Will Wade Rings Alarm Bells With Spirited Rant
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RALEIGH — Will Wade made it clear several times during the early stages of the non-conference schedule that his NC State Wolfpack squad failed to meet the standards, sometimes lofty, that he set. Frustration boiled over after Wednesday's 108-72 win over a lowly Texas Southern team in Reynolds Coliseum as the coach discussed his team's performance.
NC State's first-year coach embarked on a spirited rant after the win, calling out the effort and execution of his team. Outside of sophomore guard Paul McNeil, who scored 47 points and made a program record 11 threes, none of Wade's players were safe from his criticism.
Breaking down Wade's thoughts
Wade walked into the media room at Reynolds Coliseum shortly after McNeil finished discussing his historic outing. The energy between the two individuals was very different and evident as soon as the coach walked in the door. He was quiet at first, but clearly sizzling over his team's effort, even in such a dominant performance. After a few questions, Wade showed his true feelings about the game.
"The attention to detail on that stuff, like that stuff, it's fine, we beat Texas Southern, but that's the sort of stuff that's why we hadn't been able to beat Kansas, or we hadn't been able to beat Auburn, why we hadn't been able to beat these guys," Wade said. "It's because we make those same mistakes in those games and they kill us, and we don't get it corrected. And I'm tired of it. I'm absolutely tired of it."
NC State head coach Will Wade went on a spirited rant about his team’s struggles with correcting issues and attention to detail.
— Tucker Sennett (@SennettTucker) December 18, 2025
Here is part of his postgame press conference following the 108-72 win over Texas Southern @WolfpackOnSI: pic.twitter.com/WPAEiQBak4
The coach praised the intensity of center Scottie Ebube, who finished the game with three blocks before he fouled out. Even though Ebube played somewhat out of control in his short stints, he provided the Wolfpack with the sort of edge Wade has been trying to unlock within his other players for weeks.
"It's tough. We got a lot of nice guys, got a great team GPA... All of that stuff. It's wonderful, if we were running a daycare," Wade said. "We're running a competitive, Division-I basketball program. I am into academics, I was a teacher... But we're running a competitive basketball program. And quite frankly, I've been trying to get some urgency and some internal leadership."
In terms of the internal leadership, Wade explained that he's been happy with the examples set by Quadir Copeland and Ven-Allen Lubin, veteran players with experience in the ACC. However, the collective "personality" of the team is what concerns Wade.
"We take on the personality. We've got a lot of casual personalities on our team. We don't have people that are revved up and ready to go," he said. "... Today in our shootaround, we made 88 mistakes... Casual, lack of attention to detail, lack of focus. And that's great when you have somebody set the ACC record for made threes and the school record for made threes, but we're relying on hope that one of these cats is going to go ballistic every night. That's what we rely on, just hope, and hope is a bad strategy in my book."
It was a very different tone to the one Wade took after the Kansas loss, when he preached patience with his team. The Wade that showed up after the win over Texas Southern resembled the coach who promised a hostile takeover before the UNC Asheville game.
"S***, it's concerning it's taking this long and we're not there," Wade said after he was asked what his level of concern is. "We've got all high-major games from here on out. Kindergarten is over... Yeah, it's concerning."
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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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