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■pack perspective Pack Building Toward March Madness A By Tim Peeler soothsayer once famously told Julius Caesar to beware the Ides of March, and he wasn't even in an NCAA Tournament basketball pool. It's getting close to that time of year, when the regular season is just a memory and the focus of the sporting world turns to what Caesar and his Roman buddies called March Ideness. We know it by a different name now, probably because "madness" is what caused the whole bloody incident with Caesar, Brutus and the crowd at the Theatre of Pompey. And, as much as we have always liked the ACC basketball regular season, it's tournament time that counts most these days, a point proven once again last year when first-year NC State head coach Mark Gottfried and his team turned a relatively mundane rebuilding season into something special by getting hot in the latter stages and advancing all the way to the Sweet 16. So what are the prospects for Gottfried and his team this year, while they gear up for the final two weeks of the regular season and a possible run in the postseason? That crucial part of the season begins on Saturday when the Wolfpack travels to Chapel Hill to face North Carolina, seeking a regular-season sweep of the Tar Heels. I believe the outlook is excellent, despite a rash of close road losses in January that threw some cold water on the hopes of the ACC's preseason favorite and knocked the Wolfpack out of the national polls. The reason is, those losses, some of which came with junior guard Lorenzo Brown out of the lineup with a bum ankle, JUMP TO CONTENTS Head coach Mark Gottfried's squad has learned some valuable lessons during ACC play, ones that will serve the team well come tournament time. photo by ken martin made Gottfried's team better. Brown is unquestionably the most important guard in the league, in terms of running his team's offensive scheme. However, learning to play without him, even for a relatively short stretch, will pay benefits for the Pack when the calendar turns over from February. Since it beat top-ranked Duke and North Carolina at home, with Brown in the lineup, the Wolfpack has added something intangibly important to its bench in Brown's absence: confidence in freshman guard Tyler Lewis. Gottfried's team didn't win every game with Lewis on the court, but fans at PNC Arena could visibly see Lewis' confidence grow with his increased playing time every time he handled the ball or made important free throws. In addition, Gottfried used Brown's absence to adjust his lineup a little. He started freshman Rodney Purvis at the point one game, and put freshman forward T.J. Warren in the starting lineup twice, something that hadn't happened since back-to-back games against Michigan and Connecticut. That might not have seemed like a big deal when Warren scored just 11 points in starts against Virginia and Miami, but it sure looked brilliant when Warren made his third start in the last six games, on Tuesday night against Florida State. He carried the Wolfpack to an 18-point victory, its biggest of the season against an ACC opponent. Warren not only scored a career-high 31 points — tying the third most ever scored by a Wolfpack freshman — he also had a career-high 13 rebounds, for his first double-double of the season. Most importantly, eight of those rebounds were on the Pack's end of the court; State matched FSU's total number of rebounds with its 21 offensive boards, and Warren helped his team create a 29-6 advantage on second-chance points. Teammate C.J. Leslie also had a doubledouble, with 19 points and 10 rebounds, and double-double machine Richard Howell, who leads the ACC and is 11th in the nation in rebounding at 10.9 boards a game, was not far behind with eight points and seven rebounds. Those numbers are important because the Pack needs rebounds to feed its running offense. Sometimes, Gottfried admits, his team has relied too much on Howell to let everyone else on the team start leaking down the court to get the offense moving. If Warren, Leslie and Howell can be more productive on the glass, Page 32 Gottfried believes his team will be able to run even more. "What is good right now is that we are defining our roles and everybody knows what they can do to contribute," Gottfried said after beating the Seminoles 84-66. "I thought everyone played at a high level, and that's what we need to win games like this." Playing at a high level, particularly on the boards, will be critical Saturday against the Tar Heels, who have gone to a four-guard lineup. The Pack outrebounded UNC by 10 in its 91-83 win in Raleigh Jan. 26. It appears that Gottfried is trying to balance his lineup, which has six players averaging at or near double-digits, to fit any circumstance it may face. Howell, Leslie, Brown and senior Scott Wood know their clearly defined roles, and have thrived at times. Leslie's performance might have been over-shadowed a bit by Warren's totals, but his three high-flying dunks show just how good he can be, even while someone else is carrying the scoring load. What Gottfried wants now is for his trio of highly touted freshmen to play like sophomores, with more consistency and confidence. Tuesday's performance by Warren, Lewis' contributions in recent weeks and Purvis' play all season suggest that the Pack will have a lineup deep enough to compete in the postseason, when most teams are paring down their rotations to seven or eight players. The Pack's advantage is having a lean lineup that is capable of rebounding and running as it readies for the challenges of March Madness, which are just around the corner. ■ You may contact Tim Peeler at tim_peeler@ncsu.edu.