Revisiting The Wolfpacker preseason roundtable football predictions
In the preseason, The Wolfpacker staff went on the record with some of its predictions and asked its premium subscribers for their thoughts with a series of polls on the premium Wolves’ Den message board.
Now that the year is over, it is a good time to look back and see how everyone performed.
What will be NC State’s record this fall?
The first caveat is that everyone was basing a prediction upon hosting a highly touted West Virginia team at home, but that game was obviously replaced with reeling East Carolina instead. To be fair, many may have upped their prediction by a win if they knew that would have been the case.
Matt Carter said that his official prediction was 8-4 even though his instinct was 9-3. He should have gone with his gut. Deeper analysis shows how much things can change between preseason conventional wisdom and actual results. He predicted a loss at Louisville — although he also noted, “I am not a big believer in Louisville this fall” — and chalked up Virginia as a safe win when the Cavs turned out to be a solid squad. He also wrongly predicted a win at Syracuse.
Jacey Zembal nailed it with his prediction of a 9-3 season. He noted that “last year’s NC State team maybe had more talent, but it also had a tougher schedule.” One prediction where he was slightly off: brushing off the notion that the game at Syracuse following the contest at Clemson would be a challenge.
By a vote of 40.5 percent to 29.4 percent, fans predicted 8-4 over 9-3. All but 4.0 percent of the vote went to records ranging from 7-5 to 10-2.
Who leads NC State in catches and receiving yards?
Neither Zembal or Carter went as far as predicting redshirt junior Jakobi Meyers to set a single-season school record with 92 receptions, but both nailed Meyers pacing the squad in catches and junior Kelvin Harmon leading the team in receiving yards. Meyers finished with 92 catches for 1,047 yards and four scores, while Harmon added 81 receptions for 1,186 yards and seven touchdowns.
The fans were in agreement. In the polls, 74.4 percent predicted Meyers would pace the team in catches and 65.3 percent picked Harmon to lead the team in receiving yards.
Who will lead NC State in tackles?
This was another good prediction for Zembal. He went with fifth-year senior Germaine Pratt, who would go on to register 104 tackles and would have led the ACC in that category in the regular season had he not missed the UNC contest with an injury (UNC's Cole Holcomb finished with 105). Pratt also opted to skip the Gator Bowl and focus on preparing for the upcoming NFL Draft.
Carter suspected Pratt would be the popular opinion, but instead went with redshirt junior safety Jarius Morehead. His prediction was based on pattern that since 2012 in even years the team had been led by a safety in tackles and in odd years a linebacker. That didn't convince the fans, who sided with Zembal and picked Pratt with an overwhelming 73.0 percent of the vote.
Morehead finished second on the squad with 81 tackles.
Who leads the Pack in interceptions?
The fans thumped The Wolfpacker staff on this one. The top vote-getter with 41.7 percent in the online poll was Morehead, and his three picks paced the team. Zembal’s prediction of junior Nick McCloud was not far off. McCloud had two picks. McCloud and Morehead were the only two defensive players to have multiple interceptions.
Carter said he “going a bit off the board” with his pick: Kishawn Miller. The junior cornerback earned a starting job in the season opener against James Madison, giving a glimmer of hope that Carter was on to something. Alas, Miller was quickly benched in that game and never regained his job. He finished the year playing in nine games and did not record a single interception.
Who leads the defense in sacks?
Both Carter and Zembal went with senior defensive end Darian Roseboro, who entered the year with 13.5 career sacks, even with a down junior season from a production standpoint.
The fans were in agreement, with 65.5 percent voting for Roseboro.
Roseboro, however, finished with just one sack in 2018. He battled a nagging injury that forced him to miss one contest. The team was led by Pratt and redshirt junior defensive end James Smith-Williams, who both had six sacks.
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