Wade Breaks Down the Final Possession Against SMU
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RALEIGH — NC State's sixth-straight road win and fifth-win in a row overall wasn't without drama, as the Wolfpack and head coach Will Wade needed to escape SMU late with a one-point victory. Despite the Pack shooting out to a significant lead in the second half, the Mustangs cut things to a point with less than 30 seconds to play, forcing one last defensive stand.
Senior guard Tre Holloman came up with a stop against standout Mustang guard Boopie Miller, getting the Wolfpack out of Dallas with a crucial conference win. During the "Wolfpack Weekly" radio show, Wade broke down what he saw from the sideline on that critical final possession.
Making a stand
There might not be a scarier team to be nursing a one-point lead against at the end of a game than SMU, as the Mustangs carry three talented guards capable of scoring from just about anywhere on the floor. However, the real fear factor of facing SMU is what Miller can do at the end of games.
The former Wake Forest guard leveled up significantly since arriving in Dallas. He's also produced some of the more electric finishes to games in the 2025-26 season out of any player in the country. Just a few weeks earlier, Miller buried a shot from half-court to beat Virginia Tech. If anyone was going to take the shot for SMU, it would be him.
Wade and NC State knew what was coming before senior point guard Quadir Copeland missed his two free throws to push the lead to three. With just over 10 seconds to play, the Wolfpack knew Miller was coming and looking for a shot, regardless of the coverage the away team showed him. However, Wade hoped the game would have been over before the risk of a Miller game-winner came.
"I wish we'd have made the free throws," the coach said. "We were 3-of-6 in the six-minute game from the free-throw line, which is one of the keys, so if we would've made all six of them, it would have been a two-possession game. Miller has taken all their big shots. We knew he was going to keep the ball."
N.C. STATE DENIES BOOPIE MILLER AT THE BUZZER 😱
— ACC Men's Basketball (@accmbb) February 4, 2026
Tre Holloman with the block and @PackMensBball get the road win in Dallas! pic.twitter.com/LIfqVpNSuw
While not the largest member of the Wolfpack, Holloman is one of the better guard-to-guard and perimeter defenders on the roster. Wade placed his trust in the Michigan State transfer to come up with a stop when his team needed it most.
"We changed our coverage a little bit to make sure Tre stayed on him," Wade said. "They couldn't get the switch. They tried to get the switch with (Ven-Allen Lubin)... We tried to make sure that we kept the matchup that we needed to and it ended up working out."
The stop prevented a thrilling and important win from becoming another gut-wrenching Quadrant 1 loss. Still, Wade hoped that the whole situation could have been avoided, but his team did not execute at a high enough level down the stretch in his eyes.
NC State will look to avoid another heart-pounding game on Saturday when it hosts Virginia Tech back at the Lenovo Center.
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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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