North Carolina State University Athletics
There were some mysteries...
10/3/2007 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
There were some mysteries...
"Dammit, Thurl, is this for real?" Jim Valvano said. "Are you kidding me?"
The coach handed Thurl Bailey the note he had just read. The 6-11 forward read the folded sheet of paper, dropped his head, grimaced in a way only an embarrassed child would, and handed it back to Valvano. "Probably so, Coach."
It was halftime of NC State's first-round game against Wake Forest, in the 30th-annual ACC Tournament. The Wolfpack desperately needed to win this contest to prove it deserved to be in the NCAA Tournament field for the second year in a row. Not since Sherman had anyone gone to Atlanta with such a sense of purpose.
But nothing felt right about this game or this weekend. For the first time, the tournament was being played at the Omni, the now-demolished downtown Atlanta arena that looked like a rusty waffle iron. It was the ACC's first trip to Georgia for its showcase tournament and only the third time the league had held the event outside of North Carolina. Everyone was on unfamiliar ground.
What worried Valvano was that his team had just beaten the Demon Deacons by 41 points five days before in Raleigh on an emotional senior day for Bailey, Sidney Lowe, Dereck Whittenburg and Quinton Leonard. He knew the Wolfpack could never replicate that kind of dominance against the Deacons, a team that was also trying to gain entry into the newly expanded 52-team NCAA field. The Wolfpack players believed their coach when he told them this was going to be a down-to-the-wire, one-point game, which led to near disastrous consequences. At halftime, the Wolfpack was holding on to a tenuous 42-40 advantage.
With so much riding on this weekend, the last thing Valvano needed was an internal disturbance. But the note in his hand said: "Coach, if we don't..."
