”Kevin Keatts is a WINNER!”

This chant reverberated throughout PNC Arena.

Heck, even Bradley Chubb knows the deal.

Keatts first regular season as he head coach at NC State is in the books.

21 regular season wins

He tied Press Maravich (64-65) for the most regular season wins by a first-year coach at NC State.

11 ACC wins

NC State’s 11 ACC wins are the most by a first-year head coach in school history. If you want to go into the pre-ACC era, Keatts tied Everett Case for the most conference wins in a first season.

Keatts inherited a program that had won 9 ACC games over the past two seasons combined.

He took a team that was picked to finish 12th in the ACC, and led them to finish in either 5th place.

He was able to get Omer Yurtseven, Markell Johnson, Torin Dorn, Malik Abu and Lennard Freemman to buy-in to a completely different system.

He went and scooped up graduate transfers Allerik Freeman & Sam Hunt. He also managed to get Braxton Beverly to come to Raleigh after decommiting from Ohio St.

Can you imagine this team without these three guys?

This year he had a decision to make. Would he implement his system this season, or wait until next year when he has 8 new players that he recruited specifically to fit his system?

He decided to go ahead and do it this year. That could be a recipe for a wash of season, but it turned out to be only the 7th season in NC State history the Wolfpack finished with 11 or more ACC wins.

The ACC Coach of the Year award will likely go to UVA’s Tony Bennett, and deservedly so, but in his first season, Kevin Keatts is a part of the conversation.

Debbie Yow found a winner in Kevin Keatts, and we as Wolfpack fans are extremely grateful.