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Wake - USC Game Thread

I know they have beaten anyone good yet but Wake wins tomorrow and I might start thinking an NIT appearance is possible. Maybe.
 
BobStackFan4Life said:
I know they have beaten anyone good yet but Wake wins tomorrow and I might start thinking an NIT appearance is possible. Maybe.
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I said this yesterday and it very well maybe crazy talk, but there is enough talent here for us to be a bubble team this year. In my annual preseason bracket, I had Tennessee as a 10 seed in this years tourney. A win tomorrow could do a lot for this team.
 
BobStackFan4Life said:
I know they have beaten anyone good yet but Wake wins tomorrow and I might start thinking an NIT appearance is possible. Maybe.
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I think NCAA's are possibility if they can add some quality wins and avoid any truly awful losses. BC got all the preseason hype as the ACC's sleeper team, but I think Wake might end up as the surprise bubble team that finishes 7th or 8th in conference.
 
Of course, our OOC means well have to achieve that much more to even be considered.
 
Our 3 top players underperformed and we still won by double-digits. Our bench almost scored as many as our starters...which would be bad, except we won!

Madison Jones is increasingly impressive at PG.

Thomas, McKie, and CMM will have to kick it into a higher gear tomorrow. Washington is more than serviceable as Devin's back-up.
 
This win demonstrates improvement over the past few years. Unfortunately it still doesn't tell us much, other than that we are back to winning the games that we are absolutely supposed to win. USC was 143rd in Kenpom coming into today.

This season so far kind of reminds me of a bizarro 05-06. That year we were coming off the high of the CP3 years and were optimistic that JGray was going to step into that role as a senior. We had a good start against a soft schedule with a missed opportunity against Florida (Preseason NIT i think, florida went on to win their first championship that year). We played well up until Christmas and even beat a top 25 Wisconsin team at home in one of my all time favorite J-Gray games (he had like 35 points). Things fell apart after that. In my mind it always started with Trent's missed 360 against Duke but in reality that team had solid pieces but just couldn't quite fit it together.

This year we are seemingly coming out of the worst stretch in Wake Forest history and for the first time there is reason to hope. We have started well against a horrible schedule with a near miss against a top 5 team. CMM, Devin, and Travis are somewhat comparable to J-Gray, Eric and Trent. The 05-06 team had the pieces to be better than their 17-17 (3-13) record but they couldn't put it together. They had more talent (and experience) than this team does, but this team will have an easier schedule. Who knows, maybe things will swing the other way with this group.

Still think that leaves us short of the tournament though. Which is unacceptable in year 4.
 
bobknightfan said:
Came back to make one observation...in one post (and one post only):

I see many similiarities between this team and Carl Tacy's 4th team (1975-76). He also began with three down years after he inherited a program that was completely awful after Charlie Davis left in 1971. That 4th team began the season 10-0....but it had not yet learned how to win the close games when the competetion got a lot tougher in January. I believe there are stages in the rebuilding process. 1) You have to get some players. 2) You have to lose some tough games in the conference before you learn how to win those close games in the end. 3) Finally, you reach the point where you not only know how, but expect to win those close games in the end. (The 1976-77 team reached that final stage.) In most cases, this doesn't happen all at once. After starting 10-0 in that 1975-76 season, we lost 6 of our first 7 conference games (including OT loses against Carolina & Duke) before regrouping to win 6 of the last 10 to finish the season 17-10.

The next year that wonderful group of players (including Skip Brown, Jerry Schellenberg, Rod Griffin, Frank Johnson, Leroy McDonald & Larry Harrison) made it all the way to the Elite Eight....and within 20 minutes of the Final Four before losing to the eventual NCAA Champion, Marquette. (I was in Oklahoma City to see it.)

I'm not suggesting that this team is going to equal what the 1976-77 team did....but I do see many similiarities. And I am confident of one thing: This team has the potential to be a very good team. It has depth, talented...if young, in most cases...players at all five spots, a lot of heart, unselfishness, and is already doing a lot of things (defense, ball/player movement, etc) very, very well. And there is simply no way that coaching could not have been a part of this improvement. It is a shame that we have so many people who are so invested in failure that they refuse to see...or at least refuse to admit that they see...what is happening here with this team.

Like with that 4th Tacy team, I will not be surprised to see some bumps in the road in January as this team moves thru "Stage 2" of this process....but something good is definitely happening here and this team has the potential to develop into something special. It has already become a very entertaining team that is enjoyable to watch.

Now, I've said my piece. Those of you who are so inclined can get back to your depressing, never-ending negativity.....but this team deserves your support. (And don't tell me you support the team but not the coaches. You cannot support a team when you are openly hoping that it loses, just to feed your hatred for the coach.) I realize that this doesn't apply to all the people on this board....but it applies to a hell of a lot of them.
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I think that's what a lot of us are afraid of. If buzz's ceiling is Tacy we should go ahead and pull the plug now.
 
To borrow from the Panthers thread, you can all suck Madison's dick.

Dude is a baller and he continues to improve.
 
RChildress107 said:
I think that's what a lot of us are afraid of. If buzz's ceiling is Tacy we should go ahead and pull the plug now.
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Blind negativity is fun, huh? Bzz is recruiting four star guys. I know not every guy is highly ranked, but who cares if they blend well. This team seems to have good chemistry, something the Dino teams never demonstrated despite the talent. Tacy also took Wake to the brink of two final fours. I think we would all take that ceiling over the next couple seasons.
 
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Seemed that the offense ran well today. Lots of good open looks.
 
VaDeac said:
Of course, our OOC means well have to achieve that much more to even be considered.
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Good thing we've got a guy on the inside.

I can't even imagine the shit show if Wake made it in with this OOC and anything less than 11-7 and Friday in the ACCT.
 
It's a shame our '76-'77 team didn't know how to attack a triangle and two defense as that was the difference in the second half against Marquette. Coach Tacy must have been impressed - we used that defense from time to time for the remainder of his tenure.
 
RChildress107 said:
I think that's what a lot of us are afraid of. If buzz's ceiling is Tacy we should go ahead and pull the plug now.
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that would put Bz's ceiling as the 2nd most coaching wins in WF history. I doubt it's that high.

bkf is right about Tacy's credentials, arguably the best post season coach we've had (just didn't make it consistently)
 
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BKF's trolling has jumped the shark now that his new joke is that he thinks [Redacted] is the best coach we can get.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
05-06? We had zero PG's on that team. The dream was Justin could handle it but he couldn't and that was the end to that season. This team may have the best group of PG's I can remember. And by best I mean, as a group not just one guy that's a star.

Tacy was not perfect, but the guy won some really big games when it counted. His teams usually left it all on the court, just look at the semi-final losses to UVA (Sampson) and UNC (Jordon) in the ACCT. Retiring Ray Meyer and then losing to Phi Slamma Jamma by 6 (IIRC) in the final 8. Tacy couldn't get over the hump in the ACCT and win the thing, but then again he got most of his teams to Saturday.
 
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