N.C. State 76, Boston College 62: Wolfpack Cruises To Victory Over Eagles
by Brian Favat on Jan 19, 2012 10:17 PM EST
in Boston College Basketball
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PrintWell, that was disappointing.
Fresh off this young Eagles squad's first ACC winning streak, BC traveled to face an N.C. State team currently playing some of its best basketball of the season. The 'Pack had won seven of its last eight games after falling at home to now No. 1 Syracuse.
The end result was predictable, but a bit disappointing for Eagles fans hoping to see this team build on its conference wins over Clemson and Virginia Tech. The 76-62 setback evens Boston College's conference record to 2-2 and drops the Eagles' overall record to 7-11.
If there was a bright spot tonight, it was the play of big man Dennis Clifford who seems to make more and more progress every game. Clifford finished with 12 points, 5 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals and 2 blocks to pace the Eagles, including making a ridiculous three-pointer in the first half to tie the game at 21.
That would be the last time BC would draw even with the Wolfpack. The N.C. State defense held the Eagles without a bucket for the next 3:33, going on a 14-0 lead en route to a 28 point lead at the half.
Jordan Daniels had nine points, all on 3-pointers, while Gabe Moton turned in a solid performance off the bench, notching a team-high three assists.
Donahue was also to cycle in a bunch of different players, giving guys like Danny Rubin (17 minutes), Gabe Moton (14) and Eddie Odio (7) some significant PT coming off the bench.
Unfortunately, the same mistakes that have plagued this team throughout much of the year sunk the Eagles tonight. Far too many turnovers (17), poor shot selection, including a few bad looks from up close (40.3 percent shooting from the floor, 25-62), getting out-muscled and out-rebounded on the glass (-17 rebounding margin) and poor free throw shooting (3-7, 42.9 percent) all contributed to the loss.
This was not the best game for Ryan Anderson or Matt Humphrey either, who combined to shoot 0-9 from beyond the arc and finished shooting 5-19 from the floor. Humphrey, in particular, forced several ill-advised threes, at least one of which failed to draw iron. He finished just 2-8 from the floor.
The Eagles have a 36-hour turnaround as they travel back to Chestnut Hill to host the Wake Forest Demon Deacons on Saturday at noon. Wake Forest (10-8, 1-3 ACC) is coming off a 91-73 home loss to Duke. Very winnable game for Boston College as the Eagles try to get back in the W column on Saturday against the Deacons.
Leave your thoughts / observations on the game below.
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i dont know if i would say that cliffords play was a bright spot, he lead the team in turnovers which I took to be for the most part due to his lack of strength down low, and a lot of the times we tried to run the offense through him down low he could not get himself into good position by bodying up so he had to force ugly shots. That being said he is the most promising thing we have going right now, whereas players like heckmann don’t seem to be progressing at all, we rely on clifford more every game.
ryan anderson is the one whose game I have liked the most from day one. he’s the most versatile/talented player we have and even though a lot of his shots didn’t fall tonight he still is square to the basket and has a good release when he drives. he didn’t have it going from downtown tonight and i kind of have the impression that he’d do better to work on his game spotting up and driving from 18 feet for now instead of spotting up for the three, that type of play is more suited to a player like jackson’s game.
The transition D was bad tonight. So many times BC would turn it over, and then NC st would get an easy bucket at the other end. Another thing that annoys me is how often our players fall for pump fakes and go flying in, instead of staying in front of their man. This is something I’ve noticed all season, not just tonight. Also, some of the entry passes that they tried tonight were ridiculous, they’ve gotta stop forcing those. Overall though with this just being their 2nd acc road game, I hope this is just a slight bump in the road, and I’m confident Donahue will keep improving them.
Free Throw Shooting
Been ticking me off for years!
BC needs to be at 80% ++ late this season and next few millenniums.
UGH, the ups and downs of learning, meshing, and 9 freshman.
I went to the game last night. It was cool to visit the RBC center and it made me feel kind of sad to see how packed the stadium was even on a Thursday night. Most of the crowd were not even students but simple North Carolinians out to support the team. Makes me wonder what BC could do to start inspiring locals to attend our games and support our teams. I don’t buy the “professional sports town” crap and I believe that with a little winning and a lot of advertizing we could increase attendance.
As far as the game was concerned: I observed from the stands that BC needs to stop committing stupid turnovers by forced entry passes and practice better ball protection! So many points were created for NC State by stupid, stupid turnovers! Being freshmen is no excuse. I would rather have an empty possession with a bricked shot or no shot, than the continous easy buckets off of steals by NC State. I think they scored around 20 points off of such turnovers. It would have been a much closer game if not for the easy buckets.
Part of the reason for the turnovers was great defense and quick hands by NC State’s players, particularly Brown. They made it known that any sloppy passes would be intercepted. This caused multiple steals and prevented shot opportunities off of passes to the pain. It would nice if BC could start playing defense that way.
I agree BC’s fan support for hoops sucks, and not to make more excuses, but N.C. State is ~2.5x the size of BC’s undergraduate population.
Editor, BC Interruption
My Thoughts
Overall, they just seemed to be out-muscled & out-athletic by NC State. The refs let both teams play and NC State was very aggressive on D & the team didn’t respond well.
In the first 10 minutes, they got a number of good looks and just were not able to convert. If some of those shots go down early I think this would have been a much different game as they kind of folded when NC State got ahead by double digits and never had any confidence.
Definitely a learning experience and the worst BC has looked in a few games. Will be interesting to see how they bounce back against Wake.
Agree. Anderson in particular had 2 or 3 wide-open looks from downtown. Needs to prove he can hit that shot regularly. He could benefit from being Biko’d.
Our lack of improvement in protecting the ball is frustrating. Seeing development elsewhere but are still way too sloppy with the ball. This might just be a matter of getting more and more game experience but some of our decision-making is extremely frustrating.
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