Florida State men's basketball finishes regular season with Senior Day win over NC State
As the Florida State men’s basketball team continues to bring back significant players from injury, the Seminoles are showing how dangerous they could be this postseason.
FSU (17-13, 10-10 ACC) captured its third straight win on Saturday, closing out the regular season with an 89-76 Senior Day victory over NC State at the Tucker Civic Center.
In his first game in three weeks, redshirt sophomore guard Caleb Mills recorded a team-high 19 points on 7 of 8 shooting across only 18 minutes for the Seminoles. Mills had been hobbled by an ankle injury before returning to practice late this week.
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Mills exited the game with a few minutes left after suffering another injury, but FSU head coach Leonard Hamilton said it didn’t seem to be too serious.
“Caleb has a maturity about him and a confidence that is important to our team,” Hamilton said. “He is experienced. We have some guys who are not quite as confident about where they are in their development. So for him to come off an injury, haven’t not played in a number of games – to give us 19 points in 18 minutes, as efficient as he was, it was good to have him back on the floor.
“That little umph that we needed to help us over the hump. When the game got close, he was able to give us some offensive productivity. Confidence, maturity, he believes in himself, and our players believe in him.”
Seminole senior guard Anthony Polite, who missed a month before returning for FSU’s 74-70 win over Notre Dame on Wednesday, notched his first double-double of the season with 14 points and 10 rebounds. Freshman guard Matthew Cleveland missed that game against the Irish with an illness but tallied 11 points in his return.
Center Tanor Ngom (11) and forward John Butler (10) also reached double figures for the Seminoles. They helped FSU outscore the Wolfpack in the paint 42-22. Point guard RayQuan Evans dished out a season-high 10 assists while registering five points and five rebounds.
NC State freshman guard Terquavion Smith led all scorers with 30 points while shooting 11 of 23 from the field and 5 of 10 from deep. Having Mills back helped the Seminoles counteract Smith’s career performance. FSU posted its third-highest scoring total of the season.
“Caleb is just a bucket-getter,” Polite said. “He’s able to put the ball in the bucket extremely easily. So we expect him to do that, and I’m happy to have him back and finish this season out strong.”
Forward Malik Osborne (ankle), center Naheem McLeod (hand) and guard Cam’Ron Fletcher (thumb) are still expected to be out for the rest of FSU’s season. Every other player on the Seminoles is back now, but Mills’ status could be in question.
If Mills indeed plays in the ACC Tournament in Brooklyn, N.Y. next week, the eight-seed Seminoles could be a threatening team. They first play nine-seed Syracuse in the second round at noon Wednesday. The winner takes on one-seed Duke at noon Thursday.
FSU split games against both teams in the regular season.
“If you look around at how the ACC has gone in the regular season, anybody is capable of winning on any given night,” Hamilton said. “So once you get into the ACC Tournament, it’s the team that’s playing the best on that particular night. Hopefully we can put ourselves in that position.
“These guys have gotten closer together. They’ve developed more of a bond. And it seems as though they have come to a point where they feel like we can win regardless of who we have available. The next man up mentality has somehow taken over our team."
Senior Day
Polite said his family from Switzerland attended Saturday's game, which could have been his last at the Tucker Civic Center.
“All the guys celebrating us today was exciting,” Polite said. “Just playing extremely hard for all the seniors. I’m just appreciative of the team that we have and coach Hamilton for putting it together.”
Justin Lindner, Wyatt Wilkes, Evans and Ngom joined Polite in FSU’s all-senior starting five. Forwards Harrison Prieto and Osborne were also honored on Senior Day.
“These guys will remember this year for the rest of their life,” Hamilton said. “They will have some fond memories about how to persevere, how to handle adversity, how to make the best out of a negative situation and I can’t say enough about how proud I am of these guys and the way they’ve stuck together.
“I just wish that our society would mirror the relationships, communication and respect that our basketball teams have for each other. On our team, we’ve got guys from all over the country. Different parts of the world. Black kids. White kids. All religions.
“And we have guys who find a way to respect one another, get along with one another and they end up being brothers.”
Up Next
FSU will square off against Syracuse at noon Wednesday. The Seminoles split their two games against the Orange this season, losing 63-60 on Dec. 4 and winning 76-71 on Jan. 15.
Reach Carter Karels at ckarels@gannett.com or follow him on Twitter @CarterKarels.
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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FSU basketball beats NC State, heads to ACC Tournament
