The Deacs had their 2nd exhibition game of the season against the South Carolina Gamecocks on Thursday night, and it really didn’t go any better than the first one.
I didn’t get to watch this one because it was streamed on some random website that I’m not sure anyone figured out how to use, but from what it sounded like on the radio broadcast, the Deacs did not improve very much from their first exhibition against Georgetown. Wake finished this one shooting 42% from the field, including a pathetic 2-14 (14%) from beyond the arc, and they were once again outrebounded 40-30 on the glass.
The biggest concern for me is that Wake played an entire 40 minutes of basketball and had just 5 assists, all of which came in the 1st half. In the 2nd half, the Deacs had 0 assists, made 0 3-pointers, and trailed by as much as 17 points before a late run made the score look better than it was. Wake even had a stretch where they went 6 whole minutes without making a field goal. That is probably a pretty bad sign, considering South Carolina was 13-19 last season and picked dead last in the SEC by pretty much every outlet I checked.
The lone bright spot in the exhibition game was once again freshman Gavin Placide, who finished with a team high 21 points on 6-6 shooting from the floor.
In his first 2 collegiate exhibition games, Placide has scored 35 points and missed just 1 shot. I doubt he will continue getting to the free throw line 10 times per game when the season starts, but his play so far is a good sign that he will be a major contributor this season.
Wake still has a couple of weeks to improve before the season begins on November 2nd against Maryland Eastern Shore. Let’s hope they use them well.