Kevin Keatts: "To Win We Have To Play Well"
NC State head coach Kevin Keatts met with the media to discuss Senior Day, the Wolfpack's upcoming rivalry matchup against North Carolina, and much more.
You’ve talked about how rare it is to stay at a program four years. Can you speak to Jericole Hellems and his commitment to the program?
That’s a very important point I’ve always made, especially in today’s time when there are transfers and now a days where you can transfer without sitting out. A guy like Jericole, he has meant so much to our program because he came here when I first took the job. I was taking over for a program that had just won nine games in the two years in the conference, and he decided to come here.
Every year that he’s been here, he has gotten better in a lot of areas. His scoring has improved, he’s improved defensively. We were joking with him the other day about how bad he was defensively when he first got here, and people used to just take him one-on-one as a freshman.
Jericole is about what NC State is about. He’s punched the clock. He’s made himself into a really good player. He’s been a hard-working guy ever since he’s been here. I’m excited for him that he has the opportunity to go through Senior Night.
There was a point, when you look back to last year, there were no fans. Senior Night was completely different. It wasn’t Senior Night, it was more that we brought our team out and guys got their jersey, but there were no fans.
Hopefully tomorrow means a lot to a lot of people and they are there to congratulate or just appreciate what a young man has done when he’s stayed four years in a Power 5 program.
It typically doesn’t happen. You either transfer. or you’re a pro, whether you’re a first-round guy or leave early thinking that you’re a pro.
In this kid’s situation, he’s been here from the beginning to the end. I’m proud of him, and hopefully he feels the love tomorrow.
How important is it to get off to a fast start on Saturday?
Very important. I think back to our game at Georgia Tech, we got off to a hot start. We have gotten off to slow starts. We’ve always had to fight our way back into games, and we’ve always done that. Man, as a coach, I would love for us to get into a quick start and have someone have to chase us one time instead of us having to chase every time.
It’s important. It’s important for our guys to come out of the locker room ready to play and make shots. I always think we’re ready to play, but somehow we don’t make shots early in the game. We haven’t in a few games, and it’s really put us in a hole.
Do you have an update on Thomas Allen and what has he meant to this program?
Unfortunately he’s got a partial tear in his plantar fascia. Man, it’s heartbreaking to me. I’m not going to rule him out for the rest of the season, but it will be a challenge. There’s a good chance that he may not play again this year, and that breaks my heart because I want this young man to be able to go through Senior Night and I wanted him to have a chance to play on Senior Night.
He’s a guy who originally signed here... from the Raleigh area. He left but came back when I took the job. Thomas has been around for a long time. He is a kid who has worked hard. People know him around here. He will be recognized tomorrow, which he deserves to be, but it breaks my heart that there’s a chance that he may have played his last game here.
It is Senior Day and a rivalry game. Will the pregame speech be different?
I’m always trying to be inspirational in my pregame speech. It’ll be exciting. It is Senior Night, Senior Day I should say. I want those guys to be able to play for a Thomas Allen and those guys to play for Jericole, as when D.J. Funderburk left and Devon Daniels obviously didn’t get a chance to play, and C.J. Bryce... you go back to Markell Johnson and those guys.
It’s always a special night. You want to reward the seniors as best as you can. You want to play as extremely hard as you can. It is our last home game. We are playing against Carolina. There’s a lot of opportunities for our guys to be ready to play the game and be excited about playing.
You were dealt a difficult hand on opening night with the way this team was structured. I’m curious... what do you think this group is doing well or has worked the best in that reconfiguration?
You talk about going into a fight with a game plan, and then you get hit in the mouth 50-something seconds into it. I really felt coming into this year that we possibly, and I say possibly because you have to play it out on the floor, we could have had a top-25 team.
When you look at Manny Bates and the thought of Greg Gantt being able to play. Young Ernest Ross, Thomas Allen as a senior, Jericole as a senior and then the year that Terquavion [Smith] has had and Dereon Seabron has had have been incredible.
To their credit, they’ve fought the entire year. Every game we go into, and this is not the greatest feeling to have, we’re a little undermanned, especially when you look in the frontcourt and paint area. That being said, we’ve been very competitive. We’ve fought. It’s weird, but (three) of our conference games have been road wins. We’ve been able to go on the road and beat some really good teams, and then we got the great win at home here against UVA.
These guys have completely fought and through some adversity you find out a lot about a lot of people. I think we found out that Terquavion Smith is a really good player. He may not have had that opportunity to be the player we are seeing if everybody was healthy. Then Dereon Seabron has had an outstanding, breakout year. When you look at those two guys, I think they’ve benefited from it. A lot of times through adversity you get the chance to see some guys grow and get better because of adversity. I would say the two guys who have benefited mostly because of that is those two.
We’ve gotten some valuable experience for Ebe and Jaylon. Both of those guys were not supposed to play this year. One of them was going to back Manny up for about seven or eight minutes and get better because of that and be better to play next year in a bigger role, but because of his situation, they both got outstanding opportunities.
How far emotion can carry a team?
I won’t go into the game hoping that emotion will carry us. We have to make shots. We’ve got to play well.
Emotion is good. Emotion can work both ways. It can be good for you. It can be bad for you. In order to win, we have to play well. Three of our guys who have been carrying us have to have good nights. They don’t have to have career nights, but they have to play well. The support cast has to be better.
We’re going to roll into tomorrow with eight scholarship guys. That’s a rarity for me. You’re talking about how we like to play compared to the numbers that we have, it’s going to be a little bit challenging. Emotion is good at the beginning of the game, but it typically runs out about a minute into the game.
Where is Manny Bates with his recovery process?
I think he’s a little bit ahead of schedule. When I say that, I’m not a doctor, I’m not the trainer, but he’s now been able to do a little bit of light lifting. He has not been able to shoot. He can shoot with his left hand and do a couple of little scoop shots. I’ve kind of let him take a couple shots with his left hand just so he can keep his sanity a little bit.
He’s better. His mobility is back. I don’t know if his range of motion is all the way there with his right shoulder, but he is able to get in with our strength coach as we take him through a couple light lifts, but nothing major from him right now.
Can you steal a couple of minutes with him using his left hand?
You know if I could, I would.
It’s crazy, if it were up to Manny he would try to fool me and tell me he was 100 percent and could play in the game, but I wouldn’t put him at risk like that.