Iowa Western C.C. defensive lineman Anterio Thompson picked up offers from Iowa and Illinois last week, and then ended his plan of visiting NC State and others in December, and committed to Iowa on Friday, his birthday.

Anterio Thompson story

Concord (N.C.) Robinson junior nose tackle D'Nas White is planning for a return trip to NC State. He came to the Texas Tech at NC State game in September. White got a minor injury Thursday, so he didn't get to play Friday, but he's down about 25-30 pounds since last March at about 6-foot-5 and 300 pounds. South Carolina also seems to be working him hard.

Just goes to show how some things don't matter with recruits. Miami is now eighth in the country in football recruiting.

Cormani McClain story

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The offense would get a B. The offense was awful for almost 3 quarters, in all phases. The Defense would get a B. The defense gave up to many big plays and allow the QB to have a couple of good runs, one being the TD on 3rd down. Special Teams would give an B grade. Good kick off return but Thayer let the ball hit the ground too many times on punt returns and almost had a killer t/o with a fumble. Hopefully all three units will play a more complete game against WF.

The offense line did a better job in 2nd half of pass protection and run blocking. Houston, Thomas, Carter, Pennix, and Timmons play well. Timmons needs to start over Lesane. Pennix is going to help State offense generate more offense. Hopefully Carter can play like that the rest of the season.

Defense: Vann, Wilson and Thomas play like MVP. The late hit on Wilson was horrible call. State needs to get rid of three man rush. Both pass plays to 80 of VT were with 3 man rush. Yet Battle had no deep help. The TD pass I believe was VT in max protection.

Special Teams: Gray had nice ko return and KO coverage was good. The punter needs to be more consistent with his punts.

Go Pack

be excited

Having a tough time and that’s rare for me

like George Harrison said, “Give me hope, help me cope”

A look at the ACC backup quarterbacks to put Charleston Southern graduate transfer Jack Chambers of NC State in perspective. Maybe out of the 14 backup quarterbacks, maybe six would be adequate.

Boston College — Redshirt freshman Emmett Morehead, three stars

Clemson — Freshman Cade Klubnik, five stars

Duke — Freshman Henry Belin IV, three stars

Florida State — Redshirt sophomore Tate Rodemaker, three stars

Georgia Tech — Redshirt sophomore Zach Gibson, two stars (Akron transfer)

Louisville — Junior Brock Domann, two stars (JuCo transfer)

Miami — Freshman Jake Garcia, four stars

North Carolina — Sophomore Jacoby Criswell, four stars

Pittsburgh — Senior Nick Patti, three stars

Syracuse — Redshirt freshman Carlos Del Rio-Wilson, four stars (Florida transfer)

Virginia — Sophomore Jay Woolfolk, three stars

Virginia Tech — Redshirt senior Jason Brown, zero stars (St. Francis and South Carolina transfer)

Wake Forest — Redshirt freshman Mitch Griffis, three stars

Almost a year ago, I introduced Greensboro (N.C.) Grimsley junior wide receiver Terrell Anderson. He's now been offered by NC State. I think colleges just wanted to see him get off to a good academic start this year.

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Thursday’s game:
Virginia Tech at NC State, 16-10.

Saturday’s games:
Notre Dame at Syracuse
Boston College at UConn
Georgia Tech at Florida State
Miami (Fla.) at Virginia
Wake Forest at Louisville
Pittsburgh at North Carolina

Non-ACC game of the week:
No. 9 Oklahoma State at No. 22 Kansas State

The tie-breaker will be score of NC State game.

PackinFL and legend83 both had 21 points in week eight, but congrats to legend83 for winning the tie-breaker.

Received 3 tickets and parking pass for the game but need one more so whole family can go. Don't really care where the seat is located as I just one to get into stadium.

Call or text me at 919-389-9762

NC State defensive end Savion Jackson not on the two-deep, which is telling since the two deep rarely gets updated.

C.J. Clark is the new first-string defensive end, and it also means more snaps for Claude Larkins.

Depth Chart​

We've all had our issues with Beck's playcalling thus far and the offense as a whole underperforming which is now exacerbated by losing our starting QB. Now that we've had a nearly full two weeks to adjust to Jack (presumably) being the starter, what do you want to see against VT? Air it out? Run it 40 times? Interested in specific examples of what you all think will work. I'd personally like to see us try to establish the run and then take some shots at opportune times. Maybe not 40 yard bombs but at least 15-20 yard throws to keep the defense honest.

This is hot board week and played around with the classes of 2023, 2024 and 2025.

Here is the class of 2023 preliminary hot board.

Richmond (Va.) John Marshall senior forward Dennis Parker will announce at 3 p.m. Oct. 26.

NC State, Georgetown and Oklahoma State the final three. NCSU assistant coach Levi Watkins has been the point man on Parker, but head coach Kevin Keatts has been recruiting him for three-plus years.

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1. Now you see him and maybe now you don’t.

That seems to be the theme of Bronx (N.Y.) Our Saviour Lutheran senior point guard Ty-Laur Johnson. Everything seemingly went perfect with Johnson after he officially visited NC State on Oct. 7-9, but he also doesn’t do much media either.

What has emerged since then is that a crucial person in Johnson’s inner circle wants him to take a long hard look at Memphis. So, he’s officially visiting the Tigers this weekend, who have one senior wing commit.

Johnson played with the New York Rens, the same traveling team that former Wolfpack signee Jalen Lecque played for. The Rivals.com top 60 prospect is the ideal Kevin Keatts point guard — a score-first, ball dominant and pick-and-roll type.

Memphis had hired Andy Borman from the Rens on Sept. 6. Norman played at Duke and is former coach Mike Krzyzewski’s nephew — Borman’s mom is the sister of Mickie Krzyzewski.

Since Sept. 6, the question always looming was “Does Memphis want him?” Now, they seemingly do and that doesn’t bode well for NC State, Pittsburgh, Ole Miss or Fordham.

Where does NC State go from here at point guard? It looks like a waiting game unless a junior college target catches the staff’s eye. The portal loomed large anyway, and sophomore Breon Pass and freshman point guard L.J. Thomas have a season to prove themselves at the spot.

NC State will still try to battle for Johnson and hope that he has final say on his college decision, but the waiting game has begun.

2. NC State’s other main recruiting priority of the fall has been Dennis Parker of Richmond (N.C.) John Marshall.

Parker will announce Oct. 26, which will give his college choice plenty of time to try and convince him to sign in November. However, the current plan is to commit and then sign in April.

NC State, Georgetown and Oklahoma State are the three finalists. That would be three coaches with different backgrounds among Keatts, Georgetown’s Patrick Ewing and Oklahoma State’s Kenny Boynton.

Parker could fill the Torin Dorn role of being a combo forward who can do a little bit of everything, but his calling card would be defense. He’s athletic, solidly built at about 6-5, 6-6 and can finish in the open floor. His jumper needs work, but most players improve their shooting over time.

Parker’s prep coach, Ty White, runs Team Loaded, which has sent Thomas, Dorn, Dennis Smith Jr., Caleb Martin, Cody Martin and Tyler Lewis to NC State. Shaun Kirk and Braxton Beverly both played for Team Loaded for a short stretch, and so did Manny Bates and Shakeel Moore when they were younger.

3. Barring a surprise, it looks like Ty-Laur Johnson will be NC State’s last official visitor this fall in hoops recruiting.

NC State is going to need to be tight with official visits in the future, unless the NCAA changes the rules. It doesn’t look like either center Braden Pierce of Bradenton (Fla.) IMG Academy or point guard AJ Johnson of Simi Valley (Calif.) Donda Academy will be visiting this fall.

But there could be an unofficial visitor on the horizon — Treymane Parker. Nothing is set in stone with Parker, but NC State has home football games Oct. 27, Nov. 5 and Nov. 12. The only thing predictable about Parker is that he’s unpredictable.

As I’ve written many times in the past, don’t let the lack of offers or his lack of national ranking fool you on the pure talent. He just badly needs stability and coaching to bring it out.

The Fayetteville, N.C., native, who is the half-brother of former Tennessee/North Carolina A&T shooting guard Kwe Parker, has been bouncing around from school-to-school, and now is with Overtime Elite in Atlanta. Ten years ago, there’s probably little chance he qualifies academically, but the NCAA has severely lowered the standards post-COVID era.

NC State has changed it up this season and aren't playing East Carolina in its secret scrimmage. Instead, it is Davidson on Oct. 22.