Duke Beats Wake Forest in "Back and Forth" Game
Duke beat Wake Forest on, 79-68 Saturday to move to 3-0 in the ACC.
“I thought my team played really well today,” said coach Mike Krzyzewski, who returned to the Duke bench after a one-game absence. “I thought this was a really great basketball game, today—back and forth.”
Wake played Duke tough much of the day before the Blue Devils pulled away late. “Steve (Forbes) has done a really good job,” Coach K said of the new Wake Forest coach. “He’s had more interruptions than anyone else in our conference with COV.”
The Demon Deacons went five weeks between games, from Black Friday to New Year’s Eve.
“He tried lineups against Georgia Tech and was beating Virginia in the second half,” Krzyzewski said of Forbes’ progress. “Today, he put out a lineup … I think he’s getting to know his team. The kid (Daivien) Williamson really played for him (17 points). He was a veteran for him today. They’re a tough team to defend. They defend well. The key to the game was our rebounding, specifically, our perimeter rebounding.”
Duke led the rebounding battle, 35-24.
“We got some big-time buckets where guys hustled and got it,” Coach K said. “Obviously, Matt Hurt had a big game (26 points). I’m proud of Wendell (Moore Jr.). Wendell did not score well (4 points), but that did not affect other aspects of his game. The first part of the season, if he wasn’t scoring, he didn’t play well. He played really well today. He was our leading rebounder. He played really well defensively.”
