The NC State Wolfpack men's basketball team represents North Carolina State University in NCAA Division I men's basketball competition. NC State is one of the seven founding members of the Atlantic Coast Conference. Prior to joining the ACC in 1954, the Wolfpack were members of the Southern Conference, where they won seven conference championships. As a member of the ACC, the Wolfpack has won 11 conference championships and 2 national championships in 1974 and 1983.
Since 1999, the Pack has played most of its home games at Lenovo Center, which is also where the NCAA championship trophies are kept. Prior to 1999, they played at Reynolds Coliseum.
History NC State began varsity intercollegiate competition in men's basketball in 1911. In 105 years of play, the Wolfpack ranks 25th in total victories among NCAA Division I college basketball programs and 26th in winning percentage among programs that have competed at the Division I level for at least 26 years. The team's all-time record is 1782–1114 (.615).
The program saw its greatest success during the head coaching tenures of Everett Case (1946–1965), Norm Sloan (1967–1980), and Jim Valvano (1980–1990).
NC State has produced some of the ACC's best players, including Tom Burleson, Rodney Monroe, Monte Towe, and Ron Shavlik. David Thompson, who led the Wolfpack to its first NCAA title in 1974, has been recognized as one of college basketball's greatest players. The Wolfpack has won a total of 18 conference tournament championships and 13 regular season conference titles. State has appeared in the NCAA tournament 29 times, with four Final Four appearances (1950, 1974, 1983, 2024) and two national titles (1974, 1983). The Wolfpack also appeared in the Final Four of the 1947 National Invitational Tournament, which was during the NIT's "national championship era."
NC State achieved its 1,700th overall win against Presbyterian College, 86–68, becoming the 26th NCAA school to reach such an achievement.
The early years (1910–1945)
In 1910 Guy Bryan formed a special committee that proposed to the university administration the organization of the school's first basketball team.Media Guide, p. 101 The program played its first official intercollegiate basketball game on February 16, 1911, against a much more experienced squad from Wake Forest. NC State, then known as the North Carolina A&M Farmers, lost, 33–6. The two teams met again five days later in Raleigh, with A&M earning its first-ever victory, 19–18. The following year, the school's athletics council officially recognized basketball as a sport.
Before the 1920–21 season the university changed its name from North Carolina A&M to North Carolina State College. At that time the school's nickname was the "Tech." That season the program joined the fledgling Southern Conference as a charter member. State College changed its nickname yet again in 1923, this time to the "Red Terrors." The name was drawn from a combination of the play of Rochelle "Red" Johnson and the team's new bright red road uniforms. Also in 1923, State opened its first basketball facility, Frank Thompson Gym. The gym, named in honor of a former athlete from the school who died in action during World War I, served as the team's home until 1948. During the first years of the program, the team had no practice facility and was forced to practice on an outdoor field in nearby Pullen Park.Chapelow Raleigh's Reynolds Coliseum, p.34
Gus Tebell took over the basketball team as head coach in 1924. During his tenure he led the program to a number of school firsts, including the first conference championship in 1929 and the first 20-win season. He compiled a then all-time program best career coaching record at 79–36. The Wolfpack's first player to garner significant national recognition was Bud Rose, who, after the 1931–32 season, was named as an honorable mention All-American.
In 1941 the university began construction on William Neal Reynolds Coliseum, a multi-purpose arena that would serve as the new home of Wolfpack basketball. Construction was stalled due to the involvement of the United States in World War II, and the skeleton structure of the arena was left unfinished for nearly six years until its completion in 1949. The Wolfpack would play its home games at Reynolds for the next 50 years, until the men's team moved to PNC Arena in 1999.
Everett Case era (1946–1965) Following the end of World War II, chancellor John W. Harrelson and athletic director H.A. Fisher set upon rebuilding the university's athletic teams. In 1946 David Clark, a former president of the NC State Alumni Association, suggested to the Athletics Council that the best place to search for a new head basketball coach would be in Indiana, which was a basketball hotbed at the time. Per Clark's suggestion, Harrelson and his father Stejem Mark met with Indiana native Chuck Taylor who was in Raleigh to coach his army team in an exhibition game against NC State. Taylor's recommendation for the job was his former high school coach Everett Case.Chappelow Raleigh's Reynolds Coliseum, p.34 When approached by Harrelson about the job, Case was at first hesitant because of the tight restrictions under which the program had been operating. Harrelson assured Case that he would be given an expanded budget and more than enough scholarships to field a competitive team. Additionally, Case was lured by the still unfinished Reynolds Coliseum. He accepted the job almost immediately without ever visiting the campus.Menzer Four Corners, p.30
Six consecutive Southern Conference titles
Everett Case was named head coach on July 1, 1946. Case had previously coached high school basketball in Indiana, where in 23 seasons he compiled a 726–75 record and won four state championships at Frankfort High School. Before arriving at NC State, he spent two years as an assistant coach at the University of Southern California and spent several years coaching teams at various Naval bases during the war.Menzer Four Corners, p.29 In February 1947, his first season at NC State, Case defeated North Carolina in Chapel Hill, 48–46 in overtime, beginning a streak of 15 consecutive victories over the Tar Heels. Later that month, an afternoon game in Thompson Gym against Duke was postponed by city fire officials because of overcrowding. That evening the game was officially canceled after fans were found sneaking through bathroom windows, breaking down doors, and hiding in the basement.Media Guide, p. 102 Less than three weeks later, Case guided the Red Terrors to their first Southern Conference championship in 18 years. Case and his team celebrated by performing an Indiana high school tradition of cutting down the nets. The tradition soon spread to college teams across the nation and survives amongst championship teams to this day. Soon after his arrival, Case was named "Tar Heel of the Week" by the Raleigh News and Observer, citing that "since the little man came here from Indiana...basketball has almost supplanted politics as the favorite topic of discussion in the North Carolina capital."Grundy Learning to Win, p.196 In Case's second season as head coach the team changed its nickname from the Red Terrors to the Wolfpack.
In February 1948, Case made alterations to the design of the still incomplete Reynolds Coliseum. Attempting to usurp Duke's Cameron Indoor Stadium as the largest basketball arena in the area, Case insisted that the blueprints be changed to increase the maximum capacity from 9,000 seats to 12,400. Construction resumed later that month after a final shipment of steel arrived in Raleigh. Reynolds officially opened its doors on December 2, 1949, with a Wolfpack win over Washington & Lee, 67–47, in front of a crowd of 11,020.Chappelow Raleigh's Reynolds Coliseum, p.59 At that time, the arena was the largest college basketball facility in the southeast. Soon after Reynolds' opening, the Greensboro News & Record wrote that Raleigh had become "the basketball capital of the world. Immediately, at once."Menzer Four Corners, p.33
Later that month, December 28–30, the first annual Dixie Classic tournament was held in Reynolds. The Dixie Classic was a three-day tournament held each December until 1961 that matched the four Tobacco Road schools of NC State, North Carolina, Duke, and Wake Forest against four of the top teams from across the country. In its time the Dixie Classic became the largest regular season tournament in college basketball. After finishing the season at 27–6 and winning its fourth consecutive Southern Conference tournament, the Wolfpack received invitations to both the National Invitation Tournament and the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament. Case declined the NIT bid and accepted the invitation to the program's first ever NCAA Tournament.Chappelow Raleigh's Reynolds Coliseum, p.60 The team defeated Holy Cross before losing to eventual champion City College of New York, 78–73. NC State went on to defeat Baylor in the third-place game, 53–41. The Wolfpack won its fifth consecutive Southern Conference title in 1951 and its sixth the following year. Both seasons ended in early exits from the NCAA Tournament, though. In 1951 State defeated Villanova in the first round before losing to Illinois. In 1952 the team lost in the first round to St. John's and future North Carolina head coach Frank McGuire.
The Wolfpack's six-year winning streak against North Carolina came to an end in January 1953, as the Wolfpack, ranked #17 in the country, lost to the unranked Tar Heels in Raleigh, 70–69. It was the first match between the two schools since the hiring of Frank "the man" McGuire the previous summer. McGuire inflamed NC State players and fans by having his players cut down the nets in Reynolds Coliseum following the victory. Despite the loss, the Pack finished first in the conference at 13–3 but lost in the conference tournament championship game. The team was ranked 18th in the final AP poll of 1953 but was left out of the NCAA Tournament for the first time in four years.
The move to the ACC
By the end of the 1952–53 season the Southern Conference had bloated to 17 members and was still seen as a football-centric conference. Maryland and Duke had become national football powers and there weren't many schools in the conference that could regularly compete against them. In an effort to create a more balanced round-robin schedule and thus secure an automatic bid to the Orange Bowl, the top eight football schools from the conference—Maryland, Duke, UNC, Virginia, South Carolina, Clemson, Wake Forest, and NC State—left to form the Atlantic Coast Conference.Menzer Four Corners, p.43–44