What NC State’s women’s players would have said about the Vanderbilt fumble if anyone had asked, which they did not, because the glam shots were still being posted and Coach Moore was already in the cart.
Sept. 20, 2026
THE NEWS & UNOBSERVED
packwbb.com • Imagined Access • We weren’t there
A note from PackWBB.com
PackWBB.com does not have official media access to NC State women’s basketball. We also do not have a locker-room pass, a credential, or a realistic chance of Wes Moore calling on us in the second row.
The News & Unobserved. Imagined Access. So we are publishing the quotes as they probably would have occurred if the players had been asked about football, six seconds, and why a grown man ran backward with the game in his hands instead of just sitting down. None of these interviews happened. All of them feel true. Favour asked us to start over twice.
RALEIGH – Yesterday they sat still for hair and lights. Today they sat still for a fumble.
NC State had Vanderbilt put away. Lead. Interception at the 2. Six seconds. Fourth down. Keep the football. Run the clock out. Come home. CJ Bailey ran backward into his own end zone to let the seconds die and let the football die instead. Somebody punched it loose. Somebody else fell on it. 35-31. The only lead Vanderbilt had all afternoon arrived after the afternoon was supposed to be over.
Favour Ossai watched it the way you watch a magic trick that does not work.
“I thought the point was to keep the ball until the time was gone,” Ossai said. “Then he ran to the place with the painted dirt and they all jumped on him like it was a rebound. I said, is that our basket? They said it is the opposite of a basket. I said, then why did we go there with the ball still in his hands? Yesterday a woman spent twenty minutes on my eyebrows. Today football spent six seconds running from the clock. The eyebrows stayed on. The ball did not.”
Khamil Pierre used to play in that building. She did not love the reunion.
“That is my old gym,” Pierre said. “I already gave them two seasons. I did not give them a touchdown. I spent August arguing about red jerseys and white jerseys and black jerseys in the rain. Nobody told me the road uniform in Nashville was ‘please take this.’ If we go back there, I am not rebounding that ball on the way in or out.”
Zoe Brooks had just picked a favorite photo. Hands empty. Smile on. That was the assignment Friday.
“Different assignment on Saturday,” Brooks said. “Empty hands were the problem. A safety is still a win. Sitting down is still a win. The job was to hold it and let the clock finish. He held it long enough to get hit. We take pictures when we are supposed to take pictures. We hold the ball when we are supposed to hold the ball. Football mixed the days up.”
Adelaide Jernigan translated before the room could ask Favour to translate it back.
“They intercepted the game,” Jernigan said. “That is the defensive rebound with the shot clock off. The next job is hold it and let time expire. Not host a tour. Favour asked if the end zone was our basket or their basket. The honest answer is it was ours until it was theirs. That is the whole sport in one sentence. I hated saying it out loud.”
Maddie Cox walked past the TV like it owed her rent.
“Four years here,” Cox said. “I have seen ugly. I have seen bounce-back. I have not seen somebody try to run out the clock and run out of the ball. Media day took all afternoon and nobody dropped anything. Football had six seconds and dropped the season.”
Desiree Wooten wanted a chair brought onto the field.
“Put a chair in the end zone,” Wooten said. “Sit. The clock leaves on its own. You do not have to jog it there. I transferred here to play basketball. I did not transfer here to watch a man run out the clock by running out from under the ball.”
Ky’She Lunan had been tagging teammates in the glam shots when the clip autoplayed underneath.
“I liked my picture,” Lunan said. “I did not like the sequel. If that is how you close a game I am closing my phone. Full court. Six seconds. Hold it. Fall down. Do not audition for more time.”
Kamora Pruitt thought media day was the hard part.
“They told me not to blink,” Pruitt said. “Football blinked. I am a freshman. I thought the stressful thing was standing still in my new uniform while they took the picture. Standing still with the football on would have run the clock out. Nobody asked me. I would have stood still. I already had the new Adidas kicks on.”
Qadence Samuels did not need a translation. She wanted the ball inbounded to a teammate. Any teammate. Or a manager.
“There was no inbound,” Samuels said. “There was a gift. I press gifts. I do not accept them from our own quarterback.”
Wes Moore was already in the golf cart, doing laps of Reynolds the way he always does when the building is empty and the Coliseum still needs a look.
He did not stop. He did not park. He rolled past the practice door, eyes on the floor, and handed out the advice without taking his foot off the pedal.
“Sit down,” Moore said. “That was the play. You have the lead, you have the ball, you sit down and let the clock go. Yesterday we took pictures so the new kids would look like they belong here. Today football stood up when the job was to sit. Favour asked why you run to the place you do not shoot. You don’t. You stay on your end. You keep the ball. You let the clock do the work. I’m going around again. Don’t throw it in the cart. The cart is not an option.”
Then he was gone toward the far baseline, still looking at the floor, still not looking at Nashville.
At press time, Ossai was still in the comments under a media-day carousel, stuck on the spelling.
“Pretty pictures,” she said. “Confusing sport. Why is it not fútbol? If they cannot spell it, how can you expect them to hold it? Sitting is easy. I sat for makeup. I can teach him that. Spelling I cannot teach him. Pierre said that gym already got two seasons from her. I believe her. They did not need the last play too. I still do not believe the last play. Or the name.”
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