NC State ‘kicking away opportunities’ for tournament resume with recent losses
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Coach Wade demands improvement; upcoming Quad 1 games provide paths to rebuild resume.
- NC State is 5-3; current bracketology lists the team in the First Four out.
- Upcoming Quad 1 games, including Kansas, present critical chances to improve NET ranking.
Cold air blew in through the loading dock at Neville Arena on Wednesday night, a reminder of winter’s nearing arrival. The calendar just turned to December. March is still three months away.
Except every day and every game matters, and N.C. State already sits in a precarious position. One bracketology report had the Wolfpack listed as one of the “First Four Out” for the 2026 NCAA Tournament, based on the results so far.
After falling to Auburn, 83-73, on Wednesday night in the ACC-SEC Challenge, the Wolfpack (5-3) has now lost three of its last four games. It fell to Seton Hall and Texas in Maui — both solid teams, certainly — in winnable games.
N.C. State doesn’t have any bad losses, at least they don’t look that bad right now, but it also doesn’t have any great wins. Quadir Copeland said the team has to start hating the disappointed feeling it experiences after losses to get the results it wants.
“We keep going into the locker room, heads down. We don’t like that,” Copeland said. “We don’t like this feeling, so stop losing. It’s as simple as that. I feel like that’s the easiest fix; locking in, paying attention to the details, focusing and starting to get wins.”
Missed opportunities for big wins
Prior to the game, N.C. State ranked No. 43 in the NCAA NET rankings and No. 31 in KenPom. It has no Quad 1 wins to this point; a victory over the Tigers would’ve provided one. It’s also 2-2 in Quad 2 games after the losses at the Maui Invitational. The Wolfpack is lucky to not be 1-3 in Quad 2 after narrowly beating VCU, 85-79, in the fourth game of the season.
“Our backs are against the wall,” N.C. State head coach Will Wade said. “We’re going to have two more opportunities, and we’ve got to start building towards those opportunities.”
The team doesn’t want to lose, but Wade said he was more encouraged against Auburn than he was last week. He felt like progress was made, even if the result didn’t show up on the scoreboard. It was always going to be difficult to win on the road at Auburn. The Tigers went 58-4 at home in the last four seasons and are now 5-0 in 2025-26.
The losses last week in Hawaii, however, were “backbreaking,” the first-year head coach said. That’s why it could use one, if not both losses, back.
“This was a tough assignment, but we don’t give ourselves any margin for error when you lose to Seton Hall,” Wade said. “Seton Hall’s a great team, but those are the ones that are killers. It’s a lot easier to beat Texas on a neutral court when we have more fans there than [it is] to come to Auburn, in front of 9,100 people, and try to win. When you kick away those opportunities, put yourself in a tough spot.”
Upcoming chances for impact wins
The Wolfpack hosts Kansas next Saturday at Lenovo Center, which is currently a Quad 1 game. Its matchups against Liberty and UNC-Asheville, both taking place before the Jayhawks travel to Raleigh on Dec. 13, are Quad 3 and Quad 4 games.
Ole Miss, which travels to Greensboro on Dec. 21, has also struggled to start the season. That was expected to be a Quad 1 game, but it is currently listed as a Quad 3. The Rebels are listed at No. 124 in the NET, but that number could change slightly depending on the results over the next several weeks.
Wade and his staff set up its schedule, in part, with the tournament selection requirements in mind.
“They tell us on the front end who [are] the teams we’re playing. You can project out how many of those games are going to be Quad 1, Quad 2, Quad 3,” Wade said of the ACC schedule this summer. “You know what an average NCAA Tournament resume looks like and how many Quad 1, Quad 2, Quad 3 games they play. Then you just do simple addition and subtraction. The league’s going to get us seven. We need 12. We gotta go get five. It’s simple.”
It seems early to harp on the “quads” and the NET rankings in earnest at this point in the season, but what happens in the early portion of the season often matters on Selection Sunday as much as what takes place during conference play.
Last season, the ACC went 2-14 against the SEC in the December event. This year, it went a much-improved 7-9. That should not only help the conference’s reputation, but it helps teams improve in the metrics. And, in N.C. State’s case, it helps create more opportunities for quality wins. Losses don’t hurt the resume quite as much, either.
Pending any major changes, six of N.C. State’s ACC contests should be Quad 1 contests. That provides more opportunities for the team to build its resume to become an at-large team.
“You can’t keep kicking away opportunities,” Wade said. “Fortunately, our league’s done better, so we’re going to have way more opportunities in league. But, I mean, you’ve got to win the games. … We’re in a tough spot, but we’ve got to fight our way out. We put ourselves in it, and we’ve got to dig ourselves out. And we will.”
This story was originally published December 4, 2025 at 5:15 AM.
