NC State Basketball Loses Assistant Coach to Troy

0:00It's March 29th. I'm Cory with The Story, and this is Durham News Today, local news powered by AI. NC Stateman's basketball just lost another key piece from its staff, but this one's heading to Troy instead of LSU. Adam Howard, who's been one season as assistant coach under Will Wade, got hired as Troy's new headman on Saturday. He steps in after Scott Cross left for Georgia Tech, replacing the guy who took Troy to back-to-back NCAA tournaments and sunbelt titles. Earlier this week, Howard was the brains behind NC State's offense, pushing them to top 30 nationally and scoring at 83.2. Points per game, three pointers made at 10.2, 3.0 percentage at 38.8, and assist to turnover ratio at 1.7. Kinpom ranked their offensive efficiency 23rd in the country at 123.1. Players blew up under his schemes too. Senior forward Venn Allen Lubin topped power 4 shooters at 66.8% from the field.

1:01Quadar Copeland jumped his 3-point shooting from 15.4% to 39.7, adding 222 assists for. 9th in program history, Paul McNeill drained 105 threes at 42.7%. Before NC State, Howard helped Nebraska snag 23 wins and their first NCAA bid in 10 years. Now he's back at Troy where he assisted from 2016 to 2018, but Wade sudden jumped to LSU triggered an exodus with four staffers already following him to Baton Rouge. More changes loom as assistant coaches Vernon Hamilton and Brandon Chambers look set to bounce two. NC State's rebuilding fast, but Howard's departure caps a wild shake-up for Wolfpack Hoops.