NC State head coach Will Wade met with the media to discuss NC State's 93-64 loss to No. 1 Duke.
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On the loss to No. 1 Duke...
Yeah, I mean, look, we're in one-game seasons from here on out. The Stanford game is huge for us. You know, game-wide tonight, obviously, you don't want to lose by 30, but look, tonight's a tough task. The problems, having a seven-point lead at Miami, or with Miami, having a seven-point lead two-and-a-half minutes at Notre Dame, like, those are the problems. Like, these guys are in a little different weight class than we are right now.
We know where we've got to get to. We can see that live and in person today. This is where we have to strive to kind of get up to that weight class. But the issue with the 5 out of 6 is the games that were within our control. Not necessarily tonight, but we've got to put everything we've got into Stanford on Saturday. It was the biggest game of the season. We've got to recalibrate and get ready to go.
I want to ask about Scottie; obviously, Ven had some foul trouble. What did he provide for you, and kind of what did you see from him today?
I thought he brought physicality, energy, what we see every day in practice. And so, somebody that we wanted to look at a lot of different guys tonight, kind of see what, because we've got some important games here down the stretch for us.
And so, we need to look at a lot of different guys. So, I thought Scotty was somebody who really rose tonight and did some good things.
Will, can you walk us through a little bit of the decision to go with the zone and kind of what you were hoping to accomplish with that tonight?
Yeah. I mean, I read an old book, The Genius of Desperation, about football. And, we've been so bad defensively. I saw it on my shelf, and I pulled it out when I was at home on Saturday night. I was like, what, we can probably try something different. And this probably wasn't a great team to try against. But, I mean, look, we were trying. I mean, when we went man, we fouled them almost every possession. We would have fouled everybody out, I think, if we had played them in man.
And look, you know, we did. It was worth trying. We're going to have to just junk up the rest of the year with our defenses, and we've got to build off of it. But our guys did a solid job. I mean, we stalled it twice yesterday and once today. And then we ran it against them. I mean, not everybody's got wings on the back side and can mountain on the back side with Boozer.
So, I mean, there's just some mismatches there. They may have scored 120 if we played man the whole game. We're just going to run out of people. We're going to foul them every possession. And so, out of desperation, we tried it. Worked for about eight minutes.
This has been a big swinger of a rivalry. Beating UNC and then the game tonight. How are you going to do it? How would you describe it?
Well, they're big games. But, as I said, I mean, we've got a long way to go to catch Duke right now. I mean, they're as good a team as I've played against. I'm not just talking about their talent. The way they operate, they're ruthlessly efficient on both ends. Coach Scheyer does an incredible job. Watch the way they run to the scorer's table when they sub in. Like, everything is tight.
I mean, it's an impressive, impressive, impressive operation from top to bottom. And we've got some work to do. We know where the standard is now. We've got work to do, and our eyes are wide open to try to start the chase and try to catch up.
But they're a tremendous, tremendous team. Great players, great coaches. Just incredible. The whole operation, to see it up close. Watching it on film, really, it's very impressive to see it up close. It's almost unparalleled from what I've seen in coaching. Very impressive.
What's the biggest area you want to see this team take a step in in the next few days before you get ready for Saturday?
I mean, look, obviously, we've got to shore up. Obviously, we've got to shore up some things. Defensively, we've got to continue to work on that. We've got a little more time to spend on the zone. We're going to need to play some zone the rest of the year, so we've got to get that stuff better, get that stuff shored up, and clean up some things with the rotation and get ready to go on Saturday and make a huge game.
What were you just saying about Duke overall? What would you say about Boozer specifically, and how he did tonight?
Oh, I think he's shot 11 free throws tonight. Look, he's physical. He plays with force. Just a tremendous, tremendous player, tremendous talent. How hard he plays, how physical he plays. I mean, there's not a lot you can do with him. That's why he's going to beat up. High draft pick.
At the season's end of the day, do you think your team is doing enough to stay on the right side of the bubble?
Yeah, I think we're fine as of today, but we don't want to lose Saturday. Coach, I think it will get a lot trickier than that. I mean, look, we've had four quad one wins. Look, some of our losses have been pretty loud, but still a loss.
Other than not playing Duke, what can you guys do in the future to have more than two fast break points like you did tonight?
I mean, look, they're hard to play against, and they get back in transition. They do a great job. They've got lead. They've got athleticism. I mean, it's a challenge. So that hadn't been an area of issue for us for most of the year, but it certainly was tonight.
Will, you mentioned Duke. It's almost maniacal how they approach the game. How do you teach that? How do you incorporate that? I mean, in some ways, you kind of, I would imagine, want to simulate.
I mean, look, you've got to put your own twist on it. We're not Duke. They've been doing this for a long time. They added a freshman, but a lot of those kids were back. Take a ton of transfers. The transfer they took from Rice is sitting out, right? Is that correct? But the rest of them are freshmen and guys that they've had back and have been in the program. They've done a great job acclimating everything.
The biggest thing is, I mean, their pieces and their parts fit. You've got two main parts, and then the other pieces fit around the parts. And they've got six starters. I mean, Brown to me is the whole key. I love that kid. And he comes off the bench. I mean, he went off the bench 30 seconds and deflected one of our balls out of bounds. I mean, he's just so active.
He's like having a starter. I mean, he is a starter that comes off your bench. He's a phenomenal, phenomenal player for them. So, I mean, look, they've got a great team, and they have the right approach. They're connected. They're unselfish and supremely talented. That is a deadly combination. That's why they're on a roll right now.
How connected does it feel like the team is right now? Are there any concerns about keeping everyone together and on the same page?
No, I mean, I think we'll be fine. Look, it's been, like I said, we've had some, we've lost some, we've missed some three-foot putts. And when you miss three-foot putts and then you try to make up for it on 30-footers, it's hard to do. And our margins are pretty thin right now. We're pretty thin. We can't punch in the heavyweights right now.
But the middleweights and lightweights, we've let them knock us around a little bit, too. And, we've landed our punches in those classes too. But, I mean, we're just, we're not there right now. And we've got to get there. We've got to get there quickly. This program deserves it. Our fans deserve it. And we're going to work extremely hard to get there and get there fast. But we're not there right now.
And so, we've got to punch in our weight class better than we have. That's been the most disappointing thing for me: everywhere we've been, we've lost games. But we've very rarely lost the ones we were supposed to win. Very rarely.
And we've lost, in my opinion, four different games that we were supposed to win. And that turns a good season into an okay season, a great season into a good season, however you want to put it. We've always been able to hit the 3- or 5-foot putts. That's been the most disappointing part. You have a 7-point lead with 57 seconds left, and you lose it all. You have a 7-point lead with 2 1⁄2 minutes left, third inning, and you didn't take the lead or tie the game until overtime.
And you lose the game. And if we had those two, not even going back to Georgia Tech, but if you have those three, now look, we've had some loud losses. We've gotten beat 30 now three times. That's bad, anyway you slice it. But we've got to handle what we can handle. And that's been extremely disappointing.
But, look, Virginia and Duke are in a different class than everybody else in the league right now. I mean, Duke's, I shouldn't say that, I'm sorry. Duke's in a different class. Virginia's kind of the next tier. And then there's, then there's a group of everybody else. And, we haven't handled our business well enough. We have, to some extent. But we haven't, especially at home. Like losing to Miami and Georgia Tech at home. And, the road game at Notre Dame, and Coach Shrewsberry has done a great job.
But it's just, those are the ones that, that's what's been frustrating. We hadn't been able to quite get off the ground. Like we wanted to. Because of those, of those, of those games. And we had a couple of non-conference games too. And so that's been, that's been the biggest, the biggest, the biggest struggle.
