Herb Sendek knows his players can’t feel sorry for themselves coming off their 82-69 loss Saturday at North Carolina.

The N.C. State coach said Monday that playing in the ACC doesn’t give them a chance to feel too bad about any one game.

“You don’t have that luxury,” Sendek said. “It’s a heck of a league.”

He said bumps in the road are inevitable with the toughness of the conference the Wolfpack play in.

How the season turns out, he noted, depends on how the team responds to those detours.

“You’re going to have to be resilient enough to bounce back, and you may have patches through the season that you’re not playing you’re best,” Sendek said. “But your ability to stay on task and stay focused gives you the best chance of rebounding sooner rather than later.”

Luckily for Sendek and State, the chance to begin showing that resilience comes quickly as they play at Boston College tonight.

Sendek said there are both positives and negatives to the quick turnaround.

“But that’s one thing about basketball, I guess, is that’s the good and the bad all wrapped up in one. You don’t have a week in between games. Sometimes that’s good. You get right back at it and move forward,” Sendek said. “But sometimes you would like just a little bit more time to get things right.”

Boston College coach Al Skinner’s comments Monday were similar to Sendek’s comments. After all, his team just dropped to 0-2 in ACC play Sunday night when the Eagles lost 60-58 at Georgia Tech.

Skinner said his team is still trying to carve out an identity as it struggles at the beginning of conference play.

“We’re still trying to get better, just trying to figure out who we are, exactly how we’re going to perform,” Skinner said. “And so we’re still searching a little bit as far as our rotations are concerned and what’s the best for this team.”

Skinner, whose team is dealing with a shorter turnaround than the Pack, said preparing for State would be tough with so little time to get ready.

“And then you just got to make sure you take enough time to properly prepare for the next opponent,” Skinner said. “It’s just that N.C. State’s a difficult team to prepare for, so it’s going to take a lot of concentration on our part to get ready for them.”

Meanwhile, Sendek said facing Boston College and their 6-foot-7 preseason All-American forward Craig Smith will be a tall task.

He said Smith is one of the main reasons the Eagles are off to an 11-3 start.

“Craig Smith is a big reason why. He’s a consensus first-team All-American because he’s really good. And he has awesome strength, terrific hands and balance. He’s very agile on his feet, and he plays very hard. He competes.”

While Sendek noted that defense is an area needing improvement, he won’t be too angry about other teams racking up points as long as State ends up with more.

“We wouldn’t mind the game getting in the 80’s as long as we had more than the other team,” Sendek said.

With Saturday behind him and tonight on his mind, Sendek remains optimistic about what lies ahead.

He said dwelling on the loss is not an option, but learning from it is a must.

“Sometimes life’s best lessons are the hardest learned. We don’t like to go through them, but they help toughen you. They help make you better,” Sendek said. “Hopefully we’re smart enough to learn from the experience on Saturday and move forward.”