It's been awhile since Wake's had a win worth bragging about. Beating Xavier is worth it, even if they're a bit off this year. It's a real basketball school, and what's better, Wake built a lead, only to let Xavier back in, so they had to earn the win.
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It's a big deal for the Demon Deacons program.
As he had said prior to the game, Xavier's Chris Mack was worried that Wake might cause turnovers for his team, and they did as the Musketeers coughed it up 20 times.
Travis McKie and CJ Harris were there normally reliable selves, scoring 19 and 15 each, while Cody Miller-McIntyre popped in 16 and shot 6-7 from the field.
We've seen some superb freshmen performances around the ACC, but we're not sure we've seen a rookie grab 14 boards lately. Well, Devin Thomas did it.
Xavier missed 28 shots and Thomas rebounded 10 of those misses. He had nearly half of Wake's total (32).
Miller-McIntyre said this afterwards:
"I guess because we know what it felt like to have a game we should have won, and let up and they come back and win. I think the fact that it had already happened before, we knew exactly what to do â not to get all crazy and turn the ball over.
"I think thatâs the main reason we won this game because we had already lost one like this before."
Consider this: if they had not blown the Seton Hall game, as Miller-McIntyre alluded to above, they would've won five straight. And if they hadn't lost to Richmond by two, then they'd be 9-3.
They're not obviously, but they do seem to be improving. Which is great.
We're not sure you can say that about Florida State.
Auburn? Really?
Florida State isn't getting much from their big men, a flaw underscored by Michael Snaer, as the highly competitive guard pulled down 12 boards.
Somebody has to do it. Kiel Turpin (four boards) certainly didn't. Boris Bojanovsky (7-3) got just one. Michael Ojo (7-1) didn't play. Robert Gilchrist (6-9) whiffed.
Forwards Okaro White and Terrance Shannon got seven and six respectively.
Turnovers, a FSU trademark, continue: there were 20 against Auburn.
Auburn just crushed them from the line, with the Tigers biting on 28-41 to FSU's 7-15.
We know Leonard Hamilton's team starts slow, but this is January now and they have losses to South Alabama, Mercer and Auburn. That's going to hurt.
Don't look now, but Georgia Tech is 10-2. As always this time of season you have to measure the schedule. They've played Rice, coached by former Cal coach Ben Braun, and Cal, coached by former Stanford coach Mike Montgomery, Illinois and Georgia. The rest is fluff. They beat Rice (in fairness, they were heavily hit by transfers) and Georgia, while losing to Illinois by 13 and Cal by 11.
So it's a mixed bag. Still, they're mostly winning the games they should win. Last year at this point they had already lost to St. Joseph's, LSU, Northwestern,Tulane and Mercer.
Freshmen Marcus Georges-Hunt and Robert Carter are both playing really well. Carter had a double-double with 13/12 while Georges-Hunt had 16.
Miami got a good first half from LaSalle before putting them away early in the second. They did a nice job making up for Reggie Johnson's defensive rebounding (he broke his thumb if you haven't heard): Kenny Kadji grabbed 11total and Julian Gamble had eight. Offensive rebounding is a different story: Miami pulled down seven. They'll miss Johnson there.
Durand Scott and Shane Larkin both hit for 18 points while Trey McKinney-Jones had 14, as did Kadji.
With tonight's games, the non-conference part of the season concludes. ACC play starts on Saturday with five games.