‘Winning and losing is a thin line’: Small mistakes, poor free throw shooting cost NC State
N.C. State’s locker room was somber after the Wolfpack’s game Wednesday. Players got dressed, many of them facing away from the rest of the room as they put on hoodies, hoping to avoid speaking with the media. Those that did looked disappointed, their body language expressing their feelings clearly.
Forward Dontrez Styles was one of few players to answer questions about the Wolfpack’s 63-59 loss to Texas. His face showed frustration and sadness that the team didn’t pull off the win, because it knew it had a chance.
N.C. State (5-3) led Texas by two with four minutes remaining. It was down by one with 1:20 remaining. It had possession with 17 seconds left. It missed a layup and couldn’t get the putback. Longhorn guard Chendall Weaver then raced down the floor and pounded an emphatic two-handed dunk.
“We’re a very good team,” Styles said. “We’ve just gotta figure out the small things; just limit those. Once we do that, we’re gonna be the team we know we can be.”
Guard Michael O’Connell felt similarly. The captain put much of the responsibility on himself. He finished with his worst shooting night of the season, going 1 of 8 from the field and making one free throw. He committed too many turnovers.
“We were right in the game,” O’Connell said. “Especially myself, if I knock a few more shots down and don’t turn the ball over — we’d have the lead and probably win it by a little bit.”
The Wolfpack has now lost three straight, but, unlike its two games against Purdue and BYU, it looked like a competitor against the Longhorns. The game featured nine ties and 12 lead changes as both programs fought for the victory. N.C. State couldn’t say the same last week, when Purdue and BYU won by double digits.
“This was a back and forth game. This was a tight game,” head coach Kevin Keatts said. “The entire time you didn’t know who was going to win the game until probably the last minute of the game.”
Styles said the loss is tough, because the Pack felt like it should’ve won. Texas averaged 83.3 points entering the game. N.C. State held it 20 points below that. It forced 12 turnovers, when the Longhorns typically commit eight.
Aside from a 9-0 run to start the night, N.C. State never allowed a major run. It limited the Longhorns’ ability to score in the paint, where they went 2 of 14 on layups.
There was a lot of good. Unfortunately, the minor mistakes cost them what could’ve been a Quad 1 or Quad 2 win.
N.C. State finished with a season-low at the free throw line, making just 6 of 14 shot attempts (.429). Previously, its least efficient game took place in the season opener when the Wolfpack shot 12 of 21 (.571) from the line. And its previous season-low of made free throws was 10 against BYU.
“We had guys that made some plays down the stretch, but in a (one) possession game, we can’t go 6 of 14 from the free throw line,” Keatts said.
The Wolfpack finished with nine turnovers in the game. Typically, it would be proud of that number, but not when O’Connell committed a turnover with 26 seconds remaining, impacting the game plan and time on the clock.
He entered the game with a 7.5 assist-to-turnover ratio, ranking No. 2 in the NCAA. O’Connell had recorded 30 assists and committed four turnovers in the Wolfpack’s first seven games. He ended with four in one night.
N.C. State would be prouder of its better effort off the glass, too, had it managed to scrape by with the victory. Sure, it still had lulls in its rebounding and Texas finished with a six rebound advantage, but it looked more aggressive than it did last week.
And, it would’ve been more celebratory of its three transfers — Styles, Marcus Hill and Brandon Huntley-Hatfield — combining for 43 points.
These are all things the Pack could have been really happy about. Instead, the Pack felt the sting of coming up short.
They know these things have to be fixed. The players think practice and more time to build chemistry will get the Wolfpack where it wants to be.
Keatts agrees.
“Winning and losing is a thin line. We would have a whole different line of questioning if we just won a one possession game,” Keatts said. “It’s really a thin line between winning the game and losing the game, how you feel and how you approach the next game. In our situation, we got to shake it off. We gotta get better.”
