Will Wade Breaks Down What Went Wrong Against Louisville
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RALEIGH — Embarrassing. Torched. Whipped. Those were just a few of the words NC State coach Will Wade used to describe his team's performance on the road against No. 24 Louisville, as the Cardinals completely dismantled the Wolfpack in a 118-77 rout on Monday.
Dominant individual performances by a pair of Louisville guards were too much to overcome for State, with another opponent putting together a record-breaking night scoring the basketball. The defensive miscues and lack of urgency snowballed into what quickly became the worst loss of Wade's young NC State tenure, but the future remains clear.
What went wrong according to Wade?
Nothing went right for the Wolfpack. It became evident that it might be that kind of night early, as Louisville shot in front with an early 14-4 lead. Every time it felt like NC State might punch back offensively, something went wrong on the other end of the floor. When Wade was asked what he thought specifically failed on the defensive end, he offered a hard truth.
"Everything," he said. "We just got whipped off the bounce. They beat us every way possible. We got torched. We gave up 76 points to two players. I don't know if I've ever seen that. We got torched and they picked at some matchups and we could just never get our footing... We just got hammered."
Mikel Brown Jr. & Ryan Conwell of @LouisvilleMBB are the only Division I teammate duo in the last 30 seasons to combine for 75+ points, 15+ rebounds & 15+ threes made in a game.
— OptaSTATS (@OptaSTATS) February 10, 2026
Only one NBA duo has ever done it: Damian Lillard & Nassir Little during Lillard's 71-point game. pic.twitter.com/f9jMShsRCh
The two players Wade referenced were freshman guard Mikel Brown and his senior backcourt mate, Ryan Conwell. Brown shattered Louisville records, scoring 45 points in the win, while Conwell added 31 of his own. It was a remarkable performance for both players and NC State simply had no response on either end of the floor. It harkened back to some of the dominant shooting nights the Pack allowed earlier in the season, which Wade referenced, particularly with Brown.
"He hadn't seen our defense yet," Wade said. "Melvin Council from Kansas, he torched us and he was shooting terribly. So, we're good medicine if you can't shoot it... (Brown) is a great player. He's going to be a lottery pick. He's a tremendous player. You let a tremendous player get going and see the first one go in, they think it's their night."
The 118 points marked the second-most points allowed by a Wolfpack team in program history, with the high watermark being 124 points back in 1978. That certainly leaves a mark on Wade's group, but it also might provide something of a learning experience with a few weeks left in the regular season. After beating Virginia Tech, Wade warned of a potential letdown, saying that the Wolfpack couldn't win games without a B+ or A effort. Obviously, it got neither on Monday.
There were very few bright spots Wade could point to after the loss. While Ven-Allen Lubin and Tre Holloman notched 20 and 19 points, respectively, their efforts were futile as the Cardinals erupted against the leaky defense on the end. Any response was met by one of equal or greater impact, creating an avalanche and one of the worst box scores for a Wade-coached team.
Final. pic.twitter.com/1jnJdkXfs2
— NC State Men's Basketball (@PackMensBball) February 10, 2026
"They had more defensive rebounds than we had total rebounds. Look, you can look at that stat sheet all you want, we got beat in every category," Wade said. "We were outcoached. We were outplayed. I didn't have us prepared for the moment. We were outclassed in every way imaginable and the stat sheet reflects that."
The Cardinals shot a blistering 60% from the field and made 18-of-30 attempts from 3-point range. Conwell and Brown accounted for 15 of those makes, completely exposing the defensive miscues and constant miscommunication. Now comes the difficult decision of how to handle such a loss. Do you grow from it by watching it? Do you flush it entirely? That's Wade's latest dilemma.
"I've got to figure out what to do. There's certainly things that we're going to have to show, but we've got to move forward," the coach said. "Unfortunately, I've had this experience before. This happened to me one other time at a previous job. They set the SEC record for threes on us. It was at home... Alabama made over 20 on us. We move forward from that... We've got to find a way to be better on Saturday against Miami."
Wade reiterated that while the loss was an embarrassment for him and the program as a whole, it's not the end of the season. The Pack still has plenty of chances to turn things around in the final month of the regular season, starting with the Hurricanes, as he said.
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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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