Wake Forest Demon Deacons vs Iowa Hawkeyes Basketball Recap

Wake Forest 76, Iowa 73

The more things change in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, the more they stay the same. That’s good news for a Wake Forest basketball team that has looked awful for long stretches of the month of November. A difficult period in the life of a proud basketball program ended on the right note at the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

Wake Forest defeated Iowa on a long 3-point shot by freshman J.T. Terrell with 2.7 seconds remaining. A team named the Demon Deacons evidently likes devilish prayers, and that’s exactly what Terrell’s moonball must have felt like to a snake-bitten Iowa team that let multiple leads slip away.

Wake Forest led the all-time series 3-0, the latest a 57-47 victory over the Hawkeyes in Iowa City in the 2007 edition of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge. Three years later, the Demon Deacons collected yet another scalp for the ACC in this immensely popular TV-created intersectional event.

Fran McCaffery’s Hawkeye squad was 3-3 coming into the game. As an interesting historical footnote. McCaffery played for Wake Forest during the 1977-78 season, averaging 4.5 points playing in 28 games. He wishes he could have beaten his former school on Tuesday night

Jeff Bzdelik’s Demon Deacons were also 3-3 coming into the game, but unlike Iowa, the boys from Winston-Salem, North Carolina, moved to the sunshine side of the .500 divide. The Deacs were 8-2 all-time in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, including a 5-0 mark at home; those numbers only got better against an Iowa club that is transitioning from the old halfcourt-based style of former coach Todd Lickliter.

Both McCaffery and Bzedlik are in their first year as the head coaches of these programs.

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After leading by as many as 17, Iowa was dominating play by the end of the first half, leading 39-27. Wake Forest committed 13 turnovers, Iowa had 7 steals, and the Demon Deacons posted only one offensive rebound while shooting 10 for 26 from the field (38.5 percent).  The Hawkeyes exhibited balanced scoring with seven players cracking the stat sheet, led by Eric May with eight points and four steals. Terrell, before his long-distance heroics at the very end of this thriller, had 13 points and six turnovers for the Deacons.

Wake Forest came out of the locker room energized after the break and erased the Iowa lead when Terrell tied the score at 43, hitting two free throws just five minutes into the second stanza.  The Deacs pulled to a nine-point lead (62-53) with nine minutes remaining due to solid ball movement and good floor spacing plus a combination of smart shot selection and stingy backcourt defense.

Iowa was reeling for a period of time, but the Hawkeyes got back off the deck and whittled their deficit to just five points before retaking the lead at 71-70 with 3:12 to go. With the score tied at 73, Terrell – who was presiding over a ragged possession and looked to be in trouble – uncorked what looked to be a 33-foot shot, an absolute parking-lot-range bomb. It wasn’t a high-percentage attempt by any means, but all that matters is that it splashed through the nylon to give the Demon Deacons their biggest win of the season, by far.

For Wake Forest, Terrell led all scorers with 32 points (most by an ACC freshman so far this season) behind 7-of-11 shooting from 3-point range; he did not turn the ball over in the second half. C.T. Harris had 12 points for Wake, hitting 5 of 6 threes. Center Ty Walker had 8 points and 8 rebounds for the victorious Deacons.

Iowa was led by guard Eric May with 17 points and 6 steals. Bryce Cartwright had 13 points and 5 assists, while Melsahn Belsabe had 13 points and 8 rebounds.

By: Matt Zemek
ACC-Fans Staff Writer