NC State’s tournament run reaches Elite Eight after beating Marquette

DALLAS — The 11th-seeded North Carolina State men’s basketball team is headed to the Elite Eight for the first time since 1986 after holding off No. 2 seed Marquette 67-58 in Friday’s Sweet 16 round of the NCAA Tournament at American Airlines Center.

DJ Horne finished with a team-high 19 points to pace the Wolfpack in the win.

Marquette makes DJ Burns decision early

Coaches who have seen DJ Burns Jr. throughout March Madness have noted the difficult decision they have to make. Either let the 6-foot-9, 275-pounder go one-on-one against a much smaller, physically overmatch opponent and hope for the best, or double him and force the ball out of his hands.

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Marquette showed its hand early, opting to double Burns even out by the 3-point line to force other Wolfpack players to beat him. It backfired in a big way.

In the first 20 minutes, Burns had five assists and just two points, and it led to a 37-24 lead for NC State at the half. Burns did luck out when he was whistled for his second foul of the half with 5:47 left, though officials rescinded the foul after reviewing it for a potential flagrant situation.

Wolfpack perimeter defensive plan works

One key to NC State’s success in the postseason has been holding opponents to poor outside shooting games. It started with limiting Texas Tech to its worst outside shooting game in four months and continued to lift the team against Marquette.

Unlike the Texas Tech game, though, NC State wasn’t exactly being aggressive in keeping the Golden Eagles from firing up 3s. In fact, Marquette had a number of clean, open looks, though the Golden Eagles were just 2-of-13 from the outside in the first half.

NC State led by 13 at the half, but the margin felt much bigger due to Marquette’s usually potent offense being rendered useless beyond Tyler Kolek, who was 6-of-8 at the break for 14 points. The rest of his teammates were just 4-of-21 from the field.

Cold spell lets Golden Eagles back in the game

The Wolfpack had a much more relaxed effort through the first 13 minutes of the second half. For the majority of that stretch, the Golden Eagles didn’t make up any ground.

Then came a three-minute stretch of no scoring for the Wolfpack. In that time, Marquette went on a 7-0 run to make it an eight-point game with 7:26 left, the closest the Golden Eagles had been since the 2:59 mark of the first half.

Wolfpack finish the job

Just as it looked like Marquette might get back into it, the Wolfpack had the answer.

First it was Horne with his four 3-pointer of the game to answer one on the either end by Marquette’s Kam Jones. Then following a Golden Eagle turnover, Casey Morsell got a tricky layup to rattle around the rim and through the net, putting the Wolfpack back up by eight with less than two minutes to go.

Michael O’Connell put the exclamation point on the win with a 3 to make it a double-digit lead and less than 90 seconds remaining.