GREENSBORO, N.C. — Flashback to the NC State women’s basketball team’s home regular-season finale, a blowout against Syracuse that clinched the school’s first regular-season title in 32 years. Graduate forward Kayla Jones, who wiped tears of joy from her face, said that was just one of the Pack’s three goals for the season.
Go back even further to the 2021 ACC Tip-off in Charlotte. The hunger and drive this team had shined through.
“We have goals and winning a regular season is one,” Jones said at the ACC Tipoff. “I want a regular season. I don’t want to keep splitting it. I want to win an ACC Tournament, a regular season and go to the Final Four. That’s our goal. It’s straightforward.”
From the jump, the Wolfpack’s mission has been clear. Win the regular season. Win the ACC. Win a national championship. After the Wolfpack’s 60-47 win over Miami, two of three goals are complete.
“It’s just been an amazing ride, and again, I think it was a challenge for me and maybe for them, too,” said head coach Wes Moore after Sunday’s ACC Championship win. “But that’s what makes it even sweeter when you’re able to come out and accomplish both those things this year, regular and postseason tournament.”
For Moore, the Wolfpack’s win in the ACC Tournament comes full circle. When asked what he thought of when he heard the word “three-peat” Moore was quick to respond, “NC State, I hope,” in October.
Following each of the Pack’s last two ACC Tourney wins, bad luck has struck in one way or another. After the 2020 championship, the COVID-19 pandemic forced the NCAA to cancel its tournament, ending the Wolfpack’s season before it got a chance to make a run.
Then, after last year’s tournament win, the Wolfpack bowed out of the big dance early, bowing out in the Sweet 16 in disappointing fashion to the fourth-seeded Indiana Hoosiers.
This year, the Wolfpack is aiming higher.
“I don’t think anybody is going to put any higher expectations on our team than we are ourselves,” Moore said at the ACC Tipoff. “We talked about on the championship rings putting ‘three straight Sweet 16s’ and the players said ‘No, we don’t want to be reminded of that. That’s not a good memory.’ I think they’re still hungry.”
It has been far from an easy path for the Wolfpack. Unlike any of Moore’s prior teams, NC State entered the season as an overwhelming favorite to win the ACC’s regular season and an ACC Tournament. Of course, that changed how teams approached the Pack.
“Yeah, I definitely thought it was kind of more challenging this year,” said graduate guard Raina Perez. “Teams know that everyone is coming back, and they know what we have. But I think we just had to dig deep in ourselves and just execute everything, and everything would just fall through.”
And yet, NC State powered through.
NC State still has a long way to go before claiming the ultimate goal. The Wolfpack needs to win six straight to claim the national title. Current bracketology has the Pack playing in Bridgeport, Connecticut, to begin the tournament, with teams like Kentucky, No. 8 Iowa State and a rematch with No. 14 Indiana on a potential horizon.
In that scenario, the Wolfpack would play No. 1 South Carolina, one of three teams to beat the Pack this season, in the Final Four. It’s a daunting task, but one the Wolfpack is ready for and has been for some time.
“We want more,” Jones said in October. “That’s what we prepare for every day.”
For now, the Wolfpack will relish in its three-peat before getting back to work. Three years ago, this utopian state of the program was hard to imagine for Moore.
“It has been an unbelievable ride from where we started, our attendance and all that, and the success,” Moore said. “It’s hard for me to believe. I didn’t know if we would ever win one of these, okay. I really didn’t. Now, these guys have won three of them in a row. Pretty awesome.”
