NIT: N.C. State advances

RALEIGH, N.C. –There’s still some magic left in Sidney Lowe’s red jacket –and in North Carolina State’s creaky Reynolds Coliseum.

Ben McCauley scored 19 points and the Wolfpack continued their exhausting, exhilarating postseason run with a 69-62 victory over Marist (25-9) Friday night in the second round of the National Invitation Tournament.

Dennis Horner and Gavin Grant added 13 points apiece for N.C. State (20-15), which played its sixth game in nine days and improved to 5-1 in that span.

The weary Wolfpack fed off a raucous sellout crowd in a rare game at Reynolds, their venerable former home where a generation ago Lowe played point guard on the Jim Valvano-led team that won the 1983 national title.

Now it’s on to a quarterfinal rematch with West Virginia in Morgantown. The Mountaineers beat N.C. State 71-60 three months ago in Charleston, W.Va.

Engin Atsur had 12 points and Brandon Costner added 10 before fouling out with 1:43 left for N.C. State, which led by double figures for most of the way.

Jared Jordan had 11 points, and James Smith and Wilfred Benjamin added 10 apiece for Marist.