Pack Heads North to Face Boston College

The NC State men's basketball team (12-4, 1-2 ACC) plays its third road contest in four games as it travels to Chestnut Hills, Mass., to face Boston College on Wednesday night. The game is scheduled to begin at 9 p.m. ET.

The game will be televised on RSN with Tom Werme and Mike Gminski on the call. RSN affiliates showing the game live include: FOX Sports South, FOX Sports Carolinas, FOX Sports Sun, FOX Sports Midwest Plus, FOX Sports Indiana Plus, Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic Plus, YES, NESN, ROOT Sports Pittsburgh, SportsTime Ohio, FOX Sports Detroit, FOX Sports North Plus, FOX Sports Wisconsin Plus, FOX Sports Southwest Plus and FOX Sports Arizona.

Fans can also listen to the game on the Wolfpack Sports Network with Gary Hahn and Tony Haynes calling the action.

Pack Tracks
- NC State dropped its last game, 107-56, to UNC-Chapel Hill. It was the lowest scoring output of the season for the Pack as they were held below 70 points for just the third time this season and held below 40 percent shooting (36.5%) for just the third time in 16 games.
- Freshman Dennis Smith, Jr., recorded the second triple in NC State history on Wednesday in the Pack's 104-78 win over #21 Virginia Tech. The freshman finished the game with 27 points, 11 assists and 11 rebounds. It was the first triple-double for NC State in an ACC game. Smith is the first freshmen in ACC history to record a triple-double in ACC play. For his efforts, Smith was named ACC Freshman of the Week for the second time this season. Smith, Jr., joins Boston College's Ky Bowman and Georgia Tech's Josh Okogie as the only players to win the ACC's weekly honor twice this season.
- Smith Jr., has been playing at a high level for the Pack over the past seven games. The ACC's Preseason Rookie of the Year is averaging 20 ppg., on 57.3% shooting (47-86), including 51.4% (18-35) from three-point range. He also has passed out 58 assists in the seven games (8.3 apg.) and has 20 steals (2.9 spg.) He has led NC State in scoring in six of the last seven games and has led the team in assists and steals in eight straight games entering Saturday night's contest.

Noting NC State
- NC State has held six of its last eight opponents to less than 1.00 point per possession. The Pack held McNeese State to 0.77 points per possession, tying the low-mark of the season (Appalachian State - 0.77). The Pack has held an opponent to less than 1.00 points per possession eight times this season. In the first eight games, five teams shot 45% or better, including four teams that shot over 50% against the Pack defense. In the last eight games, only three teams have shot over 40% against the Pack.
- After being outrebounded in five of the first seven games of the season, the Pack has outrebounded its opponents in six of its last nine games. NC State out-rebounded its last two non-conference opponents by 43. The Pack had a season-best+28 rebounding advantage over McNeese State (55-27) on Dec. 22. NC State has outscored its opponents in second chance points in six of the last nine games. The Wolfpack limited Fairfield to a season-low two second chance points on Dec. 18.
- The Pack has had more assists than turnovers in 12 of its 16 games this season. The only games where the Pack had more turnovers than assists was at Illinois on Nov. 29, vs. Tennessee State on Dec. 10, at Miami on Dec. 31 and at UNC-Chapel Hill on Jan. 8. NC State is 11-1 when it has more assists than
turnovers this season.

Full Squad = Major Bench Production
After playing the first nine games of the season with at least one scholarship player missing, and sometimes two or three players missing, the Pack has had its full complement of players for the
last seven games. Five of the last seven games have produced NC State's highest bench point production nights of the year as the Pack has scored at least 26 points off the bench five of the last seven games. The Pack had three players score in double figures off-the-bench in the win over Appalachian State on 12/15 after having only three individual double-digit scoring performances off-the-bench in the first nine games. The Pack scored 46 bench points against Appalachian State, double its previous-best season performance to that point. In the first nine games of the season, NC State's bench scored 95 points (10.6 per game) total. The team has scored 194 points (27.7) off-the-bench in the last seven games.
            The Pack has had a player score in double-figures off-the-bench in seven of the last eight games.

Balanced Scoring Attack
            NC State has had five or more players reach double figures in scoring in five games this season. Last season in 33 games, NC State only had three games where five players reached double figures in scoring. The Pack had five players reach double-figures in wins over Georgia Southern (Nov. 11), St. Francis Brooklyn (Nov. 13) and Fairfield (Dec. 18) and had six players in double figures in the win over Appalachian State (Dec. 15) and Rider (Dec. 28). In the Jan. 4 win over Virginia Tech, NC State had three players (Dennis Smith, Jr., Terry Henderson & Abdul-Malik Abu score 20+ points). The Pack has had five different players lead the team in scoring this season: Abdul-Malik Abu, Torin Dorn, Terry Henderson, Maverick Rowan and Dennis Smith, Jr. Through 16 games this season, the Pack has five players averaging in double figures.

Smith Sets PNC Arena Assists Record
Freshman Dennis Smith, Jr., set a PNC Arena record on Wednesday, Dec. 28 when he passed out 16 assists in the Pack's 99-71 win over Rider. The 16 assists broke the previous record of 13 which was held by NC State's Lorenzo Brown (vs. Duke on 1/12/13) and UNC-Chapel Hill's Kendall Marshall (vs. NC State on 2/21/12). The 16 assists are the most in a single-game by an NCAA DI player this season.

More on Smith's Triple-Double
- Dennis Smith Jr.'s triple-double was the second in school history. (Julius Hodge - 11pts/12reb/10ast - vs. North Carolina A&T on 12/14/02).
- His triple-double is the 17th in NCAA DI this season and the 3rd by an ACC player. He is the only ACC player this year to record his triple-double against an ACC foe.
- Smith is the 7th freshmen in ACC history to record a triple-double. He is the only one of the seven freshmen to register his triple-double against an ACC opponent.
- In addition to the triple-double, Smith also had a career-high five steals in the win over the Hokies.

Getting Their First Run with the Pack
            Counting Terry Henderson (who only played the first six minutes of the season last year before being injured and lost for the year), 70.8% of the minutes (2284 of 3225 minutes) played for NC State this season have been by players that did not play for the Wolfpack last season. Not counting Henderson, the Pack has had seven players make their NC State debut this season, including five freshmen. The five freshmen have played 1269 minutes this season, 39.3% of the total minutes played on the year. The freshmen class accounts for the highest percentage of minutes played this season for NC State.

Shooting Star
            Sophomore guard Torin Dorn shot 50.5% from the field as a freshman at UNC-Charlotte in 2014-15 en route to being named the Conference USA Freshman of the Year.
            Through 16 games this season, Dorn is 80-of-149 (53.7%) from the field to rank 4th in the ACC in field goal percentage. Dorn is the highest ranked guard on the field goal percentage list in the ACC. He is 60-of-107 (56.1%) on two-pointers and 20-of-42 (47.6%) on three-pointers. Dorn did not miss a two-point field goal attempt in the Nov. 13 game against St. Francis. He was 8-of-8 in the game on two-pointers. He also hit his first four field goals against Montana before missing a layup late in the first half to snap his streak of 13 consecutive 2-point field goals made.

One of Top-Scoring Trios in ACC
            Freshman Dennis Smith, Jr., sophomore Torin Dorn and senior Terry Henderson combine to form one of the top-scoring trios in the ACC. The trio combines to average 48.1 points per game. Overall, Dorn, Henderson and Smith have combined to score 769 points this season, which is 58.1% of the points scored by NC State this year.

Top Scoring Trios in ACC
School Trio                             PPG
Pittsburgh - Michael Young (22.3), Jamel Artis (21.5), Cameron Johnson (12.4)           56.2
Duke - Luke Kennard (20.3), Grayson Allen (15.6), Amile Jefferson (13.6)        49.5
NC State - Dennis Smith, Jr. (19.1), Terry Henderson (15.4), Torin Dorn (13.6)         48.1

Freshmen Running the Show
            Freshman point guards Dennis Smith, Jr., and Markell Johnson run the show for the Wolfpack this season. The two players combined have 138 assists and 68 turnovers in 838 minutes of action this season. The two combine to average just 1 turnover every 12.3 minutes. Johnson (35 assists/15 turnovers) has a 2.33 assist-to-turnover ratio, while Smith (103 assists/53 turnovers) has a 1.94 assist-to-turnover ratio. Through 16 games, NC State is averaging 82.7 points per game and shooting 48.9% from the field. The points per game rank fifth in the ACC, while the field goal percentage ranks third. The two freshmen also rank 1st (Smith - 35) and 2nd (Johnson - 16) on the team in steals.

ACC Freshman of the Week Two Times
            Dennis Smith, Jr., has been named ACC Freshman of the Week two times this season (Dec. 19 and Jan. 9).
            He was named Freshman of the Week on Dec. 19 after averaged 19.5 points, 7.5 assists, 3.5 rebounds and 2.5 steals in two Wolfpack wins the previous week. For the week, Smith was 11-for-18 (.611) from the field, including 6-for-9 (.667) from 3-point range.
            He was named Freshman of the Week on Jan. 9 after recording the first triple-double in ACC history by a freshman against an ACC opponent. Smith had 27 points, a career-high 11 rebounds and 11 assists in NC State's 104-78 win over 21st-ranked Virginia Tech. It was the second triple-double in NC State history.

Henderson Has Been Strong in Bounce-Back Performances
Sunday marked just the fourth time this season, senior guard Terry Henderson did not reach double figures after finishing with just four points in the loss at UNC-CH. Henderson is averaging 24.3 points per game and shooting 58.5% from the field, including 51.7% from three-point range in the three games this season immediately after his single-digit scoring performance.

Abu Climbing NC State Career Offensive Rebounding Ledger
Junior forward Abdul-Malik Abu has been a capable offensive rebounder throughout his career at NC State. This year, Abu has 42 offensive rebounds in 16 games (2.6 per game) and has 27 more offensive rebounds than the next closest player on the team. (Ted Kapita - 15). For his career, Abu has 228 offensive rebounds to rank ninth all-time in the NC State record book for career offensive rebounds.

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Players Mentioned

Abdul-Malik Abu

Torin Dorn

Terry Henderson

Markell Johnson

Ted Kapita

Maverick Rowan

Dennis Smith, Jr.