N.C. State sophomore guard Anthony Grundy scored 30 points Sunday afternoon at the Entertainment and Sports Arena as the Wolfpack buried ancient rival Wake Forest 76-56.

Grundy joined the Wolfpack for the second half of last season and made history by scoring the final basket in Reynolds Coliseum. Sunday, he made a bit more history by playing the best game ever in the Pack’s fabulous new arena.

Grundy poured in 11 field goals on a day when none of his teammates made more than two. He sank free throws, 3-pointers, pull-ups, tip-ins and jump hooks. And he single-handedly sank the Demon Deacons (11-5, 2-2), who shot an awful 32.1 percent from the field.

“Some days this game isn’t all that complicated,” said Wolfpack coach Herb Sendek, whose team took over second place in the ACC with a 3-1 mark. “Sometimes a fine player just elevates his game to a different level from everyone else and takes over. Anthony was that kind of player today.”

Guard Adam Harrington, last year’s leading Pack scorer, saw enough of Grundy down the stretch in 1998-99 to make a decision to transfer to Auburn. ACC opponents can’t exercise that option, however. They’re going to have to figure out some way to contain him. Tape of Wake’s feeble attempts to defend him won’t provide any answers.

“I watched him in warmups and he was even better than he was in the game,” moaned Deacon coach Dave Odom. “It wasn’t like we didn’t know he could play, we just couldn’t stop him. He hit shots against man-to-man and hit shots against zone. You want someone on your team to come up and grab you and say, ‘Let me try to stop him, coach,’ Well, I’m still waiting for someone.”

Grundy, who is 6-2 but has the wingspan of a 6-6 player, says the weirdest thing about himself is that he sleeps with his eyes open. But now, he’s opening eyes all around the league. People are just starting to wake up to the idea that Grundy is a legitimate star.

It took Grundy 16 seconds to take charge. On Wake’s first possession, he swiped the ball from Darius Songaila and drove for a layup. On Wake’s second possession, Grundy blocked a shot by Robert O’Kelley and outran a pack of Deacs to score. A Justin Gainey steal led to a layup by Pack freshman Damien Wilkins. Then Grundy beat the Deacs down the floor and scored on a funky jump hook. Suddenly it was 8-0, and nearly 20,000 delirious fans were howling their heads off.

“They were running and we were trotting,” said a disgusted Odom.

Wake never could get all the way back.

The Deacs came close once, moving to within 21-20 when reserve Antwan Scott’s baseline turnaround danced in at the 7:57 mark. But Wake wouldn’t score again until Scott converted two free throws with 46 seconds left in the first half. By then, the Deacs were down 31-22. They went down 34-22 after Grundy nailed one of his four 3s to end the half.

“The tell-tale play in the first half came when Grundy got a tip-in over everyone,” said Odom. “Every one of our kids was looking around like, ‘Hey, it wasn’t my man.’ They were right. He was nobody’s man all day.”

Wake made only one move in the second half, pushing to within 48-41 with 9:21 remaining when reserve Craig Dawson, who pumped in all seven of his points in two minutes, got hot. But N.C. State scored the game’s next five points on a drive by Damon Thornton and free throws by Gainey and Archie Miller and was out of danger.

That trio of free throws was part of an absolute onslaught by the Wolfpack (12-2) at the line. With Gainey making 10 straight and Wilkins eight in a row, N.C. State, by far the ACC’s worst foul shooting team, hit a stunning 31 of 37. Wake, in contrast, got just 11 points at the line.

“You don’t have to look any further down the stat sheet than free throws,” said Odom. “N.C. State has been suspect at best at the line all year. Today, we made them the best foul shooting team in the country.”

“We didn’t do a thing different in practice, I assure you,” said Sendek, who watched his team shoot a miserable 10-for-27 from the line when it beat Virginia on Wednesday.

N.C. State has given up the fewest points in the league (59.5) and improved on that stingy stat. Wake didn’t score a single field goal in a span of more than 10 minutes that bridged both halves. The hard-working Pack has done similar things in its previous ACC games. It held North Carolina without a field goal for nearly eight minutes and stopped Virginia and Maryland cold for four-minute spans.

Wake star O’Kelley finished with 15 points, but was bedeviled by Grundy and Gainey, who held him to 6-for-17 shooting and seven missed 3s. Songaila added 14 points, but spent major portions of the game on the bench with foul woes.

Grundy didn’t need much help outscoring the Deacs, but Gainey chipped in with 13 and Wilkins added 12. Thornton had nine boards as the Pack whipped the Deacs on the glass.

“We didn’t win a single statistical column,” griped Odom. “This was just N.C. State’s day.”

More to the point, it was Grundy’s day.