NC State men’s basketball fell to the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets 82-67 in Atlanta on Saturday, pushing it to an atrocious 0-10 road record for this season and all but eliminating it from the ACC Tournament.
This game for the Wolfpack (11-18, 4-14 ACC) marked its second consecutive blowout loss after it lost 74-60 to Syracuse on Wednesday night. Georgia Tech (15-14, 9-9 ACC) came in trying to make a push, attempting to achieve the program’s first winning record with head coach Damon Stoudamire.
The game started pretty even, with both teams going back-and-forth, making contested shots. The score was tied 25-25 with just over four minutes left in the first half, but the Yellow Jackets went on an 11-3 run to make the score 36-28. This was the closest it was for the rest of the game as the second half was all Georgia Tech. The Yellow Jackets outscored the Pack 46-32 in the final 20 minutes, cruising to a comfortable win.
The two main scorers for NC State were senior forward Ben Middlebrooks and senior guard Dontrez Styles, who both scored 13. Middlebrooks and Styles accounted for nine of the Pack’s 20 made shots. They were the only two players who scored in double figures as freshman guard Bryce Heard’s seven points were the next most on the team.
Perhaps the most disappointing parts of the game for the Wolfpack were the shooting performances from senior guard Jayden Taylor and graduate guard Michael O’Connell. These two were a part of the Pack’s miraculous run last season and came back expected to perform better, but both have not lived up to expectations. This game served as a big example as Taylor only recorded four points and O’Connell had none.
Taylor and O’Connell have had great individual games here and there, but have been far from consistent all year. O’Connell in particular has not lived up to his expectations this year, especially at the point guard position. In this modern age of basketball, the starting guards have to be able to step up consistently in scoring for the team to be successful. Wolfpack fans saw that in the past couple of years with Terquvion Smith, Jarkel Joiner and DJ Horne, but O’Connell has been far from it, only averaging 6.1 points per game.
With the California Golden Bears’ 82-71 win over the Boston College Eagles later in the night, NC State has less than a 1% chance to make the conference tournament. It needs to win its last two games against Pittsburgh and Miami, and for Notre Dame to lose its last two.
The Wolfpack’s next game will be on Wednesday against the Pittsburgh Panthers at the Lenovo
Center where it will be celebrating senior night. Tipoff is set for 7:00 p.m.
