The Wolfpacker's No. 5 story of the decade: The rise of the non-revenues
Throughout the week, The Wolfpacker will be enumerating its choices for the top 10 stories of the past decade that was in NC State athletics.
Related links:
No. 10 - The hiring of Kevin Keatts
No. 9 - Winning the rivalry in football
No. 8 - The renovation of Reynolds
No. 7 – The rise of women’s hoops
No. 6 – The 2014 class leads football
The countdown continues with No. 5:
There have been many non-revenue success stories over the past 10 years, and they are continuing to the present day. On Wednesday, NC State’s men’s tennis team went on the road and upset No. 17 Michigan, and the women’s tennis team is currently rated No. 8 in the country.
Women’s soccer has been to three Sweet 16s in the past four years after an extended reign at the bottom of the ACC prior to the arrival of head coach Tim Santoro. It had not been that far in the NCAA Tournament since 1996 before the recent successes.
The three sports that really took it to the next level were women’s cross country, wrestling and swimming. Not only did they reach new heights, they became nationally elite.
Women’s cross country has done it somewhat under the shadows of the other two sports. It though notched its third top-five finish at nationals in the past five years this past fall and is bringing in a banner recruiting class, headlined by Katelyn Tuohy. She's a national phenom who was recently named by MileSplit.com as the “Runner of the Decade” after she became the first high school runner to win the Nike Cross Nationals Individual three times in a row.
Wrestling has been revitalized under Pat Popolizio, finishing first or second in the ACC four straight years (winning it twice) and working on a string of six straight top-20 finishes at the NCAA, including a tie for fourth place in 2018 that brought home the program’s first platform finish. Two different wrestlers — Nick Gwiazdowski and Michael Macchiavello — won national titles (Gwiazdowski won two), while the Hidlay brothers of redshirt junior Hayden and redshirt freshman Trent are decent bets to join that list before their careers are over.
Swimming though may have proven to be the greatest success story of the decade. The once proud program under Willis Casey and Don Easterling had fallen on tough times before Braden Holloway was hired in 2011. Now the men have won five straight ACC titles and finished fourth at the NCAA Championships four consecutive seasons. Three different swimmers have won individual national titles, plus the Pack has won several relay championships.
The women have won two of the last three conference titles and been top 10 in three of the last four NCAAs.
The best may yet to come as the Pack gets ready to move ahead with the potential addition of an outdoor swimming pool that will feature a platform dive. Three top-50 swimmers on both the men’s and women’s side have signed with NC State, according to collegeswimming.com, including one in the top 10 on the women’s side (Raleigh’s Abby Arens).
Two top-20 female swimmers have committed for 2021, and for the men, five of the top 50, including four in the top 25, have pledged to NC State. Among them is the nation’s top-ranked junior according to collegeswimming.com — Aiden Hayes.
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