NEW ORLEANS — For all that worrying about Texas, it will be Wake Forest — not the Longhorns — facing UK in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
The ninth-seeded Demon Deacons, after blowing a 12-point second-half lead, rallied from eight down in overtime to defeat eighth-seeded Texas in New Orleans Arena. Wake Forest’s Ishmael Smith hit 10-foot jumper with 1.6 seconds left in the game to defeat Texas 81-80.
Texas’ Gary Johnson two missed free throws with 10 seconds left opened the door for the late-game heroics.
“The second part of the second half, Texas did a great job of keeping me out of the lane,” Smith said. “I knew I wasn’t going to be able to get all the way to the lane so I knew I had to pull up. Thank God I hit a big shot. We live to play another day.”
The Demon Deacons, now 20-10 on the season, are viewing it has a new window of opportunity. Before the NCAA Tournament, Wake Forest was in a serious funk, losing five of the last six regular-season games.
Now with Kentucky, the East Region’s No. 1 seed on the schedule for Saturday — game time is scheduled for 30 minutes after the conclusion of the Baylor-Old Dominion game at 5:40 p.m. ET — the Atlantic Coast Conference team has new life.
“Everybody knows that we can play,” said sophomore forward Al-Farouq Aminu, who finished with 20 points and 15 rebounds. “This is going to give us confidence. Hopefully we can carry it on to the next game.”
If nothing else, they’ll have a swagger should the game go into overtime. The Demon Deacons are now 5-0 in overtime games.
Afterward, Wake Forest head coach Dino Gaudio admitted to knowing very little about UK. The third-year Wake Forest coach said assistant coach Dave Wojcik was in charge of scouting Kentucky in the case the two teams met.
“I have not seen one second of Kentucky tape,” Gaudio said. “We’ll see a lot of it between now and daybreak tomorrow. …They’re just really, really good. They’re very well coached. It will be a challenge for us.”
If there is one thing Kentucky should be concerned with, it’s on the glass. The Demon Deacons whipped a tall, athletic Texas team on the boards 59-34, including 20 offensive rebounds. The rebounding dominance led to 42 points in the paint and 25 second-chance points. Aminu had 15 rebounds, and Smith, a 6-foot guard, pulled down 12 boards.
That’ll be a daunting task for a Kentucky team that has been outrebounded four out its last six games.That’s all from me tonight. I have about 20 minutes to catch the media shuttle and need to get some sleep. There is media availability back here at New Orleans Arena Friday afternoon, so be on the lookout for more posts and videos on Friday.
