Today in NC State History: Everett Case ends coaching career
Everett Case engineered unprecedented success for NC State men’s basketball for 18 years while he was head coach. He brought an up-tempo style to a game that had largely been relegated to the half court. And he helped promote the sport in new ways, vaulting the Wolfpack and the ACC to the top of the basketball world.
And it was on this day in 1964 that what many consider the golden age of NC State basketball came to an end, when the coach they called “the Old Gray Fox” stepped down as the program’s head coach due to health reasons. Case would die two years later after an extensive battle with cancer.
During Case’s tenure, the Wolfpack went 377-134 and won 10 conference championships. He won six championships at the annual Dixie Classic, a tournament that was his brainchild. And he coached seven All-Americans — John Richter, Vic Molodet, Lou Pucillo, Bobby Speight, Ronnie Shavlik, Sam Ranzino and Dick Dickey.
Here’s how the 1965 Agromeck summed up Case’s achievements: “There is little doubt Everett Case’s contribution in filling the basketball program with glamour, exhilarating competition, and high-principled sportsmanship is indirectly responsible for the great success in the sport shared by many teams in North Carolina and the South.”
Case was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., in 1982, and into the NC State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2012 as an inaugural member.
Subscribe