2008 NC State Preview show

Below is the final preview show that is aired anywhere in my area. I will post more articles as the season progresses. As always, below is a running diary of the preview show, not necessarily a preview column for the team.

Minute 2: Jenn Hildreth (It’s nice to have you back.) lets us know the tale of two seasons we saw out of NC State last year. Coming off a miraculous 2006 ACC tourney run in which they made the championship game as a 10 seed, NC State looked like they were going to roll right into the NCAA tournament.

They started 15-7 with a 4-4 conference record at the halfway point. Then, they completely went in the tank. The Wolfpack lost their last nine games of the season.

Hildreth tells us that the good news is there is nowhere to go but up. You can always count on Jenn Hildreth to put a silver lining on any dark cloud.

Minute 4: Ben McCauley, speaking about the loss of Hickson, lets us know that as long as they have him, Costner, Trevor Ferguson and Dennis Horner, then they will have a great inside-outside game. Ben, why don’t you just say you would be happy to play with me and some of the guys from my 2-9 rec league team a few years back. You’d probably get the same production. Horner and Ferguson combined to score barely seven points a game last year. Horner scored 4.6 ppg as a freshman and actually saw his production decline. Yikes!

Minute 6: NC State took a preseason trip to Toronto. I bet that was nice. Most teams go to Costa Rica, Panama or Europe for their preseason trips. This is right out of Wayne’s World. Hi… we’re… in… Toronto.

Minute 7: Well, Hardees’, it took you 6 shows, but you’ve finally done it. I’m going to order a Thickburger today.

Minute 11: The interview with head coach Sidney Lowe commences. Here is a trivia question for you: Who is the ACC career leader in assist to turnover ratio? You think you can guess. I’ll give you five but you only need one. This is a pet peeve of mine when sports broadcasts will have a trivia question in which the answer is almost always one of the coaches on the sidelines.

Minute 12: For those of you that didn’t get the above, the answer is Sidney Lowe.

Minute 13: I have now seen the same Brandon Costner highlight three times. I guess after his putrid season, they only had one decent clip to show. Has anyone fallen off the face of the Earth faster than Brnadon Costner? He went from averaging over 16 a game and scoring more points in the ACC tourney than anyone in recent memory as a freshman to scoring more than seven points twice in his last 8 games last year. That’s the furthest fall from grace since the Alpha Beta’s had to go live in the gym after losing the control of the Greek Council and tearing down the Tri-Lambs house.

Minute 18: There is a two minute sequence in which Courtney Fells mentions that he grew up down the street from where Elvis lived which prompts a few “Thank you very much” comments. Fells is my new NC State man crush. That was freaking hilarious. (plus he mentions how much he loves playing in Reynolds Coliseum and that he wishes they played more games there. I loved watching games in that gym.)

Minute 20: The official name is the All ACC-Preview Team. I can’t believe it took me six viewings to clear up that nugget of info.

Minute 26: They show the same Costner highlight for the fourth time.

Minute 27: Gminski leaves us with this piece of information: “Point guard is one of the most important positions…” You can’t pay for amazing information like that. Well, actually, I guess Fox Sports Atlantic did.