The men’s basketball team will travel to Toronto this weekend to compete in two exhibition games against York University and the University of Guelph. The exhibition trip comes after 10 preseason practices, a head start the NCAA allows each team every four years.
According to senior Courtney Fells, the team is ready to redeem itself after an embarrassing 15-16 season that ended with a 63-50 loss to Miami in the ACC Tournament.
“I’m going to let it be known straight up, and I have already, that we’re not going to have another year like we did last year,” Fells told Technician this summer. “Things that went on early on in the year last year are not going to carry on to this year.”
According to junior Trevor Ferguson, the early practices give the team an outlet to put last season’s woes behind it.
“Being able to start practice now kind of gets the bad taste out of our mouth from last year,” Ferguson said. “We look forward to a new year and getting up there and playing as a team early on, and it definitely helps with chemistry. We have great team chemistry going on right now.”
The lack of “chemistry” was considered one of the main problems plaguing the Wolfpack last season, Fells said.
“The problem was we had a lot of self egos going on inside the locker room, so we kind of lost the game before we even got to the court,” Fells said. “And it was like everybody, or a certain group of guys, wasn’t thinking about the big picture, which was winning the game. They just wanted to go out there and be the star player and be the show of the game. And that affected us as a team.”
The trip will also allow the team to bond with the two incoming freshmen, point guard Julius Mays and wingman C.J. Williams. The two freshmen should get plenty of playing time as redshirt junior point guard Farnold Degand and redshirt freshman Johnny Thomas will travel with the team, but will not play as they continue to recover from injuries.
“It’s good to get the new guys acquainted with each and every one of the older guys and getting them acquainted with coach Lowe’s style of the play and the offense and defense that we are going to run,” McCauley said. McCauley said the team’s chance to conduct early practices will be more beneficial than the actual scrimmages in Toronto. Instead of watching film of York or Guelph, the team has been watching film of its own practices from the day before.
“More or less we’re going to focus on ourselves,” McCauley said. “Sure, we want to win, obviously, but we’re really going to concentrate on what we need to do better as a team and what we need to do to be successful as a team.”
One of those areas of focus, according to Ferguson, will be an increased emphasis on pushing the ball in the open court. The team hopes that moving Courtney Fells to small forward and the return of Degand will allow Lowe to establish his style of basketball. McCauley and redshirt junior Brandon Costner have both lost weight in the offseason in hopes to run the floor better and establish the post early in the team’s offense.
“Coach Lowe definitely wants to push the ball,” Ferguson said. “When he first came in, maybe he didn’t have the personnel to suit pushing the ball exactly. I think we’ve got some players, and moving Courtney to the three, we just have the ability with our point guards to really push the ball.”
McCauley said the team knows little about its plans in Toronto other than the team will be playing “a lot of basketball” but will have time to enjoy the international experience. The team will conduct 8 a.m. practices and discover the city as much as possible before its 7 p.m. games.
McCauley has traveled to Canada before as a child. Others, like Trevor Ferguson and five other teammates had to make a team trip to the post office to acquire passports.
“I’ve never been out of the country, so it’s exciting,” Ferguson said.
Basketball player breakdown
In addressing the media about the men’s basketball team’s weekend exhibition trip to Toronto, the ever-articulate senior center, Ben McCauley, offered his thoughts on many of his teammates’ improvements and transitions in the offseason. Here’s what McCauley had to say.
On freshman point guard Julius Mays“Julius has been playing very well at point guard. He controls the ball very well for being such a young guy. You know, he’s just a freshman coming in and so far, he’s really poised and he’s playing really well at the point guard spot.”
On freshman wingman C.J. Williams“C.J. has been playing very well also. He’s a very good shooter. The one thing I really like about him is he cuts to the basket very well. And personally, for me being a post player that likes to pass, I like to have guys that are moving to the basket. And I think that’s going to work well with coach Lowe’s offense.”
On the recovery of Farnold Degand“[Farnold] is doing well– he’s constantly in the training room, doing his rehab, doing everything has to do to get better. He’s really itching to get back and playing. I think he’ll be ready to go in October when we start playing.”
On Courtney Fells’ transition to small forward“Its going to be different for him. But I think he’s really taken into the idea that, I’m going to be the three man and that’s the way it’s going to be. And I think that he’s really going to blossom at the [small forward] position because not only is he going to be more of a slasher now, but he can also help us rebound. And Courtney, with those long arms and jumping ability, is really going to help us on the defense boards and on the offensive boards.”
On the improvement of Javi Gonzalez“He’s gotten a lot better I think. The good thing about what happened last year with Javi was that he got some experience. With Farnold going down and him being a young freshman, he was put into a pretty rough situation. Coming into this year I think he knows what he can do and what he’s capable of and I think he’s working hard to do the right things and not be too out of control, which some freshman can do. I can tell he’s growing up and he’s becoming more patient and assertive, where as last year, being a freshman, he kind of got out of control.”
On Brandon Costner returning to form“I can see him getting back to his freshman year days. I think he’s definitely come a long way. He had a rough year last year. But he’s molded himself back into the shape he needs to be in and he’s playing well these past couple of practices, I can definitely see the Brandon Costner from two years ago, and that’s big for us.”
