Where Does Wake Forest Basketball Stand After Start of ACC Play?
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The Wake Forest Demon Deacons are 17 games into the season and four games into ACC play. They sit at 10-7 overall and 1-3 in league play. This week, the Demon Deacons had a much-needed break before going to take on Florida State this weekend in Tallahassee.
At this point in the season, you can see that the ACC is much improved from where it was a season ago. As of January 14th, the ACC has 13 teams in the top 75 of the NET rankings. This shows a much more consistent league with more opportunities to pick up big wins. Let's take a look at where Wake Forest sits in the analytics.
KenPom/Efficency
As of January 15th, Wake Forest sits at #60 in KenPom. Some fellow ACC schools are just above them, as Syracuse is 58th and Virginia Tech is 55th. More important than just the overall ranking, let's take a deeper dive into some of Wake Forest's analytics.
Currently, the Deacs have an offensive rating of 114.5, which ranks 91st in the nation, and a defensive rating of 101.6, which ranks 54th in the country. So the Deacs obviously are playing at a higher level defensively than offensively right now, at least according to the analytics, despite the fact that their offense has picked it up significantly the past few games. Let's take a look at why this is the case.
What Wake does best, according to the anayltics is creating turnovers on opposing teams. They have a 21.3 turnover rate defensively, which is good for 19th in the nation. This is shown by the amount of defensive pressure Wake puts on opposing offenses to create these turnovers.
Going off that, Wake has a 13.0 steal rate defensively, which is good enough for 24th in the nation. These pesky takeaways are likely what is helping to bolster the defensive rating.
On the other hand, the Deacs are allowing their opponents to shoot an average of 56% on two-point baskets. This is 309th in the nation and one of the main areas where this team is weakest. Too often, opposing teams can get into the paint and score easy baskets against this aggressive defense. This is something the Deacs will likely look to correct this off week.
Offensively, Wake Forest is shooting 34.1% as a team from three (168 in the nation) and 54.1% on two-point attempts (103 in the nation). They are also shooting 75.8 from the free-throw line (64 in the nation). These numbers are not bad, and the three-ball is improved from last season, but look for Wake to continue to improve these numbers, especially by capitalizing more on two-point attempts in the paint.
What's Next?
The Demon Deacons now turn their attention to the Florida State Seminoles on Saturday. This is a very winnable one that the Deacs have to have. The game is at 6 pm and can be watched on ESPN2. After that, the Deacs will return home on Tuesday to square off with the SMU Mustangs, then hit the road for a weekend battle with the rival Duke Blue Devils. The road does not get any easier!
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Justin is a student at Wake Forest University. He is from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and aspiring finance major interested everything sports. In his freshman year, Justin completed an internship with the Wake Forest Ticketing Department where he gained some valuable insight into the sales and operations aspects of collegiate athletics. Before working with Wake Forest On SI, Justin was a contributing writer for Wake Forest’s student publication The Old Gold and Black. Currently, Justin serves as a student manager on the Wake Forest Men’s Tennis team. In his free time Justin enjoys spending time with his family and friends on the golf course and traveling.