Not much has stayed the same for the NC State men’s basketball team over the last few years. An overhaul of the coaching staff has seen the Pack transition from the Mark Gottfried era to the Kevin Keatts era, and the roster turnover the Wolfpack has seen has been as substantial as any team in the country.
However, Tuesday night, in a season-opening 105-55 win over Mount St. Mary’s, NC State fans did get a reminder of the most prominent constant for the Wolfpack during the last three years: redshirt senior Torin Dorn.
Dorn tallied a career-high 28 points in the first game of his final season of college basketball, and his tenure in the program extends further back than any other player or head or assistant coach. Dorn has been around the block with the Wolfpack, and with a 2018-19 team that features eight new faces, his experience can’t be taken for granted.
“In college basketball if you can stay older, or in this situation you can stay experienced, I think that’s better,” Keatts said. “Having [Dorn] as a guy who’s been through the wars and obviously played in the system and been able to benefit from the way we played last year, it’s huge for us, because his leadership is going to be important for some guys who never really went through a season of NC State basketball.”
Dorn is now starting off his third season of NC State basketball after being named Conference USA freshman of the year in his lone season at UNC-Charlotte, and he seems to just keep getting better for the Pack. In his sophomore year for NC State, he averaged 9.5 points and 4.6 rebounds per game. Last year he bumped those numbers up to 13.9 ppg and 6.3 rpg, both second best on the team.
Now in a new season, Dorn has come out of the gate running and leading a deep and talented Wolfpack squad. The team is skilled, but also incredibly unfamiliar with NC State and ACC basketball. With six transfers and two freshmen making up the majority of the team, it’s Dorn’s time to step up as someone who has the experience of playing in college basketball’s premiere conference.
“Being able to show these guys what it takes to play in the ACC,” Dorn said. “Especially with some of these younger guys that haven’t had the chance to do it, just using the things that I’ve learned to help them is the biggest thing for me. That’s my concentration.”
One of those new faces for NC State is graduate guard Eric Lockett, who has been around college basketball for a while but never at the level he is at now. For Lockett and the rest of this Wolfpack team, there’s no question who the leader is.
“Torin’s a good leader for us,” Lockett said. “He’s been here a while. He knows what to expect and he’s played at this level. It definitely helps.”
Dorn hasn’t just played at this level but has had success at it. He’s one of the most versatile and dynamic guards in the ACC, a 6-foot-5 presence that is as good at pulling the trigger from outside as he is at getting into the post to defend and grab rebounds.
He’s a guy that can do it all for NC State, and an incredibly valuable stretch guard that fits perfectly into Keatts’ four-guard system. With his success for the Pack last year, Dorn took the summer to test the waters of the NBA draft, something a lot of borderline-NBA prospects do before returning to college for a final season.
He had the opportunity to work out for NBA teams and get feedback, but ultimately returned to NC State. Whether or not Dorn was ever actually considering leaving, that decision to come back is vital for the Wolfpack.
“I’m very grateful that he had the opportunity to go through the NBA process and figure out where he was at,” Keatts said. “He can work on some things this year to be able to have the chance to play in the NBA, but I’m excited for him because if there’s anybody who benefitted from our program, it’s Torin Dorn.”
Going through that process taught Dorn some things about himself, and while the NBA is likely in the future of dynamic guard, all the focus for him is on this season at NC State.
“I definitely learned some things I need to improve on,” Dorn said. “Learned what it takes to make it to the next level and what I can do to help this team. Those are definitely things I learned this summer.”
If the season opener is any indication, Dorn should have no trouble finding his way onto a pro team next year. But for right now, with a talented group of teammates looking to take the Pack to its second straight NCAA Tournament appearance, Dorn is fully thinking about the goals of this year. Those goals are sky high, but for the competitive Dorn, that’s the point.
“Going into every season, everyone thinks championship,” Dorn said. “Every team in the country is going into their first week of practice thinking championship. If you’re not, then you’re not competing. If you go in with that mindset, you want to build on what you did last year. We got a little taste of it, but this year our goals are to go as far as we possibly can.”
