The Wolfpacker: An Independent Magazine Covering NC State Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1510285
TRACKING THE PACK NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2023 ■ 13 232 South White St. — Downtown Wake Forest WakeForestHardware.com — 919-556-3562 @BWhardware SINCE 1949 NORTH CAROLINA'S PREMIER TRAEGER DEALER PACK PERFORMERS Ava Brizard, Women's Volleyball The sophomore outside hitter from Novi, Mich., has been one of the stars of NC State's volleyball resurgence. Through the team's first 21 matches, she was ranked fifth in the ACC in kills with an average of 3.58 per set and was eighth in points at 3.93 per set. Brizard played a key role in the Pack's 3-1 upset of fifth- ranked Louisville on Oct. 1, finishing the match with 14 kills. With Brizard fueling the attack, NC State was 16-5 overall and 6-4 in conference play heading into a conference matchup at Duke on Oct. 27. Luke Hille, Men's Soccer A junior forward from nearby Cary, N.C., Hille was leading the Pack and tied for sev- enth in the ACC with 7 goals through 16 games. The total was a career-high for Hille, who had 6 goals as a redshirt freshman in 2021 and 3 goals last fall, two of which were game-winners. Hille was also tied for ninth in the conference in points with 14. He scored what would prove to be the winning goal in the 59th minute of the season opener against Radford. The Wolfpack had a 6-8-2 overall re- cord heading into its final ACC matchup of the season on Oct. 27 against visiting Clemson. Katelyn Tuohy, Women's Cross Country Tuohy, the defending NCAA cross country champion, made her first appearance of the 2023 season at the Nuttycombe Invitational on Oct. 13 in Madison, Wis. She finished second to Parker Valby, the Florida stand- out whom she outlasted at the 2022 NCAA Championships last November. While Valby earned top honors amid the rainy, windswept conditions in Madison, Tuohy's time — 19:29.5 — was 15 seconds better than her finish at last year's Nuttycombe Invitational. Tuohy, a senior from Stony Point, N.Y., helped NC State place second in the team standings behind Northern Arizona University. Payton Wilson, Football Wilson was the Butkus Foundation's Na- tional Linebacker of the Month in September after making 56 tackles in the Wolfpack's first five games. The foundation's voters were par- ticularly impressed with a stop that the grad- uate student from Hillsborough, N.C., made against Notre Dame, noting that GPS tracking showed Wilson was traveling 23.4 mph on the play, a school re- cord. He was one of 51 players on the preseason watch list for the Butkus Award, which goes to the nation's top linebacker. — Matt Herb