What happened to NC State last night?

Joe Giglio from the Afternoons here on 99.9 The Fan. The OG at Giglio underscore OG. I appreciate you changing your Twitter handle to fit the show.

So you have to be my eyes and ears. I only know the score. I was busy with hockey. Tell me why NC State thought it was a good idea to lose at Syracuse. Well, first of all, it's not a bad loss. Top 100 on the road. Syracuse, while mostly had beaten bad teams in the ACC, still has a winning record in the ACC. They look capable to me. And they kind of sort of look like one of those annoying Syracuse teams with their zone where, you know, they have the random little white mascot who's going to bang threes.

And you're going to be annoyed by it. Is it McNamara? Is it one of the other ones? What's his name? Is he a Boeheim?

I don't know. Jerry McNamara. Anybody named Boeheim and Gerard. So he shot well.

Okay. He usually does, actually. He shot well against Carolina, too. He had a poor sophomore year. He has rebounded since.

And then they'll probably beat Duke next week. They also had, Syracuse also had two flukey three pointers to the point where Dan Bonner, who called the game with West Durham, was like, Judah Mintz is only shooting 20% from three in ACC play. And Mintz hit a large three, as did Jesse Edwards. I believe it was one of his first threes of the season. Jesse Edwards. Jesse Edwards, their seven-footer. Yes.

Okay. So that kind of gives you an idea that they got six free points that they normally don't get. And they ended up winning by three. But it wasn't a bad performance. It was actually a really good game until the final two minutes. And then the officiating took over.

And I know you're with me with this stuff. With what stuff? With the block charge. Oh, it's the worst thing in basketball. There were a couple of calls. One on K.C.

Morsell, where Gerard took a charge. I'm using the term loosely. Right. Completely and totally embellished.

That one irritated Kevin King. Oh, yes. Flopping. Yes.

They actually have a term for it and a call for it. Right. But the real stinger was DJ Burns fouling out on a charge that they called Jesse Edwards. I just looked up his size. He's 610 and he's 230 pounds. Right. He's a grown-ass man. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. I know DJ Burns is a big boy.

But if he is just in the post backing you and goes to the basket, you're not going to be 610 and 230, 240 pounds and fall over the way that Jesse Edwards did. That was a critical call against State. Next possession, State goes down. Syracuse scores. They get an and one on a little bit of a phantom call on E.B. Diwana.

Syracuse ends up winning the game. It's a it's a culture. It's a basketball culture thing. It's in a way it's like soccer culture where, OK, you go to the ground. Maybe there was a foul, but you must act as though you're dead.

Yes. You riving around on the ground. I'm sorry. We might have to helicopter you out to a trauma center. But and then all of a sudden you're back playing.

I don't understand that for the life of me. But basketball has a similar culture where we must go to the deck. So you did miss one important thing for NC State. Jack Clark returned. Ah, he played really well.

Excellent. Nine rebounds, 15 points. And he shot well. It was good to see inside the zone. And just as anyone could have predicted, Burns was spectacular at the high post.

Sure. Against their zone. If you do that against Syracuse's zone, you'll eat it alive. And he did. He was really good, really effective. But he had foul trouble. And ultimately, you know, like I said, Syracuse played well. It was a good game.

Good back and forth game. Syracuse got two truly fluke statistically fluke three pointers that ultimately proved to be the difference in the game. But the fact the last foul call on Burns was one of those where you go, they really just need to get this out of college basketball. They've done it in the NBA, but I don't understand. To an extent they've done it in the NBA.

You still see Chargers called the NBA. There's player control fouls where there's truly an initiative. You see the initiative. This type of play where a player's backing you down in the post, they don't call that. They tell you.

They look at you and go, what are you looking for? Play the game. And Edwards was not playing the game. I keep using these figures. Tell me if you think this is even close to accurate. 90% of charge calls that they make are incorrect.

90%. It requires you knowing the rule, number one, which I interpret as who initiated the contact, right? And was the defender moving? But even then, if the defender's moving, it was a flagrant initiation.

You do have a right to be there. I don't like it. That's what I'm saying. Just get it out of the game.

It's not that hard. If you don't reward somebody like Jesse Edwards for flopping, if there's no reward for the act, then there's no reason to do it, and it therefore becomes very limited in the game. Can I just tell you, here's the reason why it's still in the game. Because it's an equalizer for teams that are less talented. But it shouldn't be in the game for that reason. That's the wrong reason for that to be in the game. Because, oh, this will give these other d-little plucky teams an opportunity.

No. The game itself provides the opportunity for anybody to beat anybody. We don't need that. The three-point shot is the equalizer. It was for a long time.

It should be the game's equalizer. The three-point shot. State went from 36 in the net to 38. So again, not a bad loss.

Yes. Again, Syracuse is the top 100 team. One quick thing. Because of the loss and because of North Carolina losing at home to Miami, there's actually importance on this game beyond rivalry game on Sunday. State kind of needs it too. Because their resume, while better than Carolina's, is not significantly better than Carolina's. And you can't get swept by North Carolina. If I'm looking at it, because you have Wake Forest, Clemson, and at Duke left, there's not a lot of great wins left on your schedule. So the added importance of Sunday. Look, I think mentally, for their confidence, you don't want to get swept by Carolina.

That's number one. But I don't think this is a must-win game. There are four games left. If they go 2-2 in those games and then they win their first game or even, I think if they even just win one game in Greensboro, they would be safe. You're confident of that.

I am. But you've got to win some games here. And these final four games, you just kind of yadda yadda yadda. But Carolina, Wake, those are both tournament teams in my opinion. Clump can play itself into the tournament, of course. I think Wake and Clemson are in similar spots for the NCAA tournament. Yeah, I don't think all five of those teams will make the tournament. I don't think so.

So that's why it's important. You have a win over Wake. You have a win over Duke. So in theory, you'd love to beat Carolina and Clump, get to Greensboro, win a game, feel super good about yourself. I tell you what though, this state team is different. I like the state team. Even last night, and you have been high on the state team from the jump, even last night, they got down by a few possessions and you're like, uh-oh, here we go. Fans. Wasted a triple-double at Jarkel Joyner, my guy. Exactly.

He's outstanding. But they just keep playing. They keep plugging along. They're completely and totally impervious to the school's history and to everything else.

Good. They just play. That's why I don't care about anything else.

They just play. That's why I don't think that that matters. The history of it matters Sunday.

Right. It's more of the most recent game that they played against them where they would be irritated of how that game ended more so than anything else. Kevin Keats has tried to explain this to me multiple times about this generation of players.

He's like, they don't care about the same things that you and I care about. Because we were specifically talking about Brad Davison at Wisconsin. And you'll remember in 2019, NC State did not make the NCAA tournament. And I said to him, you realize if that little weasel didn't flop six times, speaking of getting the charge out of the game, if that little weasel doesn't flop six times, you win the game, that's a Q1 game, you're in the tournament.

You know? And when they played the next year, he says to me, Joe, they don't know who he is. They don't care about Brad Davison. They don't remember playing. They might remember going and being how cold it was, getting off the plane. He's like, they don't care about such things.

Like you and I, we think about things. They don't care. They just want to play.

You're right. This group in particular, Joyner, Burns, older group, I love that they got Clark back. That's a really nice addition because he now, maybe at the beginning of the year, he was trying to do a little bit too much.

Now you can just be a little bit of extra. I like that's a good position for State to be in. I'm going to say it right now. Joyner, Smith, Morsell dominate the game. State beats Carolina. Yeah, Morsell needs to make his shots. He's a big difference maker when he's making his shots. And we've seen that because Joyner and Turk struggled against Georgia Tech. And they still won the game because of Morsell and Ernest Roske picking up big. And Burns, obviously, has just been a revelation. So I can't wait for Houston to be a one seed and State to be an 8-9 with them. And it'll be like 83 all over again. But when State wins the tournament in Greensboro, they won't be an 8-9. They'll be on the five line. That's Joe Giglio. Nice hat. Thanks for having me.