The last couple of months have been a trying time for NC State basketball fans to say the least. They’ve seen their team completely implode in conference play during a season that started with great promise and potential. More recently, there were a few days of leaked reports, rumors and speculation about the future of head coach Mark Gottfried.
That speculation was put to bed on Feb. 16, a day after a 24-point thrashing to rival UNC-Chapel Hill Tar Heels at PNC Arena, with the announcement from NC State Athletics that Gottfried would not return following this season. Well, that’s the end of that, right? Not so fast. State fans have now been subjected to the national media’s continued insistence that they are somehow responsible for Gottfried losing his job. Among the narratives have been that “State fans have unrealistic expectations” and “Gottfried got to the tournament his first four years, that should be good enough,” and my personal favorite, “Who do they think they are? They have to compete with Duke and Carolina.”
Let’s start with the viewpoint that State fans’ expectations are what got Gottfried fired. That’s simply not true. Mark Gottfried got Mark Gottfried fired. Giving credit where credit is due, Gottfried did accomplish some great things in his first four years. After a long stretch of ineptitude under his predecessor Sidney Lowe, he made Wolfpack basketball relevant again. Gottfried reached the NCAA tournament in all of his first four years, including a run to the Sweet 16 in his first season in 2012, and again in 2015, including an upset of the top-seeded Villanova Wildcats.
However, the last two years have been nothing short of a disaster for NC State. Every season of Gottfried’s tenure, at least one player has transferred in the offseason, and players have unexpectedly entered the draft early as well. This amount of roster turnover caught up with the Pack last season, as a team simply lacking depth finished 16-17 (5-13 ACC).
Things seemed to be looking up, however, heading into this year. With a projected top-five NBA draft pick in five-star freshman point guard Dennis Smith Jr., a top international recruit in freshman Omer Yurtseven, redshirt senior guard Terry Henderson finally healthy, redshirt sophomore guard Torin Dorn eligible to play and junior forward Abdul-Malik Abu returning, among others, expectations were high. This was the most talented team on paper NC State has had in years.
On paper, it’s the worst team Gottfried’s put on the court, and probably worse than anything Lowe or Herb Sendek ever had as well. State is currently sitting at four ACC wins and will finish the season with six at most. For a team this talented, that’s simply unacceptable. There’s more than just the coach to blame for a disastrous season like this, but the head coach is going to bear the brunt of the responsibility.
Simply put, this Wolfpack team struggles on defense. Per KenPom, the Pack is 216th in the country in defensive efficiency, allowing 107.5 points per 100 opposing possessions. Teams that rank near the bottom of the ACC in 3-point shooting come into games against the Pack and shoot the lights out. Syracuse senior John Gillon, averaging 10.6 points per game on the season, came into PNC Arena and put up 43 points with a PNC-record nine 3-pointers in the Wolfpack’s overtime loss to the Orange earlier this season. This team simply has not shown any ability to make the necessary adjustments to play solid defense. That’s coaching.
The Pack has lost five ACC games by 24 or more points, showing little fight or effort in several blowouts. That includes the two losses to UNC, the aforementioned 24-point drubbing at PNC and a 51-point shellacking in Chapel Hill. Another performance deserving consideration for worst loss of the season was a 30-point defeat at Wake Forest in which the Wolfpack showed little to no fight or effort. These are so-called rivalry games, yet the Pack seemingly failed to muster any kind of fight or determination in any of them, the lone exception being the team’s upset win at Duke in January. That’s coaching.
Bottom line is that while, yes, State fans have been calling for Gottfried’s head this season, the criticism was deserving. It’s not the fault of NC State fans that he will be unemployed following the conclusion of this season. While Gottfried deserves plenty of praise, admiration and credit for what he accomplished in his first four years at NC State, he’s done a poor job in the past two. That’s what got him fired, not NC State fans. That’s sports, and that’s life. If you do a poor job, you’re not going to be asked to come back and do that job again.
The other ridiculous part of that notion is that State fans’ expectations are “unrealistic” in the first place. They’re not, particularly among older generations of the fan base, who have seen their team reach the ultimate pinnacle not once, but twice, in 1974 and 1983. NC State is one of 15 colleges in the NCAA with two men’s basketball national championships. 15. That’s it.
But apparently, because of proximity to two perennial contenders, this program and its fan base shouldn’t be striving to achieve that level of success again. Coaches should beware that you’re expected to win at a storied program. That’s what NC State is. A storied program. They’ve won it all twice. They’ve had success. But per national media, because of Duke and Carolina in the backyard, State fans should accept mediocrity. Sendek reaching five straight NCAA Tournaments** and only getting past the second round once? Build him a statue. Gottfried making it four years in a row then bombing out in the next two? Raise the banner.
A program and its fans wanting to be better, striving to reach the ultimate height of success is not something that deserves to be ridiculed and mocked. It should be praised and admired. State’s basketball program and its fans know what this school is capable of. People have seen it. It’s happened before, and it can happen again. Everyone in the ACC competes with Duke and Carolina, not just the Wolfpack. In the early 1980s when State and UNC were winning titles, did the same national pundits write about delusional Duke fans who wanted the impossible?
Whoever the new NC State coach is will be taking over a great program with a long history of success, one that is capable of doing the same thing again. That’s what State fans should have on their minds. Not that their “unrealistic expectations” get coaches fired and make winning at NC State impossible.
**Editor’s note: this was originally misprinted as “national titles,” but was modified to to reflect that Sendek had been to five NCAA Tournaments.
