Know Your Opponent: Wake Forest

By Matt Bowers

Wake Forest Demon Deacons (WakeForestSports.com)
Location: Winston-Salem, N.C.
Rankings: No. 99 KenPom, unranked AP
Record: 10-13, 3-10 ACC
NET/SOS: No. 104 NET, No. 39 SOS
Carolina Series History (Last Meeting): UNC leads, 161-66 (UNC 95, WFU 57 on Feb. 16, 2019, in Winston-Salem)

Wake Forest comes into Tuesday night's matchup with Carolina in the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum needing a win just about as badly as the Tar Heels do, as both teams claw to escape the bottom of the Atlantic Coast Conference standings. Wake and Carolina have matching 10-13 records, and WFU's 3-10 conference mark is tied with Miami for last place in the ACC. The Tar Heels are a half-game better at 3-9.

The Demon Deacons have lost two in a row, five of their last six and eight of their last 10. Then again, they have wins over Clemson, Boston College and Pittsburgh, all of which beat UNC earlier this season.

If anything, Wake (like Carolina) might be due for some good luck after being on the down side of some narrow losses of late. In the last six games, WFU has lost by two at Syracuse, by 10 at ACC leader Louisville, by 10 to Notre Dame, by two in overtime to Virginia and by three to Clemson.

Head coach Danny Manning is in his sixth season at Wake, looking for another NCAA Tournament appearance after reaching the First Four in Dayton, Ohio, in 2017.

Last year, Carolina blitzed the Deacons in Winston-Salem, winning 95-57 behind seven three-pointers and 27 points from Cameron Johnson.

This season's set of Demon Deacons don't shoot the ball particularly well from the floor (42.1 percent as a team) and get just 26.7 percent of their points from behind the three-point line, ranking 278^th in the nation. But Wake does get to the free throw line, shooting 75 percent as a team and getting over 24 percent of its total points from the line (sixth in the nation).

Senior Brandon Childress leads the Deacons in scoring at 15.0 ppg with a team high 100 assists. He's second on the team behind Andrien White in three-point attempts and makes while playing a team-high 34.6 minutes per game.

Junior seven-footer Olivier Sarr is second on the team in scoring at 13.1 ppg and leads the team in rebounds (9.4) and blocked shots (23). White shoots 39.1 percent from three-point range and leads the team with 45 threes while scoring over 10 points a game. Chaundee Brown missed almost all of January returned to the lineup but averages 12.5 ppg and 6.0 rpg (second on the team).

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