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Tuesday, December 20, 6:30pm ET, ACCN
Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum
It's that time of year again when Duke plays one game over the course of 21 days. This is about as bad a game as Duke could ask for in the final exams rust spot - the first road game of the season, and it's against an ACC opponent that's certainly good enough to beat Duke but not good enough for a Duke loss to be viewed nationally as anything but a major upset.
On paper, Wake Forest appears to pack it in on defense, focusing on stopping 2s much more than on stopping 3s, and focusing on defensive rebounding more than on generating turnovers. Duke will probably need to have at least an average performance shooting 3s to win this game.
Two key players:
Tyree Applebee is finally having a breakout season in his 6th year in college, at age 24. A transfer from Florida, Applebee has had an uninspiring career until now. He suddenly finds himself with a 10.5 BPM, 128 efficiency on 25% usage, 32% assist rate and 54/44/90 shooting splits. He has gone from being a nobody last season (and all the seasons before that) to arguably being the best player in the ACC. He leads all ACC players in points per game and assists per game. There were not many signs that this was coming, so it might all be a big fluke. I think it's more likely that Applebee, like many other players, is figuring it out at age 24. The weirdness/unnaturalness comes from the fact that most players are playing professionally at this age and are figuring it out in their 3rd or 4th seasons in the pros.
Matthew Marsh is a 7-1 sophomore whom Wake recruited from England. He typically plays only about a quarter of the game, which may just be bad coaching. His numbers look great for a center, driven mainly by his 88% FG, with 17 dunks on his 25 FGA this season. Unfortunately for Wake, he doesn't appear to have any shooting ability aside from dunks - career 57% FT and 0-1 3PT.
The next game after this isn't until NYE.