NC State
Charlotte
Wolfpack Comeback Stops Charlotte, 75-63
3/18/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
March 18, 2005
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By Tony Haynes
Worcester, Mass. - Julius Hodge provided the leadership and offense, while Cameron Bennerman spearheaded the defense. The results will send NC State into the second round of the NCAA Tournament following a 75-63 victory over Charlotte (21-8). Leading five players in double figures, Hodge put up 19 points, seven rebounds and nine assists in one of his best all around performances of the year. Doing the dirty work was Bennerman, who cooled off 49rs shooting star Brendan Plavich in the second half after the 6-2 senior had torched the Pack (20-13) with five 3-point baskets and 15 points in the opening 20 minutes.
On Sunday, the Wolfpack will go up against No.2 seed Connecticut, which posted a win over Central Florida
For NC State coach Herb Sendek, the victory was most satisfying, not only because it pushed his team into the next round, but also the way it was achieved. Trailing by 14 early in the first half and down by seven at the break, the Wolfpack wouldn't flinch and battled all the way back to post a winning margin that certainly wasn't as one-sided as the score might indicate. NC State closed the game with a 35-14 run after taking a 53-52 lead with 10:03 remaining. And after Charlotte pulled into a 59-59 tie with 4:15 left, the Wolfpack outscored the 49rs 16-4 the rest of the way to post its fourth 20-win season under Sendek.
"I thought this afternoon's game really reflected our season in many ways because it underscored the great character of our basketball team and really accented how resilient this group has been," Sendek said. "I thought the leadership that Julius and some of our other guys gave today was extraordinary. They made sure that we continued to battle, that we maintained our poise and composure when we fell behind 18-4. Although we could single out many individuals for what they did, Cameron Bennerman played an unbelievable game in the second half."
Unbelievable is right. Guarded by Wolfpack defensive ace Engin Atsur in the opening half, Plavich was unconscious, hitting his first four 3s as the 49rs built a 14-point advantage on four different occasions. Down 29-15 after two free throws by Charlotte's Curtis Withers with 6:55 left before intermission, NC State picked up its defense and finally got going with a 12-2 run that was capped by Engin Atsur's transition layup that got the Pack within four. After Plavich drilled another 3, NC State got two Brackman free throws with four seconds left in the half to trail 36-29. It was a manageable margin given the big deficit the Wolfpack had faced earlier in the game.
"We came out and played extremely well in the first half," said Charlotte coach Bobby Lutz. "I thought that we were the aggressor and were able to get a nice lead. We knew NC State would make some runs and they did. But we were able to maintain and take a seven point lead at the half. In the second half, it was reversed; they were the more aggressive team."
And that aggression was led by the cat-quick Bennerman, who worked overtime chasing the active Plavich over and through numerous screens. Every time Plavich did catch the ball in the second half, Bennerman was right in his shirt. The result: Plavich got up only three shots after the break and missed all three.
"At first, I thought I was going to start on him at the beginning of the game," Bennerman said. "I wanted to see what Engin was doing with him and what he wasn't doing. When I guarded him in the second half, I just stayed on him. He has unlimited range; he was shooting from halfcourt in some of the clips we saw. I just didn't want to give him opportunities to make plays."
With Bennerman shutting down Plavich, Hodge got to work on the offensive end of the court, dishing to his teammates for easy baskets and getting points for himself off of slashing drives against Conference USA's best defensive player, Eddie Basden.
Hitting 8-of-12 shots for the game, Hodge was 5-of-7 in crunch time, during the second half. But he also had help from his friends. Continuing a late season surge that started in last week's ACC Tournament, freshman forward Andrew Brackman made all eight of his free throws in a 16-point performance in his first NCAA Tournament game. Brackman also did some nifty work on the boards, grabbing five of his six rebounds on the offensive glass.
Getting 17 chance points compared to only four for Charlotte, the Wolfpack made the most of its 11 offensive rebounds.
NC State's biggest shot of the game came after a missed shot. Grabbing a Brackman miss, Hodge pitched a pass out to Ilian Evtimov, who drained a straight on 3 to give the Wolfpack a 64-59 lead with 2:59 left. Atsur followed with a driving layup and Hodge knocked down 1-of-2 from the line to make it 67-59 with 1:40 left. From there, the Pack slammed the door shut by knocking down 6-of-8 free throws to finish up 19-of-22 for the game.
Along with putting up tangible numbers, Hodge constantly pushed and prodded his teammates, not wanting to end his brilliant career with a first round loss in the tournament.
"The way we've been playing the last week, we already have a fire lit under us," said Hodge, who became only the third player in school history after David Thompson and Rodney Monroe to reach the career 2,000 point plateau early in the second half. "Everybody has been playing great, but specifically in the second half, I just told the guys `this is it, we've got to get it going.' As a team, we know that it's one and done now. We had to turn it around and we did that in the second half. Everybody knew what we had to do."
After shooting just 33.3 percent (10-of-30) in the first 20 minutes, the Wolfpack knocked down 55.2 percent in the second half. For the game, the Pack hit 26-of-59 for 44.1 percent. And on a day when the 3-point shot wasn't going in (4-of-19), NC State outscored the 49rs in the paint by a 40-to-24 margin.
Evtimov and Bennerman added 12 points, while Atsur contributed 10.
It couldn't have been different for Charlotte, which made only 27.3 of its shots in the second half after knocking down 14-of-25 for 56 percent in the first stanza.
The 49rs were led by Curtis Withers, Basden and Plavich, who had 15 points apiece. Forward E.J. Drayton finished with 11 points and nine rebounds.
"Tonight we weren't able to make enough down the stretch and they did, so you have to give them credit for doing what they needed to do," said Lutz. "We just came up a little bit short. I'm really proud of my team. Our guys came out and played with a lot of heart, but so did NC State. They just made a few more plays and came out on top."
