Recap: Wake Forest Handles Business, Beats Miami 88-78

The Deacs took care of business on the road today with an 88-78 win over the Miami Hurricanes, avoiding what would have been a catastrophic loss to a team that has now lost 12 of their last 13 games. Wake had several chances to push the lead out and win this game in blowout fashion, but it’s hard to complain about a double-digit ACC road win.

On offense, the Deacs pretty much did whatever they wanted in this one. The Canes tried to play small ball for basically the entire game, and Wake was completely dominant inside with a whopping 50 points in the paint. When the Deacs weren’t getting layups down low, it was Cameron Hildreth torching them from distance—Hildreth finished the game with a game high 31 points and made 6 of his 8 3-point attempts. If the Deacs can get that version of Hildreth to show up in their remaining games, they should have no problem competing for the top of the ACC.

On defense, the Deacs struggled a little more. Miami’s small ball lineup diced up Wake’s 1-3-1 zone with what seemed like a million 3-pointers. Whenever the Deacs got the lead up to 13-14 points, Miami would hit a 3 and get it back to 10 points—Wake just never could find the kill shot to put this one out of reach. One reason for that was Wake’s inability to rebound out of the zone, even against Miami’s small ball lineup. The Canes finished the game with 17 offensive rebounds and 16 second chance points, which is definitely something that the Deacs must address as they approach the toughest portion of their schedule.

Down the stretch, Hunter Sallis took the game over for Wake Forest, scoring 15 of his 22 points on 6-7 shooting in the 2nd half. Despite Miami never going away, it really never felt like the outcome of the game was in jeopardy. Even when the Canes were throwing in 3-pointers, there was never a doubt that the Deacs could just get the ball down low and answer immediately—Miami seemingly had no interest in playing any defense in this game. That’s not really surprising, as the Canes have a 300+ ranked defense on KenPom on the season.

The Deacs have two Quad 3 games remaining before a string of nine straight Quad 1 and 2 games that will show us exactly what this team is made of. As long as Wake avoids any mishaps over the next 2 games, they have a chance to play themselves right into an NCAA Tournament spot.

Go Deacs!