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NC State Recap

“Has anyone reserved the www.banthe3.com domain name yet”

                        -Bob W.

There is little secret that North Carolina is a red state.  I just always assumed that the red came from the US Flag, not the Canadian, but here we are in the heart of Dixie, at the Royal Bank of Canada Center.  Add in a couple Europeans and NC State has definitely gone global.  Regardless of everyone’s origin, Herb Sendek now has the Wolfpack off to their best start in the last 10 years and NC State put another notch on their belt and are looking more and more like the 2^nd best team in the ACC.

I’m kind of in a weird place right now.  Normally after a loss, I rant, cuss out a few people, talk about how much this team under achieves, but you know what.  I don’t leave this game feeling this way.  In fact I am almost proud of the team.  Nik you could tell was not feeling well and no one really played all that terrible.  Of course some guys could have played better, but we were on the road against the 2^nd place team in a game we really knew we probably couldn’t win, and low and behold we were right there until the end.

Oh don’t get me wrong, I was bitter at about the 5:00 minute mark, but this team kept gutting it out.  NC State would then come down and hit a 3 and you would say to yourself, “That’s the ball game”, but then the Terps would respond.  And that is the key, it has been a while since these guys responded when pushed.  We fell apart late against Temple and we fell apart midway through the second half against UNC.  But I felt we showed something this afternoon.  Hopefully something that we can carry over.  For the next 8 games we have to steal 1 on the road and protect our home court.  A task that isn’t too unrealistic.  Though we do still have the Blue Devils in College Park, if we play like this the rest of the way, I think we will make out all right.  With that said though, it was still a loss, and until we take something from it and use in the next game, it is just another set back.  But I saw something today that made me a little more optimistic for the future.

D-7 MVP-  I’m not completely sold on this pick for MVP, I was thinking Strawberry, but his foul shooting has been killing us lately, then I was thinking Gist but I just couldn’t do it. Mike Jones, eh 4-13 shooting isn’t MVP worthy, so I am going to go with Nik Caner-Medley.  You could tell he wasn’t feeling well yet he still scored 10 points (and the points were actually at a time when it mattered) and grabbed 10 rebounds.  So the double double gets it done for NCM. 

Honorable Mention:  The honorable mention is also a tough call, but I am going to give it to DJ.  Finally relieved of starting PG duties, DJ played like a load was taken off his shoulders.  He led the Terps with 14 points scoring 10 in the first half.  

Random Thought of the Day:  If it wasn’t for the commercials, I would probably be reading a book tonight.  As hard as I try I just can’t seem to get excited for this Super Bowl.  Maybe I need to put some money on it.  Anyone know the over??

The “It Could be Worse” Section:  Illinois the #4 ranked team in the land loses at home to 11-9 PSU??!!  In basketball?

Enemy of the State:  To quote the Allegany boys “NATCH!”.  Today’s enemy of the state was no other than Tony Bethel from Fort Washington, MD (home of he with the most parking tickets Duane Simpkins).  Bethel had 17 points and 7 boards to lead the pack on to the “W”. 

Factoid Alert:  Lefty just doesn’t want to let go.  Gary Williams is now 0-3 in games where he is trying to break the all time win total at Maryland.   

ACC Standings:

            Team                Conf Red         Overall

            Duke                9-0                   21-1

            NC State          7-2                   17-4

            Miami               6-3                   14-8

            UNC                5-3                   14-5

            BC                   5-4                   17-5

            UVA                5-4                   11-8

            Maryland          4-4                   14-7

            FSU                 4-5                   13-6

            Clemson           3-6                   14-8

            Va Tech           2-7                   12-10

            GT                   2-7                   9-11

            Wake               1-8                   12-10

Bubble Watch:

Record:  14-7

Rank:  23 (for now)

Quality Wins:  #6Boston College (this one is looking less and less quality), Arkansas, Minnesota

Bad Losses:  Temple (if they are on the bubble too that L will hurt us bad)

Outlook:  7 seed