To Beat Duke, Deacons Needed More From More
Wake’s game at Duke last night was a knock-down-drag-out affair, with plenty of pushing and shoving and uncalled fouls on both teams. And the intentional foul Ray Natili called on Ish Smith was way-over-the-top bad and came at a particularly unfortunate time for the Deacons. It was one of those ``what the. . . ?’’ calls that perpetrate the widespread notion that any team visiting Cameron can expect to get shafted.
All this will be remembered and debated long after the real reason the Deacons lost for the 12th straight time at Duke is forgotten. How does Wake win getting the kind of games it got from so many key players?
Al-Farouq Aminu was superb, Chas McFarland and Ari Stewart were really good and Tony Woods gave the Deacons 13 good minutes. But no one else on the team rose to the occasion.
Ish Smith took his share, and perhaps more, of the blame after making just three of 12 shots from the floor and turning the ball over four times. He did a good job defensively on Jon Scheyer, but was helpless when switches left him trying to stop Duke’s big men inside.
“Personally I think my play was poor,’’ Smith said. “If we’re going to win I’ve got to play at a level I didn’t tonight. But I’ll just go back to the drawing board, see what I did wrong and see what I need to do for us, and turn the page and get ready for Carolina.’‘
But there were two other starters, L.D. Williams and C.J. Harris, who had games that were nothing to text home about and Gary Clark gave the Deacons next-to-nothing in his 10 minutes off the bench. The lack of offensive balance and Duke’s ability to break down the Wake Forest defense over the final 13 minutes made it a 20-point game, though it certainly didn’t seem like one as it unfolded.
For Williams, it was his second forgettable game in a row. He was two for six for six points to go with four rebounds against Maryland, and he was one for seven for three points last night, though he did hustle his way to six rebounds. All the Deacons, except for maybe Aminu, seemed affected by Duke’s size, strength and propensity for taking charges, but none more so than Williams, who short-armed more than one of his shots from in the lane. He became a better player last season when he started finishing more on drives to the basket, but last night looked more like the L.D. of the first two years.
“You can intimidate shooters in a couple of ways when they get into the paint,’’ Coach Dino Gaudio said afterward. “You can intimidate them with shot blockers or you can intimidate them with guys taking charges—and I think Duke does the latter. You’ve got to be cognizant of that.
“We drilled that, pulling up, and we had a little walk-on standing in the lane at practice. But you’ve got to be able to go in there and pull up.’‘
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By Dan Collins on 01/18/2010 (5:03 pm)
Comments
Dan,
I know that it will do absolutely no good to post this but after 55 years of watching ACC basketball I am bailing out.
I will no longer watch Duke get all the calls which make a difference. After K’s news conference years ago accusing the ACC refs of UNC bias. His team has been included in the bias. He wasn’t interested in fairness, he just wanted to be included. (check the archives)
Visiting teams in the ACC almost always commit more fouls.
Bubble teams will usually succeed against lock teams.
(47 foul shots Va. Tech to 27 WFU) Check the stats.
I do now know if the officials are crooked or not, but with
all the years piled up with just two teams getting almost
all the conference championships and tournaments too. The record just seems to improbable without massive help from the conference office telling the officials who to help.
A sad statement from a BB player the other day “we knew
coming in to Cameron that we would be called for ticky tack fouls.”
The ACC is no fun anymore. Be back when I believe that when the ball is tossed up the game will be called fairly. Right now I do not believe it is and neither do most ACC fans I’ve talked to. I do think that it will all come to the point that other ACC schools will revolt one day and straithten it all out. And it will be embarassing for the league.
Carl Holder
Carl on 02/23/2010 (1:45 pm)
Dan, a couple of thoughts…had no expectations of a win at Cameron.
Still, what makes that intentional foul so egregious is the refs had the benefit of replay! The only call I can think of any worse was the non-fumble fumble call in the Orange Bowl…also upheld by replay.
I have no doubt Aminu has talent…but what put Wake behind the 8 ball was he was absolutely abused on the low block by the Plumlees.
Duke’s best offense was a missed shot because Aminu couldn’t box them out..McFarland did to his credit.
A couple of other notes, Wake is going to struggle when they are forced to play half court basketball. When they can’t push it up the floor with some consistency and get a few cheap ones, they scuffle…a lot of standing around in offensive sets.
Finally, I think it was pretty lame of Coach K to be running a full court press in the last minute of the game when it was already decided.
Andy on 01/20/2010 (2:43 pm)
As for the article that Scott found, I think we need only to consider the source before dismissing it. Although, I think that the type of shrill complaining exhibited by the article might have something to do with why Duke seems to get a lot of calls in Cameron.
On the general subject of the rough play in the ACC, I appreciated the physical play during the Duke game. I respect that two teams could compete so fiercely while also displaying good sportsmanship (i.e. there were no cheap shots). To steal a quote from Dan’s article, I think that Coach Krzyzewski said it best when you summarized the game as “...ACC basketball at its toughest and best”.
Hopefully the refs won’t try to clamp down on the physical play either. It seems like the refs in big games (like the NCAA tournament) are more inclined to let the players bump and push a bit more. So by allowing that type of physical play to take place during the ACC schedule, the refs are really doing the teams a service when the postseason comes along.
DC on 01/20/2010 (11:03 am)
Omg i read the article listed above and was absolutely floored by its blatant lies. Duke has always been a dirty playing team, from my time at Wake in the late 80’s until now, and to think they have the audacity to think Wake is a dirty team is reprehensible. Its bad enough this league has to keep the cameras off both the Maryland and Duke head coaches because they swear like sailors, but we should expect better from the ACC.
OmgWFU on 01/20/2010 (10:45 am)
Dan, you invariably call ‘em as I see ‘em. Good job.
Rick on 01/19/2010 (1:57 pm)
Dan- Please read this article I found on a Duke website and help me make sense of it at practice on Thursday. http://www.dukebasketballreport.com/articles/?p=31398
Freshman student manager, Scott
Scott on 01/19/2010 (12:15 pm)
Dan,
Heck, sometimes, for instance this game, I’d rather read your “takes” than watch the game.
Your insight is remarable. And I love how you say more than you say.
Bobby
bobby on 01/18/2010 (8:57 pm)
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