WRAL Sports Fan

North Carolina State University

N.C. State beats UNC-G in men's basketball

By Ty Johnson

Nov 30, 2008

In Sidney Lowe's first season coaching his alma mater, the UNC-Greensboro Spartans came to the RBC Center looking to spoil the Wolfpack's first game of 2007 and gave State all it could ask for, amassing an 11 point lead with 13:53 left in the contest.

The Pack ended regulation with a 13-2 run capped off by a Gavin Grant three with 10.9 seconds left to force overtime and held the Spartans scoreless in overtime to escape with a 95-93 victory.

This season against the Spartans, N.C. State's defense again keyed the team to victory, but this time it wasn't even close, as the Wolfpack defeated UNCG, 79-52. State improved to 4-0.

From the opening tip, State was hot from behind the arc. Point guard Javier Gonzalez hit a three-pointer on State's first possession and the Pack never looked back, shooting 41.7 percent from the field in the first.

"We've got shooters," Courtney Fells said. "We did a great job moving the ball against their matchup zone and we were able to knock down the shots."

Lowe said poor shot selection kept State from making an early run, so he asked the team to move the ball around more to get open looks.

"I told our guys to be a little more patient with their shots," Lowe said. "We wanted to swing it and get our outside men open. We did a good job of punching it in and then working from there."

The Spartans kept the game close in the first half until the Wolfpack frontcourt took over and worked the home crowd into the game.

With just under six minutes in the half, Fells slammed home an alley-oop pass from Trevor Ferguson, igniting the crowd and the Pack.

"We knew it was time to buckle down," Fells said. "We wanted to build on the lead that we had."

State slowly widened the margin until a Fells dunk in transition followed by a Ben McCauley steal and dunk with two minutes remaining in the half put the Pack up big. At the break, the Pack led, 39-28.

After intermission, the Wolfpack continued widening its.

"When they pushed the lead in the second half we had to go to a man-to-man," UNC-G coach Mike Dement said. "We tried to trap out of the man-to-man, and when we did they took advantage of some matchups."

Four minutes into the half, a streaking Fells split the Spartan defense and dropped a finger roll into the basket to put his team up 47-32. Dement took a timeout to settle his team, but Lowe's team instead amped up its defense. Fells said the team's defensive focus was to prevent the hot-shooting Spartans from getting open looks from behind the arc.

"We just wanted to limit their touches on the outside and make them be more creative on the dribble," Fells said.

A jumper by Fells and back-to-back steals by Gonzalez and McCauley for transition baskets had Dement again calling his team to the sideline with the score 53-32, but the deficit proved too steep for the Spartans to erase. McCauley, who grabbed a career-high 15 rebounds in the contest, showed poise when he took a lazy pass and ran the floor to finish with a jumper, but said en route to the score, he was thinking what any big man would be thinking with a fast break opportunity.

"Don't do anything stupid to get pulled out of the game," McCauley said. "But the guy backed off me so I had a pull-up jump shot."

Dement said the Spartans' 29 percent shooting was a poor effort, but lamented that a lot of his team's shooting woes could be credited to State's defense.

"We certainly didn't shoot the ball very well, especially in the second half," Dement said. "That had a lot to do with their defense and shot-blocking."

Lowe was proud of his team's defense as well, especially those in the wing positions.

"Our wing people paid attention to detail and played solid," Lowe said. "Our guys chased [UNCG] and made it tough for them."

A lob to McCauley in the paint with 5:34 remaining put an exclamation mark on State's fourth win of the season as the senior stuffed it home to put the Pack up 68-46 and key another UNCG timeout.

"Plays like that really get you pumped up. To have all five of us getting after it on the defensive end, that's going to be tough for a lot of teams to score on."

State used clock control to limit the Spartans' chances at a comeback and stayed undefeated both in season play and all-time against UNCG. The Pack is now 6-0 against UNC-Greensboro.

Immediately State's coaches and players turned their attention to the Wolfpack's next in-state foe - a Saturday matchup with Davidson and Stephen Curry - the Wildcats' guard who has averaged 29.2 points per game thus far.

The game, which will be played in Charlotte, will pit State against a team that lost by one in the RBC Center last year and went on to defeat Gonzaga, Georgetown, and Wisconsin in the NCAA tournament before losing out of the eventual champion Jayhawks of Kansas by two points.

All things considered, it was no wonder Lowe and McCauley's thoughts drifted toward Saturday after the win over UNCG.

"They have several guys that can shoot the basketball," Lowe said. "It's a team that understands who they are and that's a challenge for us."

"We're really looking forward to next Saturday," McCauley said. "It's going to be a great game."