Are Wade and Brownell Forming New ACC Rivalry?
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RALEIGH — Will Wade returned to the place where he started his coaching career on Tuesday for the first time as a head coach. He led his NC State Wolfpack team into Littlejohn Coliseum against Brad Brownell's 18th-ranked Clemson Tigers and beat Brownell for the second time in less than a year.
Clemson was Wade's alma mater and a place that helped forge him into the fiery face of the Wolfpack nearly 20 years later. While he downplayed the nostalgia of a return, a win over the Tigers clearly meant a lot to the coach. However, it could also mark the beginning of a blossoming rivalry between the two coaches.
Brownell and Wade's history
Brownell was the man who replaced Wade's first boss, Oliver Purnell, at Clemson in 2010. Purnell left the program to take the head coach position at DePaul as Wade cut his teeth with the renowned VCU coaching staff under Shaka Smart. 16 years later, Wade finally made his return to Clemson as a head coach, with Brownell still leading the Tigers. During that time, Brownell made five NCAA Tournaments, while Wade led three different programs to the dance seven times.
The pair never butted heads, but Wade likely existed in the back of the minds of Clemson's administration as a potential replacement for Brownell should a change ever be needed. Brownell, a native of Indiana, became a candidate for Indiana's head coaching position around the same time Wade was being eyed by NC State as the heir to Kevin Keatts.
The pair clashed as coaches for the first time in the 2025 NCAA Tournament in a moment that likely shaped Wade's future for the better and potentially kept Brownell in South Carolina for the immediate future. Wade, still in exile after an unceremonious exit from LSU, led his McNeese State Cowboys to an upset victory over Clemson in the first round of the tournament, all while being courted by NC State.
Now with the Wolfpack, he had his chance to return to Clemson. Before the game, Wade was adamant that the matchup was about the team getting a win and nothing else. He didn't indicate that there was any love lost between him and Clemson, but he felt that the game meant a lot for the direction of his first season with the Wolfpack.
"We had a little chat about," senior forward Ven-Allen Lubin said. "It's kind of special for him... We just wanted to keep that in the back of our mind and we did it for him. We celebrated in the locker room and he was very happy."
Even after the victory, Wade remained adamant that the return trip to his alma mater was just about winning and nothing else, although he did hit local joint Mac's Drive-In for lunch.
"This was a big day for NC State. This had nothing to do with me," he said. "We needed to find a way to win a game like this, so this was big for us... But, lunch was good."
Wade is now 2-0 over Brownell, who expressed disappointment in the performance of his team in the loss, while also making a bizarre claim about why the game went the way it did.
"I felt it a little bit this morning in our shootaround," Brownell said. "It's a little harder today, you have a school day and it's not the same as a Saturday where you just focus and play... Sometimes, that's one of the great things about being the road team."
Even if Clemson was distracted by school, a Quadrant 1 win means the same either way for the Wolfpack and should go a long way in helping the program's resumé.
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Tucker Sennett graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in Sports Journalism from the esteemed Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. A former basketball player, he has gained valuable experience working at Cronkite News and brings a deep passion for sports and reporting to his role as the NC State Wolfpack Beat Writer On SI.
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