LAST TIME OUT VS. THE TERRAPINS
Mark Gottfried became only the second coach
in school history to win his ACC opener, when
the Wolfpack downed Maryland, 79-74, on Jan.
8, 2012.
C.J. Leslie led the way to the Pack’s 79-74 win
over Maryland last season, scoring 20 points
and pulling down 11 rebounds. Scott Wood
added 19 points, going 6-for-6 from the charity
stripe to set the NC State record for consecutive
free throws made at 47 (that streak would
eventually get to 66).
A STRONG START
NC State’s 78-73 victory over Boston College on
Jan. 5 in Chestnut Hill, Mass., was the first time
the Wolfpack opened ACC play with a road win
since Dec. 4, 1997, when the Pack beat Georgia
Tech in Atlanta, 71-69.
On Jan. 9, an 83-70 victory over Georgia Tech
at PNC Arena gave the Wolfpack its first 2-0
record in league play for the first time since
2003-04, which is also the last time NC State
had beaten a top-ranked Duke team prior to this
past weekend.
On Saturday, Mark Gottfried and company sent
top-ranked Duke packing, winning 84-76 to
move to 3-0 in the league for the first time since
1988-89. That year, head coach Jim Valvano led
State to its most recent regular-season league
championship.
A win at Maryland would give State its first
4-0 start in ACC action since 1973-74. That
year, Norm Sloan’s squad ended up with a
12-0 league mark, a 30-1 overall record and
the national title. That will be a tall task, as the
Pack hasn’t won at Maryland since the 2004-05
season.
MARYLAND CONNECTIONS
Wolfpack assistant coach Rob Moxley spent the
2005-06 season on the Maryland bench under
former Terrapin head coach Gary Williams. Moxley,
a Baltimore native, helped recruit 2010 ACC
Player of the Year Greivis Vasquez, who was part
of a class that was ranked 18th by Rivals.com.
That season, Moxley helped the Terps to a 19-13
record and a berth in the NIT.
Another tie between the two programs is Terrapins
assistant coach Delonte Hill. Hill played
for Wolfpack associate head coach Bobby Lutz
in Lutz’s first season as the head coach at Charlotte,
while Moxley was a 49er assistant.
Lutz also coached Hill in his first two seasons
at Charlotte when he was an assistant to Melvin
Watkins before taking over the reigns of the
team in Hill’s junior season. During that time,
the 49ers won the 1999 Conference USA title
and made three postseason appearances: two
NCAA Tournaments and an NIT appearance.
NATIONAL LEADERS
NC State continues to lead the nation in field
goal percentage, as the Wolfpack is currently
connecting at a .528 clip - hitting 473 of its 895
attempts.
In 14 of 16 contests this season, State has shot
.500 or better, including a season best .614 in
its season-opening victory over Miami of Ohio.
In its three games against ACC competition,
State has hit .500 from the field. Accurate
shooting was missing in the Pack’s pair of
losses this season - versus Oklahoma State and
Michigan the squad shot just .458 (54 of 118)
from the field.
PACK ON A STREAK
NC State’s current 10-game winning streak is
the longest under coach Mark Gottfried, the longest
for the Pack since the 1988-89 campaign
and the sixth-longest active streak in the nation.
That season, State put together 10 consecutive
wins, starting with a 109-81 victory over Alabama
State (Dec. 20) and stretching to an 82-64
victory over Wake Forest (Jan. 18). North Carolina
handed the Pack its first setback in a month,
handing State an 84-81 loss in Chapel Hill.
If the Pack’s current streak were to stretch to
11 games, it would mark the first time since
the 1979-80 campaign, when Norm Sloan led
the Pack to 11 straight before losing to ... you
guessed ... UNC in Chapel Hill, 64-67.
The longest winning streak in NC State history
is 36 games which spanned the 1973-74 and
1974-75 seasons.
MAKING BASKETS
NC State currently ranks eighth nationally in
scoring, as the Pack is averaging 81.5 points
per game. Mark Gottfried’s team has eclipsed
the 80-point mark in 11 of the 16 games this
season, including eight of the last nine.
The Pack has not averaged 80 points in a season
since 1996 (81.2) and this season marks
the Pack’s highest scoring average since 1991
(89.3).
THE SELFISH SHARER
Junior point guard Lorenzo Brown was very
giving in the Wolfpack’s win over top-ranked
Duke on Saturday. He was also extremely
selfish.
Brown generously passed the ball to his
teammates in that epic Wolfpack win - dishing
out 13 assists to tie his career high in that
category.
The oddest thing about that statistic is that
Brown had every assist in the game. Nationally,
only three times since 1996-97 has a
team tallied more than 10 assists in a game
with every one going to a single player.
Brown ranks fourth in school history with 463
assists and is 10 away from third place. He
had one other 13-assist game in his career.
That one also came against the nation’s No. 1
team, as he handed out a baker’s dozen when
top-ranked Syracuse visited the PNC Arena on
Dec. 17, 2011.
KNOCKING OFF NUMBER 1
NC State’s 84-76 win on Saturday against
top-ranked Duke was the program’s first over the nation’s No. 1 team since Feb. 2, 2004. On
that date, the Wolfpack also knocked over the
No. 1 ranked Blue Devils, 78-74, snapping an
eight-game winning streak.
The most recent victory was NC State’s sixth
over a No. 1 team. The Wolfpack is one of 18
programs to boast multiple wins over No. 1
teams and joins Indiana with six wins against
top-ranked squads. That mark ranks 12th
nationally.
POINTS FOR ALL
NC State and Duke are the only two ACC teams
with five or more players averaging in double
figures. Only six other teams nationally have
five or more double-digit scorers: Detroit,
Duke, Indiana, Iowa State, Oregon and Oregon
State.
NC State is the ONLY program with five players
averaging more than 12 points per game.
The Pack is led by junior C.J. Leslie with an
average of 16.2 points per contest. Junior Lorenzo
Brown is second on the team in scoring,
averaging 13.0 ppg.
Senior Richard Howell is contributing 12.9
ppg, while freshman T.J. Warren and senior
Scott Wood are both chipping in 12.3 ppg.
The Wolfpack spreads its scoring responsibility
around the lineup, with five different players
leading the team in scoring more than once,
Leslie leads the way with six times as the
Pack’s top scorer.
SHOULDA, WOOD-A, COULDA
Senior Scott Wood now has 271 career 3-pointers for the Wolfpack, which leads all active
ACC players. He ranks second in NC State history behind Wolfpack career-scoring leader
Rodney Monroe’s 322 career treys and ranks 14th in ACC history.
Wood has averaged more than 76 baskets from behind the arc in his first three seasons
with the Wolfpack, which means he has a chance to become one of 10 players in ACC
history to hit 300 or more 3-point baskets since the bonus shot was introduced experimentally
for the 1982-83 season and permanently in 1986-87.
If he matches his career high of 95, set last season, Wood could eclipse Monroe’s school
record of 322, which ranks sixth in ACC history.
MAKIN’ THREES
When senior Scott Wood has success from beyond
the 3-point arc, so does NC State.
Since Mark Gottfried took over the program,
whenever Wood hits three or more 3-pointers in a
contest, the Wolfpack’s record is 22-2. Its record
improves to 13-0 when Wood connects on four or
more 3-pointers in a contest.
In his career, Wood has nailed three or more threes
46 times. State posts a 35-11 mark in those
contests.
Wood knocked down big shots when NC State
needed them the most in the Pack’s ACC opening
win at Boston College on Jan. 5.
He was 0-for-4 for the first 36:14 of the game
and had gone to the bench with four fouls, but
exploded for 12 points over the final 3:46 of the
contest to seal the win for the Wolfpack.
He scored his first six points on consecutive
3-pointers. Then in the final 27 seconds of the
game, Wood connected on all six of his free throw
attempts, including two with a second remaining to
seal the victory.
WARREN, HOWELL ON TARGET
Freshman forward T.J. Warren currently leads the
ACC by a wide margin in field goal percentage.
The rookie from Durham, N.C., is connecting at a
.672 (86-128) clip this season, well ahead of the
league’s number-two shooter, who checks in with
a .623.
If the season ended today, Warren’s mark would
be the Pack’s single-season record by a landslide.
Kevin Thompson shot .624 in 1992 for the current
best mark (Warren needs to have 100 made field
goals to qualify for the season list).
The ACC’s second-best marksman this season is
Pack senior Richard Howell.
The tandem ranks eighth and 25th respectively in
the national statistics. Warren and Howell are the
only teammates that rank in the top 25 nationally in
shooting percentage.
The last Wolfpack freshman to lead the ACC in field
goal percentage was J.J. Hickson, who shot .591 for the 2007-08 season.
NO SUB FOR YOU
Mark Gottfried’s starters and top reserve are
definitely seeing the bulk of the action for 14th-ranked
NC State in 2012-13. The Wolfpack is the
only team in the ACC that has six players averaging
over 25 minutes of playing time a game. Duke
and Miami each have five players seeing that much
action.
Beyond the Pack’s top six of Leslie, Brown, Howell,
Wood, Purvis and Warren, only freshman Tyler
Lewis sees double-digit numbers in terms of
minutes played (10.4). In ACC games, Lewis has
averaged just 3.7 minutes per contest.
In league play, Leslie, Brown and Howell are all
averaging 31+ minutes.
1,000-POINT CLUB
By the end of the January, the Wolfpack’s four
upperclassmen could all be members of the program’s
1,000-point club.
Scott Wood scored his 1,000th point in last season’s
opening-round win over San Diego State in
the NCAA Tournament.
Junior C.J. Leslie earned his place in the fraternity
in the first half in NC State’s win over Western
Michigan on Dec. 29. He became the 46th player
in NC State’s storied basketball history to score his
1,000th point.
Senior forward Richard Howell is 24 points away
from joining them and junior Lorenzo Brown is 33
points earning a spot in the club as well.
The last time NC State had three 1,000-point
scorers on the same team was in 2008-09, with
Brandon Costner (1,273), Engin Atsur (1,181), Ben
McCauley (1,138) and Courtney Fells (1,060).
The 1982-83 squad also had a trio of 1,000 scorers
led by Thurl Bailey (1,495), Dereck Whittenburg
(1,272) and Sidney Lowe (1,048). That squad went
on to win the national title.
HOWELL TAKES CONTROL
Senior Richard Howell has been a force to be reckoned
with over the course of his career, and never
more so than in Saturday’s win over top-ranked
Duke.
The senior from Marietta, Ga., who was named ACC Player of the Week for his efforts, scored
16 points and pulled down 18 rebounds in the
Wolfpack win. He is one of only two players in
the ACC (along with Duke’s Mason Plumlee) who
is averaging a double-double this season, with
12.9 points and 10.4 rebounds per game.
Howell, who could become the 26th player in
State history to post 1,000 career points and
800 career rebounds, has turned in nine double
doubles in 15 games this season and has 22 for
his career. That is the most for any Wolfpack
player since forward Kenny Inge recorded 23
double-doubles from 1998-2001.
Howell is looking to become the first Wolfpack
player since Kenny Carr, who averaged 10.3
boards per game in 1975-76, to average doubledigit
rebounds. Last season, Howell averaged 9.2
rebounds per game, the most of any Wolfpack
player since Todd Fuller averaged 9.9 as a senior
in 1995-96.
Howell has pulled 316 offensive caroms in his
career and needs just 24 more to move into third
place in Wolfpack history in that category.
BALTIMORE/BELTWAY PIPELINE
The Washington, D.C.-Baltimore metro area has
been fertile recruiting territory for the Wolfpack, dating back to head coach Norm Sloan’s earliest
days, and has produced some of the best players
in Wolfpack basketball history.
Sloan began his pipeline in Maryland, beginning
at Rockville’s Peary High, where he recruited
Steve Nuce, Paul Coder and Craig Davis, and
Chevy Chase’s Steve Graham in the early 1970s.
Sloan and his staff moved on to Morgan Wootten’s
DeMatha Catholic High in the mid-1970s, as
assistant coach Eddie Biedenbach began wooing
Adrian Dantley, who eventually signed with Notre
Dame. Biedenbach, however, developed a relationship
with a younger player – power forward
Kenny Carr – and started a D.C.-to-Raleigh trail
that is still active to this day.
Prominent DeMatha High graduates who played
for the Wolfpack include Charles “Hawkeye”
Whitney, Sidney Lowe, Dereck Whittenburg, Bennie
Bolton, Quentin Jackson and Jordan Collins.
Current Stags’ center BeeJay Anya of Gaithersburg,
Md., has signed to play with the Wolfpack
next season.
One of Sloan’s final recruits, forward Thurl
Bailey, is from Bladensburg High School in Seat
Pleasant, Md. Bailey, Whittenburg and Lowe were
seniors on NC State’s 1983 NCAA championship
team.
NC State’s all-time leading scorer, shooting guard
Rodney Monroe, is from Hagerstown, Md., where
he played at St. Maria Goretti High School. In his
four seasons with the Pack, Monroe scored 2,551
career points as part of the Wolfpack’s “Fire &
Ice” backcourt with Chris Corchiani.
Other players from the D.C. metro area who have
contributed to the Wolfpack through the years
include Kenny Matthews of Baltimore’s Dunbar High, and Levi Watkins and Tony Bethel of Montrose
Christian in Rockville.
EARLY AND OFTEN
Senior sharpshooter Scott Wood has played in a
team-high 119 career games and has started 117
of those contests.
In NC State history, only 2004 ACC Player of the
Year Julius Hodge started more contest. Hodge
got the nod 125 times.
HEAD OF THE CLASS
T.J. Warren is one the top scoring freshmen in
the ACC with an average of 12.3 points per game.
Only Boston College’s Oliver Hanlan has a better
average among rookies (13.4 ppg).
Warren, whose father Tony played for the Pack
from 1977-79 under Coach Norm Sloan, owns
the top two scoring games in the conference
among freshmen this year with 22 against Penn
State (tied with Hanlon, who also had 22 versus
Penn State) and 21 versus Massachusetts and
Norfolk State.
Warren has led the Pack in scoring four times,
with three of those performances coming as a
reserve. He has hit the 20-point mark on three
occasions, becoming the Wolfpack’s first freshman
since J.J. Hickson in 2007-08 to score 20 or
more points multiple times in a season.
Hickson scored at least 20 points on seven occasions
in his only season with the Pack, including
33 in his first game.
C.J. Leslie had a season-high 21 in his first game
with the Wolfpack in 2010-11 and Scott Wood
surpassed 20 once with his 31-point performance
against Florida State in his inaugural season.
Brandon Costner had nine 20-point performances
as a redshirt freshman in 2006-07.
PAINT PRODUCTION
The Pack has outscored its opposition, 660-513,
in the paint this season, an average of 41.3 points
per game. The opposition is scoring just 32.0
points per contest in the lane, giving the Pack a
9.8-point advantage.
That equates to .506 of the Wolfpack’s scoring
production coming from in the post, compared to
.457 of the scoring output for its opponents’ post
players.
GIVING ASSIST-ANCE
Five times this season and in each of the past
two games, junior Lorenzo Brown has recorded
double digits in assists, versus Michigan, Massachusetts,
St. Bonaventure, Georgia Tech and
Duke.
Against the Yellow Jackets last Wednesday,
Brown had 10 assists to go along with a game-high
21 points for his third career double double.
He had 13 assists to go with a dozen points in the
win over Duke on Saturday for his fourth double-double
this season.
All of last season, Brown had two performances
with 10 or more assists, including a career-best
13 in the Pack’s loss to top-ranked Syracuse.
Against the Orange, he also registered his first
career double-double, adding 10 points.
Brown, who leads the ACC in assists per game at
7.1, is the conference’s active leader for double-digit
assist games with five. Brown’s assists per
game are the most by a Wolfpack player since
Chris Corchiani averaged 9.6 per game during the
1990-91 season.
CHAIRMEN OF THE BOARDS
Senior Richard Howell and junior C.J. Leslie
are both on the ACC list of career double-digit
rebound games.
Howell is second among active players with 33
10-plus rebound contests, while Leslie is fifth
with 16.
Howell also ranks second in the league for career
rebounds with 841 and Leslie is sixth with 581.
Howell’s rebounding total places him in seventh
all-time in program history. Howell needs 46
more to overtake Todd Fuller (8387, 1993-96) for
sixth in school history.
ON THE BREAK
One of the points of emphasis in NC State’s
offensive style is to score points in transition.
This season, the Pack has outscored its opponents,
262-105, on fastbreak points.
Through 15 games, NC State is averaging 17.5
points per game on the fastbreak, compared to
7.0 points per contest for its competition.
PACK IN THE POLLS
NC State is ranked 14th in the latest edition of
the Associated Press poll, which was released
Monday. The Wolfpack jumped six places after
defeating top-ranked Duke in the PNC Arena last
week.
State has been ranked in the Associated Press poll
since the preseason, opening the year at No. 6 and
dropping to as low as 25th. This week marks the
11th-straight that the Pack has been in the poll.
The marks the longest stretch that NC State has
been ranked by the AP since spending 15 weeks
in the poll during the 2005-06 season.
The most time NC State has spent in the polls in
a season is 19 weeks during the 1974-75 season
and the most consecutive weeks it has been
ranked is 67 weeks beginning with the 1972-73
season and going through March 2, 1976 of the
1975-76 season.