ATLANTA — Wake Forest head coach Dave Odom wasn’t pleased with his team’s shot selection Friday night.
But with the kind of defense Maryland played, it’d be hard to blame the Demon Deacons for throwing up any offering that looked remotely promising.
“Defensively right now, they’re at the top of their game,” Odom said after the Terps knocked off Wake 71-53. “They’re awfully tough to score on. Our shot selection tonight was questionable at best.
“We kept taking it into the lane and not reversing the ball, and consequently we were shooting through arms and bodies all night long.”
Without much success.
The Deacons (19-10) scored a season-low 53 points in the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament quarterfinal and just missed shooting a season-low percentage from the floor.
And it had nothing to do with playing in the Georgia Dome. Wake’s 31.7 percent shooting just missed the previous low of 31.5 — reached Feb. 17 in the Terps’ 73-57 win in Winston-Salem. That night marked the second time all season Wake scored fewer than 60 points in a game.
Wake missed its first eight shots of the game as Josh Howard threw up several wild offerings in the middle of the lane and Robert O’Kelley couldn’t connect from long range.
Maryland (21-9) built an early lead in the rough-and-tumble first half. Bodies flew all over the court throughout the frenetic action, and the Deacs suffered a crushing blow when Craig Dawson left after one minute due to a separated shoulder.
Despite Dawson’s absence and 30-percent shooting, the Deacs trailed just 31-26 at halftime.
“I felt like we had played two of our best games against Wake Forest earlier in the season and I didn’t know if we could play that well three times,” Terps head coach Gary Williams said. “The first half was very competitive and I thought we were fortunate to be up five at the half. The second half, our offense caught up with our defense.”
Point guard Steve Blake sparked the offensive explosion with a pair of 3-pointers that stretched the lead to 39-28.
“We were beaten almost at will in Winston-Salem inside,” Odom said. “We made a concentrated effort tonight to do a better job.
“Both Blake’s shots came off a rotation as we were helping out in the post.”
Blake’s second 3-pointer started a spree led not so much by the Maryland offense as the defense.
Wake went 3:11 without a point and found itself trailing 49-30 at the 13:07 mark. Quick guard Juan Dixon, who finished with 15 points, capped the run with a steal and layup.
Byron Mouton pushed the lead to 20 points with nine minutes to play when he slid through the lane for a layup after a steal. The margin stretched as high as 22 points thanks to the 24-9 run Maryland used to start the second half.
“They just kept running the bodies at us and did it very effectively,” Odom said. “We just weren’t able to stop it.”
Maryland had little time to celebrate. Today’s semifinal at 4 p.m. comes against Duke.
“You better hurry up with your anticipation, because we play in just 15 hours,” Williams said somewhat sarcastically when asked about looking ahead to the matchup. “We played two great games with Duke.”
n
NOTES: O’Kelley was by far Wake’s best player Friday. The senior finished out his ACC career making 6-of-12 shots from the field, including 4-for-9 from the 3-point arc. He scored a game-high 20 points. … Odom said Dawson’s shoulder will be evaluated more fully today in Winston-Salem, but he’s optimistic that the junior guard will recover quickly. … Wake had just five assists to go with 16 turnovers. Maryland’s ratio was 19 to 12.
Today's News