Wake Forest may have a demon of a time

The Demon Deacons will depend on a young lineup and a new coach this season.

A new head coach will have to find a way to replace the 66 percent of the team’s points scored last year by players no longer in Winston- Salem.

Sophomore guard C.J. Harris is the only returning starter for the Demon Deacons, now led by Jeff Bzdelik. Bzdelik was named head coach after Dino Gaudio was dismissed in the offseason.

“(Gaudio) did a great job, and a change was made,” Bzdelik said. “There’s a lot of different ways to coach. There’s a lot of different ways to explain things. No one has the right way, we just do the best we can.”

The Demon Deacons made it to the second round of the NCAA Tournament last year before falling to Kentucky, but the team will have to replace the two leading scorers from last year.

The Demon Deacons will look to their highly talented freshman class to replace point guard Ishmael Smith and the leading rebounder in the ACC last season, Al-Farouq Aminu. Aminu was the eighth overall pick in the 2010 NBA Draft after being selected to the All-ACC second team last season.

Bzdelik is no stranger to rebuilding programs. In 2007-2008, Bzdelik took control of the Colorado Buffaloes that managed only seven wins the year before. Last season, Bzdelik led the Buffaloes to a 15-16 record.

During his tenure in the NBA, Bzdelik took the Denver Nuggets to the playoffs in 2004 after winning only 17 games in the 2002-2003 season. The 26-game improvement was the sixth-best turnaround in the history of the NBA.

Led by sharpshooter J.T. Terrell from Burlington and 6-foot-7 swingman Travis McKie, Wake Forest’s freshman class is ranked as the 13th in the country, according to Scout.com.

“Once he steps onto the court, he can shoot it,” Harris said of his new teammate Terrell. “Right when he crosses half court, I think he can knock it down.”

Despite the highly touted freshmen, Wake Forest is still picked to finish last in the ACC.

“Our expectations aren’t any lower than they have been any other year,” senior Gary Clark said. “We expect to win, we expect to compete and just make every game a great competition.”

Clark, who averaged 3.2 points and 9.3 minutes per game last year, is the only scholarship senior on the team.

Of the returning players, Harris and sophomore forward Ari Stewart are the leading scorers. Harris averaged just less than 10 points per game and Stewart added 7.3 points per game.

This Wake Forest team has strong, young talent on the perimeter, but Bzdelik is focusing on defense and intensity.
“He’s real big on defense,” Harris said. “Talking, getting your feet moving, stuff like that. That’s one thing he really stresses emphasis on.”