North Carolina State University Athletics
So Many Practices, So Few Games
12/30/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 30, 2003
By Tony Haynes
Raleigh, N.C.-If you believe in the wisdom of the phrase "practice makes perfect," then NC State ought to be a pretty good basketball team as it gets set move into what will certainly be a grueling month of January. Coaches who are often overheard complaining about a lack of practice time would certainly love NC State's December schedule, a slate that has left the Wolfpack with plenty of practice sessions and very few games. For the players, however, it must seem like the preseason all over again. This week, the Pack will have five days between games before it hosts UNC-Wilmington on Saturday night.
"We haven't played nearly as many games as other teams," said NC State head coach Herb Sendek, whose team is 6-2 following Sunday night's 86-69 ACC victory over Virginia. "Ideally, I wish we could have played more games. But it's just the way the schedule happened to fall for a variety of reasons. There's the Christmas break, our exam schedule which is a little bit longer than some other schools, and then a couple of our January games were put there because of television."
NC State opened the month with a Tuesday night game at Michigan back on December 2nd. Since then, every game has been played on either Saturday or Sunday, meaning there have been some huge holes in the schedule. The gap between the Michigan game and the next outing against UW-Milwaukee was five days. That was followed by breaks lasting six, seven and eight days, respectively.
While the gaps have given Sendek and his staff and opportunity to tweak some things and work on fundamentals, the long periods between games have hardly seemed like a vacation for the players, who have been forced to endure a steady diet of intense practice sessions.
"It's been real tough," said senior guard Scooter Sherrill. "I'm going to be real honest with you, it's not easy. Even though we haven't been playing and guys are dying because they want to play every night, we realize that we've got to get better in practice. If we keep working, we'll be ready when the games come."
The Wolfpack was certainly ready on Sunday night, putting together by far its best all around performance of the season against the Cavaliers. Along with attacking in transition, the Pack also created plenty of open looks in halfcourt situations as well by patiently executing its offense against a variety of Virginia defenses. Shooting 50.8 percent overall, NC State was 11-of-27 from 3-point range and turned the ball over just 12 times.
Maybe all that extra practice time is paying off after all.
"You can't fault this group's effort," Sendek said. "We may make some mistakes and we're still certainly a work in progress, but over the last two weeks we've practiced as well as we have in a long time. Guys have been consistent with their effort and we've been working diligently to get better. It didn't pay off at South Carolina in terms of a win and that left a bad taste in our mouth. We went back to work last week and the guys responded like champions."
Of course, by the end of January Sendek will be wondering where all the practice time has gone. Over the last two weeks of the month, NC State will play five games in just 13 days.
Passes that Count: When executed properly, the NC State offense is a system that should produce a fairly high number of assists. And even though the Wolfpack had not shot the ball particularly well as a team prior to Sunday's game against Virginia, its assist figures remained respectable. In the aftermath of game, the Pack has been credited with assists on 65 percent (133-of-206) of its baskets this season, which is by far the best ratio in the ACC at this point. Of course, those numbers look even better when the ball is going in the basket. Against the Cavaliers, the Pack picked up assists on 18 of its 30 field goals.
O'Donnell OK: It would have been easy for most NC State fans to say "oh no, not again" on Sunday when freshman guard Mike O'Donnell went down underneath the north basket at the RBC Center holding his knee. Fortunately, a brief examination a few moments later in the training room revealed no major damage to the knee and O'Donnell was allowed to go back to the bench on his own.
"When I walked out on the floor and I saw him grimacing and grabbing his knee in literally in the same exact spot where Ilian [Evtimov] went down last year, my heart sunk into my stomach," Sendek said. "When we got the news several minutes later on the bench that he was going to be ok, it was a tremendous sigh of relief."
In seven starts this season, O'Donnell is averaging 5.6 points per game and has hit 43 percent (12-of-28) of his 3-point tries.
