State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

North Carolina State University

State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

By Derek Medlin

Mar 5, 2009

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N.C. State entered action Wednesday night against Boston College at 5-9 in the ACC and in need of a win, if nothing else, for a little self-confidence heading into the final week of the season.

Behind stellar play from Ben McCauley, who scored 20 points on his Senior Night, the Pack got that win it needed, defeating the Eagles 74-69 in front of a partisan RBC Center crowd.

For McCauley, the night's performance could not have gone any better. The 6-foot-9 forward played well throughout the night, but his most important contribution came on the final play of the evening, when he hauled in a rebound with less than five seconds to go and hit two free throws to seal the deal against the Eagles.

“It’s just great,” McCauley said of the victory. “It’s great to go out on a win and I think we fought through it. We gave our fans what they wanted all year and I thank them for sticking with us. It’s a great way for me personally and the rest of the seniors to go out.”

In the first few minutes of action Wednesday, State looked like it would once again struggle as Boston College took a 17-9 lead and looked in control. N.C. State looked off balance and sluggish early on in the game, surely making many in the crowd wonder which team would show up.

A 13-0 run answered that question soon after, as State’s lead grew to nine by the halftime break. Boston College fought back and took the lead in the second half, but N.C. State kept playing well and sealed up the victory the team and its fans desperately needed.

Sidney Lowe said it was great for his team to get a win over a good Boston College team.

“It was a great win against a good ball club,” he said. “It says something of where we are and how we’ve improved.”

As for McCauley’s performance, Lowe said he couldn’t have planned a better ending to a solid career.

“I couldn’t have written a better script with the win and having Ben [McCauley] end the game by knocking down those free throws,” he said. “Our guys were conscious of giving them a good final game and they played hard.”

The Pack held down Boston College’s leading scorer Tyrese Rice, holding the standout guard to 14 points. Rice did, however, dish out 10 assists.

Javi Gonzalez, who had six assists to only one turnover, drew the tough defensive assignment for much of the evening and did a commendable job, according to Lowe.

“Coach told me I was going to be one on one the whole night because they have pretty good shooters,” he said. “I was trying to stay in front of him and make him take tough shots.”

McCauley wasn't the only senior putting his best foot forward in his last game at the RBC Center, as classmate Courtney Fells poured in 11 first half points while hitting three shots from behind the arc. Unfortunately for the Pack and Fells, the senior could not finish off his stellar start as he injured his groin late in the first half.

Fells did not return to the bench until midway through the second half and did not return to the game. After the game, Lowe said Fells would need a couple days rest before the extent of the injury could be determined.

Despite Fells’ injury, the mood following the victory was positive and upbeat.

Forward Tracy Smith, who scored 14 points, smiled from ear to ear when he described how it felt to get a victory for the seniors in their last outing at the RBC Center.

“Everybody went out and just played hard,” he said. “We just wanted them to get their final win at the RBC Center.”

Moving forward, the Pack has put itself in position to improve its position in the ACC if it can beat Miami this weekend in Florida. Miami’s 78-68 loss to Georgia Tech Wednesday left the Pack only one game behind the Canes heading into Saturday’s game.

McCauley said the win against Boston College is a sign that this team can win and has the potential to make a run in the ACC tournament next week.

“We just need to believe in ourselves,” McCauley said. “We saw what we can do this year. We can beat tough teams. If we just believe that we can win games we can definitely make a run.”

Most Recent Comments

RE: State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

Right, we didn't make the comeback against Carolina's scrubs. We made the comeback against Carolina's TEAM.

RE: State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

Btw State's FT % is 70.8%... check your stats ESPNU. No players even shoot under 56% individually so I don't know where they got that from. O well.

RE: State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

Scrubs was your word. I never used it except quoting you. If you'll go back and look, I said we were up 18-19 when our STARTERS went out and your starters hit 3-4 meaningless threes against our 2ND STRING. You threw in the bit about scrubs playing 1 minute and 5 minutes.

RE: State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

Non-starters???

Um, non-starters does not mean SCRUBS. State has an 8-man rotation. Three of those players are "non-starters", but they are every bit as important and contribute nearly as much as the starters every game. They play THROUGHOUT THE GAME, giving the starters breaks as needed. If they are playing better than the starters, chances are they get a lot more playing time (e.g., Dennis Horner for NC State). When he's hitting threes, he gets a lot more playing time.

I'm talking about scrubs. Not the 6, 7 and 8 guys. Of course they get a lot of time. They play a good amount of the game, not the "last several minutes".

SO NO, WE DIDN'T RUN UP THE SCORE AGAINST YOUR SCRUBS! :)

And I agree, it would be good to see an NCSU-UNC final, except that we would likely lose. For that reason I'm hoping it doesn't happen. It would be our fourth day in a row playing, and Carolina's third. Even if we had half a chance, our legs would be too drained to pull that off probably.

RE: State hangs on to beat Boston College on Senior Night, 74-69

I wouldn't call that performance hanging, though. The game was not as close as the score. We were up 18-19 when the first 2 starters went out, and the rest followed closely thereafter. Those 3-4 meaningless 3s your starters hit against our 2nd string have given you false hope. Again, though, good luck against everyone else. I think you might put up a good fight in the tourney.

Two scrubs played ONE minute each.
One scrub played FIVE minutes.

We didn't exactly run up the score against your scrubs. They weren't in long enough for anyone to make that claim. Did we score 10 points in the final minute?

Carolina was up three at halftime. State played a miserable 5 minutes to start the second half and got down 15. After that, Carolina didn't run away with anything. State chipped away at the lead, and not against the scrubs as you think (check the minutes played in the box score if you don't believe me). Carolina was glad the game was 40 minutes and not 60 minutes!

Carolina is better than State. I'm not saying otherwise. But we did play them pretty tough for at least 75% of the game. And how often does Carolina let a 19 point lead dwindle to 9 like that? State didn't give up, and if we played a little better to start the second half, Carolina would not have been able to cruise the way they did. We had one of our patented droughts, and it happens just about every game. Carolina made us pay for our drought.

But my point all along was that if SOMEONE ELSE would eliminate Carolina, we can beat any of the other teams in the tournament. If State had discovered the lineup we're using now a little sooner, we'd have a better record right now. And remember, we blew an 18 point second half lead on the road at Va Tech. If not for that fiasco, we'd have a good shot at an 8-8 record (assuming we can beat Miami, a team we've already beaten and who just lost to Georgia Tech...)

State's playing some really good ball right now, and could get hot in the ACC tournament. Ju
- Posted by TruthBKnown Returns

Non-starters played over 40 minutes - a good portion of which was in the last 3 minutes or so, which, as I said, was when you cut the lead from 19 to 9. So, yes, you did "run up the score" against our "scrubs". I explained how we let the 19 point lead dwindle to 9 - you hit 3-4 meaningless threes at the end (maybe not 10 points in the last minute, but darn close to it). And I don't think you really want to claim you would prefer a 60 minute game over a 40. Do you think we would play those 2nd & 3rd teamers for the extra 20 minutes? I'm thinking the starters would have played just a bit more, and instead of being up by 19 it might have been more like 30. Just a guess, but we'll never know.

Other than those points, I agree with everything in your post. Good luck! I would love to see a UNC-State final.

WRAL Sports Fan

North Carolina State University