Exhausted Pack Goes Right Back at It in NIT Road Opener

A tired, exhausted but proud N.C. State basketball team arrived back in Raleigh on Sunday night. Four games in four days, taking Carolina to the brink before losing the championship game in the closing seconds. The Wolfpack came so close, played so hard and won so much admiration from friends and foes.

So they get back Sunday night, feeling tired and dejected, but knowing they left it all on the St. Pete Times Forum court. They held back nothing. They played like champions even if they didn’t get the trophy.

They know they’ll get an NIT bid, but you know what they’re thinking: “They’ll probably give us a Wednesday game, hopefully at home. No way we’ll have to play Tuesday on the road—that’s crazy.”

You bet it’s crazy, but that’s the Pack’s reward for those four days in Tampa, a sixth seed in the East and a Tuesday first-round game in Philadelphia against Drexel. It’s get a change of clothes and back on the airplane, another road trip, another day, another basketball game.

That means five games in six days. Not even NBA teams keep a schedule like that. You wonder how much this team that gave so much in those four days in that ACC tournament has left. Five games in six days? I don’t know, but it doesn’t seem to be looking out for the student-athlete. But I guess as some say, it is what it is. The NIT says, you want to play in our tournament, you play when we tell you to play.

State will meet a 23-8 Drexel team that will try and overcome the disappointment of not making the NCAA tournament. Drexel had road wins at Syracuse, Villanova and Creighton, but what did them in was a fourth-place finish in the Colonial, losing to Old Dominion twice and getting knocked out in their tournament semi-finals. But this is a team that’s clearly distraught over being overlooked for the big dance.

“When you get robbed, you get robbed, and this is one of those things,” says Drexel coach Bruiser Flint. “When you get robbed, they don’t give you your stuff back. So we’re out of it, there’s no consolation.”

So, the Drexel team is not happy with their plight. The NIT seems like the last thing they’re thinking about. Drexel hasn’t played in a while; they’re physically rested, but mentally will they be in the game? Will they care? State has to be hoping they won’t.

Meanwhile, State is both physically and mentally tired. Senior point guard Engin Atsur has left hamstring issues again. He gutted it out for 32 minutes Sunday, but was obviously limited in what he could do. Can he even go in this game? Everyone knows his importance. Other State players are battered and bruised as well. Four games in four days is tough, five in six days—including another road trip—is like a boot camp.

N.C. State showed a lot of character in the ACC tournament. Nobody thought they could do what they did. Do they have another fight in them?

You’d think not; it seems like an impossible task. So much was put into the ACC tournament. A letdown is human, and this is, after all, the NIT.

But it is a championship to be won. I’d expect that even though State may feel like they’re lost in the desert with no water, they will keep fighting. Somewhere in Tampa they found something special. They’d sure love to keep it going. It’s something for a team with just about everybody coming back to use as a building block.

It won’t be easy. Sidney Lowe and his staff will have to do all they can to get the most out of this exhausted team. They’re exhausted themselves. They’ll have to try and go to the emotional well one more time, but is there any emotion left?

I do believe the heart will again be there, but I don’t know about the legs and the mind.