No. 17 North Carolina St. 84, Columbia 74

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Posted 6:00AM on Wednesday, December 29, 2004

NEW YORK (AP)- Neither a game much closer than expected nor serious foul trouble could keep the smile off Julius Hodge's face. No. 17 North Carolina State beat Columbia 84-74 on Tuesday night in the opening round of the Holiday Festival. Forget the Wolfpack was a 23-point favorite. Forget Hodge was limited to 12 minutes in the second half because of fouls. This was the former New York City high school star's first game in Madison Square Garden and he had a win. ``That was definitely a great feeling playing in front of my family and friends,'' said Hodge, who scored 22 points. ``My mom over there smiling every time I make a play, my brother telling me to make free throws, my little cousin smiling and cheering, it definitely felt great. And it was especially great for me because I grew up a Knicks fan when they had good teams.'' But the night was Columbia's for three-quarters of the game. The Lions (6-3) were within 59-58 with 8:57 to play when the Wolfpack (10-1) went on a 14-1 run with Hodge on the bench to take control. ``The guys definitely stepped up and made shots when I wasn't in the game,'' Hodge said. Cameron Bennerman scored a career-high 24 points and picked up the slack for Hodge, scoring seven points in the deciding run. ``I tried to slow things down, especially on the offensive end,'' Bennerman said. ``We have to stop doing that. We're letting teams back in the game. We need to keep it up for 40 minutes.'' North Carolina State will play St. John's for the title on Thursday night. The Red Storm (5-4) beat Canisius 71-51 in the opening round. The 14-1 run gave North Carolina State a 73-59 lead with 4:17 to play. Hodge, who picked up his fourth personal with 12:55 left, returned for the last two points of the run that finally put away the Lions. ``Last year it would have been OK to walk away from a game like this and say we played a good game,'' said Jeremiah Boswell, who led the Lions with a career-high 23 points. ``We want to win these big games not just be close. We played hard and gave our all. That's what we'll remember.'' Hodge, who played at St. Raymond's H.S., was New York State's Mr. Basketball in 2001. He was the Atlantic Coast Conference player of the year last season as a junior, and has made first-team all-ACC two straight years. Hodge had 13 points in the first half as the Wolfpack took a 35-31 lead. But Columbia, which was coming off a 64-40 loss at Hofstra, stayed close with its spread offense. Despite committing a season-high 24 turnovers, the Lions hit eight of their first 13 3-point attempts to stay close. Columbia finished 10-for-18 on 3s and shot 54 percent overall. When Hodge picked up his fourth on an offensive foul call near the Wolfpack's bench, Columbia was leading 52-50. Engin Atsur's 3-pointer gave North Carolina State the lead for good with 12:02 left. Gerard Barrett's layup got the Lions within 59-58 with 8:57 to go, but Columbia came up empty on its next five possessions. Bennerman's layup with 4:17 left closed the run and gave the Wolfpack the 14-point lead. The closest Columbia got the rest of the way was 81-73. ``As much as we emphasized defending the 3, they did a great job with dribble penetration and that really hurt us,'' North Carolina State coach Herb Sendek said. Matt Preston added 16 points and nine rebounds for Columbia. Boswell was 4-for-5 on 3s. Atsur finished with 17 points, all in the second half, for the Wolfpack, who were 20-for-31 from the free throw line and shot 49.1 percent from the field. ``We're upset we lost this game. Columbia no longer stands for just coming close,'' Lions coach Joe Jones said. ``We have six seniors and I wanted those seniors to have the chance to beat a ranked team in Madison Square Garden and we did that.'' The tournament is sponsored by Dreyfus.