Column: A&T gives Wake Forest trouble before shooting goes cold
WINSTON-SALEM — It was the type of neighborhood showdown worthy of an encore next season.
Wake Forest hosted North Carolina A&T in a Power 4-mid-major matchup that might have looked on paper to be a mismatch. Coach Steve Forbes retooled his team as he always does with help from the transfer portal. A&T coach Monté Ross did the same thing, and his newcomers helped his team get bigger as he gets underway with his second season in Greensboro.
Those improvements showed in the opening minutes as A&T built a modest lead over the Demon Deacons. But two Wake Forest scoring runs erased that edge, and the Aggies suffered from cold shooting in dropping an 80-64 decision on Thursday night at Joel Coliseum.
The Aggies shot 32.8 percent from the field, including 11-for-35 from 3-point range. But Ross didn't need the stat sheet to explain the problem.
"We didn't make shots," he said. "They're a team that, sometimes, they struggle to score, and were a team, at least early on, we can score ... but there are going to be some times when your offense goes cold, and those are the times that you have to rely on your defense, and that's what we tried to do."
Ross said the Aggies got sloppy at the end of the first half, and when Wake freshman Juke Harris hit a turnaround jumper with 10 seconds left in the half, Wake Forest had a 39-33 lead that capped a run and which A&T was unable to overcome.
The Aggies were more than competitive for at least 17 of the first 20 minutes. Neither team was shooting the ball particularly well, but A&T was shooting well enough to open up a 21-14 lead at the 11:36 mark thanks to a 12-2 run. A pair of 3s by Landon Glasper, who led the team with 23 points, kept A&T on top 29-25 with seven minutes left in the half, but the Demon Deacons launched a 14-4 charge to establish the 39-33 halftime lead.
It took A&T just short of four minutes to get a field goal in the second half. Wake had already built a 53-35 lead by that point, and the final score was all that was left to be decided. A&T aided the increasing deficit by sending the Demon Deacons into the bonus with just under 12 minutes to play. In a two-minute stretch once it got into the bonus, Wake shot eight free throws and made seven.
"I thought the difference was that spurt that they made to begin the half," Ross said. "After that, I thought we got our legs under us and we were able to compete and still make some shots. We still didn't make the shots at the clip that we normally make them, but, you know, that's the way it goes sometimes."
Staying close to Wake Forest was a good sign for the Aggies, but that's not how Ross works. There was one thing he wanted to see from his team as it battled an opponent from the Atlantic Coast Conference.
"To be quite honest with you, yeah, winning," he said. " ... What I told the team at halftime is on the bus ride over, if you would have told me that we were going to be down six at halftime, I would have been ecstatic. When the game started and I saw how it was playing out, I was pissed that we were down six at the half because we should have been up six and it was our doing."
With the game in the books, Ross said he'd be happy to play his Triad neighbors once again.
"We always like competition. I think these guys provide great competition, and it's right down the road," he said. "So if the opportunity presents itself, we'd love to do it."
Forbes said he'd welcome the chance for a rematch as well.
"We try to play as many teams in North Carolina that we can." Forbes said. "I think coach Ross is doing a really good job, and so I think these are good games. I think they're getting better and better and better. I think they're going to win a lot more games than they did last season."
There's a lot of season left, and the Aggies have a long road trip ahead this weekend as they head to Charleston, South Carolina, for a game with The Citadel on Sunday. Two games are hardly a fair gauge of how the season will unfold, but Ross is feeling upbeat about what his second team can do.
"I'm confident in my team," he said. "And whoever we play, we're going to rumble, we're going to compete and I like the guys that we have ... I like the team that we have, and I know one thing, they'll lay it out on the line every single night for us."
