GREENSBORO, N.C. — Suburban Dallas is supposed to be lovely this time of year. For the second time in three years, N.C. State could be headed to the NIT. If the Wolfpack is lucky. If it even wants to go.
Everything N.C. State spent the past month building unraveled quickly in the space of a few minutes at the start of the second half against Syracuse on Wednesday. In less than four minutes, a five-point halftime deficit ballooned to 15. That was as close as N.C. State would ever get in an 89-68 loss.
A sixth straight win would not have been enough to get the Wolfpack into the NCAA tournament, but it certainly would have moved N.C. State closer to the conversation, to the point where a win over Virginia on Thursday might have bridged the gap. Syracuse gets that chance now, if the Orange hasn’t done enough already.
Now the Wolfpack becomes a part of an entirely different conversation, one it was really, really hoping to avoid. The NIT will invite 16 teams to Frisco, Texas, for what could potentially be an extended stay with the NIT’s typical long gaps between games. That’s not a big deal if you’re hosting in Reynolds Coliseum. It becomes a very big deal if you’re sequestered in some business-park hotel. Is the hassle worth the experience?
“Whatever we decide to do, it will be in the best interest of our team moving forward,” N.C. State coach Kevin Keatts said.
It’s an unfortunate dilemma for N.C. State to find itself facing, because the Wolfpack found something inside itself in the wake of the Duke loss that worked, and worked well. Everything clicked at the moment it looked like everything was lost. Players accepted new roles, adjusted to a new philosophy, adopted a new identity. That’s not easy to do in the summer, and nigh-impossible on the fly amid the turbulence of this season.
That shouldn’t be forgotten, even if those same players seemed to forget all of that at halftime.
Not that N.C. State was all that great in the first half, but the Wolfpack still rallied every time it looked like Syracuse was ready to pull away. That changed quickly right off the hop in the second. By the time Buddy Boeheim was fouled shooting a 3-pointer for a four-point play to run the Syracuse lead to 16 on his way to 27 points, it was clear one of these teams had designs on the NCAA tournament and the other no longer did.
It’s a crucial distinction, because it fairly or unfairly changes the entire perception of Keatts’ tenure at N.C. State. The Wolfpack would have gone last year, but never got the chance. It could potentially have gone this year. Instead of three NCAA appearances in four years, the needle is stuck at one in four, thanks largely if not entirely to the pandemic.
That N.C. State even got into a position to think about making it back after two COVID interruptions and the midseason loss of its best player is an extraordinary accomplishment in itself, but that’s not the kind of thing easily conveyed when someone’s scanning a media guide.
“I’m very disappointed that we lost,” Keatts said. “But I’m not disappointed at the fight these guys have shown the entire year, obviously leading up to this tournament. … It’s hard for me to get mad at a bunch of guys because of one game in the ACC tournament, the way they’ve played and the way they’ve responded to me the entire year, especially with the adversity we’ve had.”
If the Wolfpack was a victim of circumstance to find itself in this predicament, it has only itself to blame for its immediate exit from Greensboro. That’s going to sting, and sting for a while. It should not, however, diminish what led up to it. Over the past month, N.C. State came farther faster than anyone could ever have expected, whether it deems a trip to Texas worthwhile or not.
