The Wolfpacker: An Independent Magazine Covering NC State Sports
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42 ■ THE WOLFPACKER BY JACEY ZEMBAL T he NC State men's basketball team has great momentum and three re- turning starters entering the offsea- son, but with six available scholar- ships, head coach Mark Gotfried and his staff are still working on supplementing the roster with more talent. NC State went 22-14 overall and 10-8 in the ACC last year, to earn the seventh seed in the ACC Tournament and a No. 8 seed in the NCAA Tournament. The difficult league schedule helped prepare the Wolf- pack for the Big Dance, and the players responded. NC State rallied from a 16-point sec- ond-half deficit to defeat LSU in the first game, 66-65, March 19, and then shocked No. 1-seed Villanova, 71-68, March 21 to reach the Sweet 16. Hopes were raised for a potential Elite Eight or Final Four berth, due in part to playing new ACC member Louisville. NC State had previously defeated the Cardinals 74-65 Feb. 14 in Louisville, but the rematch didn't pan out as planned. A pair of North Carolina natives led Louis- ville to a 75-65 victory March 27. Junior power forward Montrezl Harrell, who is from Tarboro, had 24 points and seven re- bounds, and Raleigh native Anton Gill, a sophomore shooting guard, added seven points in 11 minutes off the bench. Still, the successful season pleased Got- fried. "We come back and beat a No. 1 seed, get to the Sweet 16," he said. "This group completely, completely did some amazing things. I'm extremely proud." NC State was immediately dubbed a top- 20 preseason team for next year by the majority of the college basketball media in the "early" look-aheads. Some even had NC State as high as No. 9 in the country. Expectations were soaring that Gottfried could spur the Wolfpack to higher levels of succes next year. The fans' hopes were tempered after redshirt junior combo guard Trevor Lacey and sophomore post player Kyle Washing- ton exited the program prematurely. Lacey earned second-team All-ACC honors after averaging 15.7 points and 3.5 assists per game and shooting 39.2 percent from three- point land. The Alabama transfer left an indelible mark in his one year at NC State thanks to his clutch shooting and ability to make shots under duress. Lacey proved to be the king of the shot clock winding down with his arsenal of step-back jumpers. The 6-9, 230-pound Washington fell out of the rotation starting with the Louisville win Feb. 14 and has elected to transfer. He'll sit out next year and then have two years of eligibility remaining. Washington averaged 6.8 points, 4.1 rebounds and 1.1 blocks in 17.8 minutes per game. Washington left his mark in the LSU win, and there simply isn't a Sweet 16 berth without him. He came off the bench to score nine points in 12 minutes to help spark the comeback against the Tigers. NC State also lost fifth-year senior start- ing small forward Ralston Turner and se- nior wing Desmond Lee, who both played two years for the Wolfpack. Turner arrived as an LSU transfer, and Lee helped fill the void at shooting guard after Rodney Purvis transferred to UConn in 2013. NC State entered late April still hoping to bolster the roster going into next year, whether with graduate transfers, foreign players or potential late academic qualifiers from the high school ranks. NCSU didn't have any signees during the November signing period, but did add West Virginia redshirt junior shooting guard Terry Hen- derson as a transfer last summer. NC State has seven scholarship play- ers, with six slots left to be filled, though Gottfried has typically preferred a 10-man roster in recent years. Looking ahead to next fall (and using the class years for next season), junior point guard Anthony Barber, junior center Len- nard Freeman and sophomore power for- ward Abdul-Malik Abu will return from the starting lineup. Freeman and Abu will be New-Look Pack NC State Returns Three Starters From A Memorable Sweet 16 Squad