There’s still only one question N.C. State hasn’t been able to answer: ‘Why not us?’

The end of regulation, facing overtime in a game N.C. State led almost the entire way and missed a chance to win late, was surely the point where the Wolfpack would finally run out of gas.

No, it was three minutes later, with Oakland in the lead and both Ben Middlebrooks and Mohamed Diarra fouled out, when the needle would finally hit empty for N.C. State. Had to be.

A team with nothing left in reserve but pride, playing its seventh (and a quarter) game in 12 days, had to reach deep into its empty tanks one more time.

And once again found all it needed.

“I don’t think there’s a time when we have nothing left in the tank,” Middlebrooks said. “We’re the type of team, we will keep going as long as it takes to win the game. There is no quit in us at all.”

N.C. State’s improbable postseason lives on. Not even Jack Gohlke’s Steph Curry tribute act could derail this runaway train. When the end came Saturday night, it was Oakland’s shots that started coming up short, as the Wolfpack ran the lead to five. To seven. To nine. To Dallas.

For the first time since 2015, the Wolfpack is going to the Sweet 16, to face either Marquette or Colorado on Friday, after a 79-73 win over the equally resilient Golden Grizzlies.

Duke may join them in Dallas, if it can get past James Madison on Sunday, reminiscent of 2012 in St. Louis when Kansas single-handedly denied a regional final between N.C. State and North Carolina. And a year after being shut out of the Sweet 16, the Triangle accounts for an eighth of it. Maybe more.

The Wolfpack is the least likely of the bunch, an 11 seed that two weeks ago faced the tricky logistics of playing a home NIT game while hosting the first two rounds of the women’s tournament at Reynolds Coliseum.

Instead, a school famished for this kind of basketball in March is now overflowing with it. That it has been so long in coming, and so unexpected, only makes it sweeter.

“They’ve been longing for success, especially in the postseason, for a long time,” Raleigh native D.J. Horne said. “To come in, knowing I only had one year to make it happen, and the fact that it is all unfolding like this?”

The team that keeps asking “Why not us?” keeps finding answers where others might least expect them.

Overtime was yet another example of that. While D.J. Burns was the focus, Horne hit a critical jumper. Jayden Taylor hit the 3-pointer that put N.C. State in the lead for good. Casey Morsell defended Trey Townsend, who had a game-high 30, and kept him from hitting a field goal. Everyone had a piece.

That’s been the recipe, the most important of all the ingredients that have gone into this bubbling cauldron of basketball witchcraft. Michael O’Connell hit the bank shot to force overtime against Virginia. Horne had 29 and Diarra had a double-double against UNC. Middlebrooks had a career game against Texas Tech. And everyone contributed against Oakland, with five players in double figures led by Burns’ 24.

Burns was at the center of it all, N.C. State’s own basketball unicorn outplaying Oakland’s. Gohlke, the fifth-year Division II transfer who was one short of an NCAA tournament record with 10 3-pointers against Kentucky, looked like he was on his way again against N.C. State. He missed his final four attempts Saturday. Burns did not, especially when the Wolfpack went to a four-guard lineup out of necessity in the final minutes.

In those moments, the crowd was squarely behind Oakland, the even pluckier underdog, as the Wolfpack took on the unfamiliar role of favorite, all the neutrals rooting against N.C. State for a change. On this night, in this building, the Wolfpack was the bad guy. It embraced that role as well.

There were so many moments in this one when things could have gone awry. There were so many moments in the past two weeks when one little error, one bad call, one ill-advised shot could have relegated N.C. State to a basketball footnote.

Instead, the Wolfpack continues to make history, extending a streak that was already unprecedented and is starting to take on a life of its own. Every question that is asked, N.C. State has found an answer.

Except one.

“Why not us?” Horne asked, again. “We’re going to keep that running until the wheels come off.”

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