A good sweat is a good sign for NC State’s Markell Johnson
When it comes to sweating and basketball, there’s an accepted gold standard.
Some guys could play 40 minutes and walk off the court with a slight trickle. Patrick Ewing, the hall-of-fame big man who starred at Georgetown and for the New York Knicks in the 1980s and ‘90s, looked like he had been hosed down by the end of a game.
N.C. State guard Markell Johnson had pools of sweat glistening off his forehead and rivulets down his neck and shoulders in the Wolfpack’s win over Wake Forest last Sunday. That was Ewing-level perspiration that Johnson had accumulated in hitting a career-high six 3-pointers in a 94-74 win over the Demon Deacons.
“You said Pat Ewing?” Johnson said when he told about the sweat-level comparison. “That’s crazy.”
That’s kind of let-it-all-hang-out effort N.C. State (20-8, 8-7 ACC) needs from Johnson as it makes a push for the NCAA tournament.
The Wolfpack faces Florida State (22-6, 10-5) on the road on Saturday and has two more regular-season games after that before the start of the ACC tournament.
N.C. State coach Kevin Keatts described Johnson as “locked in” for the Wake Forest win. Johnson, who is third on the team in scoring (11.4 points per game) and leads the team in assists (4.2), had 25 points with six rebounds and three assists in 30 minutes. He made five 3-pointers in the first half as N.C. State took control of the game and paid the Deacs back for a January loss.
Johnson’s role this season, after leading the ACC in assists last season, has changed. Instead of a facilitator, Johnson has had to be more aggressive in finding his own points.
Since returning from a mid-January back injury, Johnson has been running hot and cold. He had five points in a home win over Syracuse on Feb. 13 and followed that up with an outstanding 16-point, 10-assist game at Duke on Feb. 16.
But before his bonanza against Wake Forest, he had five points in an overtime win over Boston College on Feb. 20.
Keatts said he has talked with his talented point guard about consistency.
“I don’t want a game where you play great and then you drop off a little bit,” Keatts said.
It has been more difficult finding a groove, after missing three games with a sore back, than even Johnson had anticipated. He did notice he had a little more pep for the Wake game than he did in other ACC games.
“That started in practice, me just pushing myself in practice to go harder and telling myself I’m not tired,” he said.
Getting back up to speed has been a process. Johnson crashed to the floor after trying to block a shot at 9:45 in the first half of N.C. State’s win over Pittsburgh on Jan. 12.
On a February episode of the team’s weekly television show, Johnson said he couldn’t feel his legs after he had hit the PNC Arena floor. He said he was worried his basketball career was over.
N.C. State went 1-2, including the embarrassing loss at Wake, without Johnson in the lineup. He came back for the Clemson win on Jan. 26, and had a strong second half in that dramatic win over the Tigers, but his stamina was short and his minutes were down.
Johnson topped the 30-minute mark only once in his first four games back and needed overtime to get there (31 minutes vs. Virginia on Jan. 29) but has averaged 33 minutes over the past five games.
“The telltale sign for me is that he can play a lot longer,” Keatts said after the Wake Forest win. “I kept him in the first half because he was playing well. I normally would try to get him a break, somewhere in between there, but I think he’s getting back.”
Johnson hasn’t complained or used the time off as an excuse.
“I’m good,” Johnson said when he asked if he was 100 percent. “Yeah, I’m good.”
He was better than good against Wake Forest and that’s just where N.C. State needs him at the most important time of the season.
This story was originally published March 1, 2019 at 5:21 PM.
