Miami Hurricanes Basketball: Three Things You Need to Know Before Miami Takes on NC State

It’s not too often that a team in college basketball can complete the clean sweep of those teams along Tobacco Road. Duke, North Carolina, NC State and Wake Forest, there’s no chance you could beat all four of these teams let alone three in a row, right?

In Raleigh, NC on Saturday afternoon, the 16-3 Miami Hurricanes will look to win their third straight game over a Tobacco Road opponent as they travel to take on the sputtering NC State Wolfpack. A victory would match the 2012-13 Canes record through 20 games at 17-3 and would give the current Hurricanes some momentum before a stretch in which they play eight of their next nine games against KenPom Top 60 opponents.

With this big game coming up, here are the three things you need to know:

Anthony Barber will get his points, but will anyone else on the Wolfpack show up.

A year ago, Mark Gottfried had his “Big 3” set with Trevor Lacey, Ralston Turner and Anthony Barber. Now, just one remains.

After losing Lacey to the NBA Draft and Turner to eligibility, Anthony “Cat” Barber has had to take on the role of three men in his third year with the Wolfpack. The junior has increased his points per game average by a whopping 10.7 PPG this season and has cemented his status as one of the ACC’s top offensive threats.

The 6’2” guard has had eight games this season in which he’s scored over 25 points, including the team’s last game against Georgia Tech where he scored 36 points in a 90-83 defeat. There’s no doubting how remarkable a season Barber is having, the problem is, he’s getting no help.

Now, the Wolfpack do have four players averaging double figures in scoring, but after that it’s just barren. Like Duke, NC State has struggled with depth this season especially after they lost West Virginia transfer Terry Henderson to injury in the first game of the season.

In the non-conference, their depth wasn’t an issue and the team was able to score the ball efficiently as they finished with at least 80 points four times. Once they got into the ACC though, that’s all changed. The Wolfpack have scored over 80 points just once in their last 13 games and that was down to the fact the ACC’s leading scorer Barber finished with those 36 points against Georgia Tech.

If Miami can shut down or even limit Barber in the game Saturday afternoon, the chances of a Hurricanes victory skyrocket. You saw this same formula when the Canes took on Duke and Grayson Allen. Sheldon McClellan didn’t absolutely shut down Duke’s talented sophomore, but he limited him enough to the point where Duke’s lack of depth couldn’t overcome the fact that Allen had only 17 points.

If the Hurricanes keep “Cat” Barber under 20 points like they did with Allen, you can almost guarantee another Miami win.

Everyone thought it would be a down year for NC State, but not this far down.

If you haven’t figured it out already, NC State isn’t very good this season.

After a fairly decent 10-3 non-conference start, the Wolfpack have now dropped seven of their last eight games, putting them at 1-7 in the ACC and 11-10 overall. Remember, this is a team that last year beat No. 1 seed Villanova and played in the Sweet 16 of last year’s NCAA Tournament.

Of course those losses of Lacey and Turner hurt, but going into the season this NC State team was picked to finish eighth in a pretty stacked ACC. At the time of writing, they sit tied for 14th in the ACC.

You could also point to the Terry Henderson injury for this team’s struggles, but even when they had him in the first game they lost to William & Mary. After that, the Wolfpack went 10-2 in the non-conference including a win over Ben Simmons and LSU.

This team has dangerous talent, but with struggles on the offensive end and a not-so-great defense as well, NC State is somewhere no one expected them to be as they sit in the cellar of the ACC.

Miami’s new big three of McClellan, Rodriguez and Newton should have their way in Raleigh.

When all three of these players are clicking, Miami is a Top 10 team in the country.

As we saw in their easy victory against Duke, the combination of scoring and distributing from Miami’s “Big 3” was almost unguardable and the Blue Devils paid dearly. Not only did the trio combine for 50 points, but they also combined for 19 of the team’s 24 assists. That’s pretty remarkable. Coming into this game against the 182nd ranked defense of NC State, we’ll likely see more of the same.

In the last two games, the Wolfpack have allowed an average of 89 points and a problem all season has been the fact that Gottfried’s squad has been unable to contain the other team’s top threats. That sounds like good news for Sheldon McClellan, Angel Rodriguez and Ja’Quan Newton.

As we said before, the Hurricanes are about to enter a brutal final stretch here and picking up wins and confidence wherever they can is extremely important. This isn’t going to be a resume-builder type of game, but it’s a game in which the Hurricanes can really start building to the places they want to go.

50 points and 19 assists from three players is pretty spectacular, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see these three eclipse that come Saturday afternoon.