NC State basketball coach Kevin Keatts has reasons to feel good about his squad entering his third season at the helm in Raleigh.
For starters, it’s a veteran group. Keatts noted that unlike previous years, most of his top players are back. Six of the top seven scorers on the team last year return, presuming that redshirt junior center D.J. Funderburk works his way back into Keatts' lineup from Funderburk's indefinite suspension.
Keatts had a level of excitement in his voice during media day when addressing reporters on the NC State beat who are still in the middle of football season.
Related link: Video/audio from Keatts' press conference
Related link: Transcript from Keatts' PC
“I want to spend a little bit time talking about my team, the excitement about my team and where we think we can go,” Keatts opened.
There No. 1 reason for optimism is the return of senior point guard Markell Johnson, who flirted with the NBA Draft a year ago but elected to come back for a final season in Raleigh.
After leading the league in assists as a sophomore, Johnson is the Pack’s top returning scorer at 12.6 points per game.
Keatts said that Johnson, along with junior guard Braxton Beverly, is playing at an elite level, and a couple of weeks ago had a “special” practice. In Keatts’ eyes, Johnson is one of the five best players in the ACC.
“He has to figure out, and we have to figure out, how to get him to play two halves,” Keatts said. “I thought in some games, he was tremendous in the first half and then you didn't hear much about him. And then he took over the games a lot, especially when we needed it.
“I go back to the ACC Tournament game against Clemson. He was tremendous. We were down 16 and without the play of Markell Johnson, we don't win the game. But have to get consistent play from my point guard.”
Beverly, who averaged 9.4 points per game and made a team-best 76 threes in 2018-19, should have some help shooting the perimeter jumper from senior forward and grad transfer Pat Andree, who once made 10 three-pointers in a game while playing at Lehigh.
“He is as good a shooter that I've seen in a long time,” Keatts declared about Andree. “What makes him special is he 6-8 and he has the ability to get a shot off against anybody.”
Keatts likes what he has seen on the wing from returning players fifth-year senior C.J. Bryce, redshirt junior Devon Daniels and sophomore Jericole Hellems. The coach is hoping that Bryce and Beverly will join Johnson in being vocal leaders on this year’s team.
Bryce averaged 11.6 points and 4.6 rebounds per game a season ago in his first for the Pack after transferring in from UNC Wilmington. Daniels was also a rookie for State. He played as a freshman at Utah, and a season ago he contributed 9.3 points and 4.4 boards while emerging as NCSU’s best perimeter defender. He had 32 steals and 22 blocks.
Hellems had the typical ups-and-downs of a rookie and finished the year averaging 5.3 points and 2.5 boards a game.
The bigger questions remain in the paint, where the potential loss of Funderburk for some games means that NC State will have to rely on a new duo of redshirt freshman Manny Bates and senior Danny Dixon, the latter a grad transfer from UMKC.
The 6-foot-11, 230-pound Bates adds a dimension to the team that has been lacking in Keatts’ first two seasons: a true shot-blocker.
“I understand that he’s a redshirt freshman, and we will have to live with some of his mistakes, but from the defensive end I need a guy to do a great job when we make mistakes when we gamble,” Keatts said. “That can clean up some of those mistakes.”
Dixon (6-foot-10, 230 pounds) could take on a role that Wyatt Walker provided a year ago when Walker averaged 4.8 points and 4.5 rebounds per game.
“Danny Dixon will kind of remind you guys a lot of Wyatt Walker, except we won't have the man bun,” Keatts joked. “So don't be disappointed about that part of it. But I think Danny would do a tremendous job for us.”
Keatts noted with so much experience returning, he will be allowed to bring other newcomers like freshman wing Dereon Seabron and redshirt sophomore forward A.J. Taylor at a slower pace.
“I think both of those guys bring a lot of athletic ability to our program, something that we haven't had in the last couple years, especially with the young guys,” Keatts said. “That being said, they're coming into a program a little different than we've had a couple years ago when I took the job where we now have veterans.
“So I expect both of those guys to be able to come in and play, but I wouldn't imagine them being any type of starter role.”
Ultimately though, this may be a team that goes as Johnson goes, and Keatts is feeling comfortable with that.
“I expect him to be a leader both on and off the court, and if we're going to be really good, successful team, which I'm praying that we are, Markell has to be a huge part of that,” Keatts said.
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