Deacons Playing Offense Four on Five
It’s way too easy to under-value a player’s defensive contributions in college basketball. I know because I’ve been watching ACC basketball since before David Thompson showed up at N.C. State, and I’m still guilty from time to time of putting too much emphasis on who scores a basket as opposed to who keeps a basket from being scored. But ultimately, the effect is the same on the outcome of the game.
Offense production is relatively easy to quantify. Just look at a player’s scoring average, his shooting percentages and his assist totals and you can tell pretty much all you need to know. Defense is hard to judge because of the varied schemes (man-to-man, zone, pressure), the switches and the often rather esoteric rules a player must follow to hold up his end of any defensive strategy. Defense is best judged on a team, not individual, basis.
Coaches put far, far more emphasis on defensive ability than do fans—or even sportswriters for that matter. The player who is constantly losing his man or blowing his assignments is a liability, no matter how he fills up the basket.
Wake Forest, like pretty much every college team, has its flaws. The Deacons don’t shoot free throws well, they’re inconsistent from the perimeter and they’re getting little to no offensive production from the center position. The four players who man that spot, seniors David Weaver and Chas McFarland and sophomores Tony Woods and (on a rare occasion) Ty Walker, are shooting a combined 42 percent from the floor. They’re also contributing 14.2 points a game, but that’s misleading in that often two of them are playing at the same time when forward Al-Farouq Aminu is either resting or playing wing forward.
Yes, but they’re providing enough interior defense that teams are shooting just 35 percent against the Deacons, the second best mark in the ACC after Florida State. Wake Forest leads the ACC with a percentage of 24.5 against the 3-pointer. It’s easy to take that for granted, even after watching one season after another come apart because of an inability to shut the other team down at crunch time.
Weaver, McFarland and Woods also provide one of the real strengths of the team, which is strength itself. Listen carefully to what opposing coaches say about Wake. “They’re big. They’re physical. They’re tough to score on inside. They’ll push you around if you don’t fight back.’’ True, JuJuan Johnson of Purdue had a nice game against the Deacons with 21 points and nine rebounds, but Tracy Smith of N.C. State had a long night, and so did Robert Sacre of Gonzaga.
All that said, no team wants to play offensive four or five, and for the Deacons to have the kind of season they want they will need more production from their centers. Weaver, for all his hustle and defensive ability, is limited offensively. So is Woods, moreso than I would have thought given the way he handled himself in high school and in AAU circles. He’s got two and a half seasons remaining, so there’s still time he can develop better post moves.
The most obvious option is McFarland, who a year ago averaged 8.7 points while shooting 52 percent from the floor—both more than respectable numbers. McFarland didn’t start against UNC Greensboro, and probably won’t tonight against Richmond as Coach Dino Gaudio is pushing and pulling levers to try to get him untracked.
One of Gaudio’s tactics has been to show McFarland videotape from last season.
“We’re just working with him, and I think hopefully it becomes a confidence thing where he has a good game and he builds from it,’’ Gaudio said. “Before the UNC Wilmington game, we showed him clips from Carolina last year, where he played very well, at Richmond last year where he played really well and Georgia Tech. I tell him `Chas, there are some guys who I will tell `I think you can do it but I’ve never seen it.’
But you, I’ve seen you do it. Here it is right here.’‘