face like a pillow case full of soda cans. But what I want to know is how do you follow up 30+ points with a ZERO point outing? That kid is a head case. The one good thing about all of this is that this team will be well rested for the NCAAs. Last season’s team… Read more »