Passing Fancies

When Duke visited and overwhelmed Wake Forest in its first ACC road game of the season, the Demon Deacons sputtered to 33.8 percent field goal accuracy fueled by six assists on 22 field goals (27 percent). By contrast, Duke had 24 assists on 36 made shots (66.7 percent), signs of unselfish and smoothly efficient offense on the one hand and unresistant defense on the other.

“I do feel like I could have done more,” said Wake playmaker Brandon Childress. He wasn’t responsible for teammates standing around or forcing shots, but took the blame for the 22-point defeat in his failure to be a better floor general. “It’s very unacceptable, especially for the point guard, for a team like this to have only six assists for the night.”

On the year the Demon Deacons, who figures soon to dip below .500, are last in the ACC in ratio of assists leading to made field goals with a .453 conversion rate. Last year’s 11-20 squad had a .539 rate of assists per made basket.

Remaining at the current low level to season’s end is apt to produce another losing overall record, the Deacs’ fourth in five years under coach Danny Manning.

Presumably coaches prefer to run offenses that rely on seamless pass-to-basket teamwork rather than one-on-one maneuvers. Eleven of 15 ACC squads record assists on at least half their field goals.

At Georgia Tech, where postgame notes routinely include “Pastner’s Key Metrics”, assists to made field goals is a highlighted indicator of team performance. The goal for each Yellow Jacket outing is to achieve 60 percent efficiency in this regard.

Only North Carolina, Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech among ACC men have mustered that level of assists to field goals. The Jackets are third at .603 following a close home loss to the Hokies.