‘Absolutely a tournament team.’ Abrupt end leaves NC State to wonder what if?
Only one team can end the season with confetti and a win in the NCAA tournament.
For almost everyone else, there’s typically the disappointment that comes with a loss.
For N.C. State, its college basketball season ended in a hotel room without a bang or a whimper.
The Wolfpack players were set for a film review on Thursday at the Grandover Resort in Greensboro before its quarterfinal matchup with Duke when the ACC decided to cancel its conference tournament due to coronavirus concerns.
By the end of the day, the NCAA decided to do the same with its tournament abruptly ending the college basketball season for everyone.
At 20-12 and with a favorable resume, N.C. State was in solid position to make the NCAA field for the second time in coach Kevin Keatts’ three seasons.
There is no doubt in Keatts’ mind, his team belonged.
“This was absolutely a tournament team,” Keatts wrote in a message posted on the team’s Twitter account on Friday. “They battled adversity, learned important life lessons and will always have this experience.”
Quest for consistency
N.C. State spent much of the 2019-20 season in search of consistency both in terms of available players in the lineup and in quality of play.
The final two games might have been N.C. State’s most complete, other than a 22-point home win over Duke on Feb. 19.
After all of the ups and downs of ACC play, which appropriately ended with a 10-10 record, the Wolfpack put together back-to-back dominant performances in what would be its final two games.
N.C. State handled Wake Forest in a “can’t lose” situation on March 6 in the regular-season finale with an 84-64 home win.
In the second round of the ACC tournament on Wednesday, it pounded Pittsburgh 73-58 with a spirited defensive effort led by junior guard Devon Daniels.
Senior point guard Markell Johnson led the ACC in assists (for the second time in three years) and made the second-team All-ACC but it was Daniels who emerged as the team’s best and most consistent player of the final third of the season.
Pair Daniels with a talented incoming freshmen class, ranked No. 8 in the country by 247Sports, and Keatts is set up well for success in 2021.
A big key, for what will be a younger team with Johnson and senior C.J. Bryce (13.3 points, 6.3 rebounds per game) exiting, will be playing with more consistency more frequently throughout the season.
For as good as the Wolfpack looked in the home rout of Duke (88-66 on Feb. 19, the worst loss to an unranked team in Mike Krzyzewski’s four-decade tenure), or the home win over Wisconsin (69-54 on Dec. 4) there were subpar, head-scratching efforts in losses at Virginia Tech, at Clemson and at home to UNC.
Lineup continuity
Injuries to Bryce, Johnson, forward Manny Bates and forward Jericole Hellems and an early-season suspension for forward D.J. Funderburk were a big part of the problem for Keatts in conjuring more consistency out of this group.
Bryce, who finished the season as the team’s leader in scoring and rebounding, missed four games at the end of December and early January with a concussion. In a purely unique N.C. State way, it was a fluke incident — a hard, incidental shot to the face by Bates to Bryce’s nose in a pregame practice — that sidelined Bryce.
Once he returned, it took him a week or two to get his game back together. He was scoreless in the disappointing home loss to the Tar Heels on Jan. 27 but was instrumental in the road win over Syracuse (19 points, four 3-pointers) on Feb. 11.
Between Johnson’s ankle injuries, three different concussion issues and a two-game suspension for Funderburk to open the season, Keatts had at least eight scholarship players available in only half of the ACC games.
“We’re a good basketball team when we’ve got everybody healthy,” Keatts said after the home win over Duke.
Johnson was one of the ACC’s best playmakers when engaged. Bates led the league in blocked shots as a redshirt freshman. Daniels and Bryce were solid wing scorers.
But it was Johnson who made them go. He could play like one of the best players in the ACC — “magical” is how Krzyzewski once described him — or he could disappear for stretches.
Given the depth issues and some roster limitations (the exits of guard Blake Harris and forward Sacha Killeya-Jones and the “none-and-done” path of Jalen Lecque left some holes) N.C. State couldn’t afford less than maximum from Johnson against high quality opponents.
Johnson was usually good when the lights were brightest (Wisconsin, Auburn, Duke) and he also had an uncanny knack for making halfcourt shots, including a game-winner at UNC-Greensboro on Dec. 15. But when he was off, like the home loss to UNC or home loss to Louisville, he was noticeably off.
Keatts would get frustrated, understandably, with his senior point guard. He could have used more options behind Johnson but Lecque went from prep school to the NBA, Harris transferred to North Carolina A&T and junior Braxton Beverly dealt with a balky back for most of the season.
Finding a way
Through the injuries and consistency challenges, Keatts was able to coax 20 wins out of this group, including three big ones (Wisconsin, Duke, Virginia).
A year after missing the NCAA tournament for a lack of quality wins, and a poor nonconference strength of schedule, Keatts fixed both of those issues this season.
That’s why the Wolfpack, with Wednesday’s win over Pitt and a handful of losses by bubble teams prior to that, was likely on the right side of the bubble this time around.
Due to the sudden ending to the season, no one will know for sure but there was a certain respectable resiliency to this group.
“We grew up as a team this year, they grew as men and I’m proud of what we accomplished,” Keatts wrote on Twitter on Friday.
The abrupt close of the season — and it doesn’t get much more abrupt than having the plug pulled while in a hotel waiting to go play Duke — cut short any true sense of accomplishment. There is a solid base for Year 4 for Keatts with Daniels, Bates, Hellems and Beverly all likely back in the fold.
Funderburk, who had a strong junior season, is likely to at least test his pro potential but could return. Nebraska transfer Thomas Allen and Dereon Seabron, an academic redshirt, are both athletic guards who can help.
The five-man recruiting class will define Keatts’ tenure. This is his first chance to bring in a group together, develop them and grow with them.
