Wake Forest University
6-12,3-12ACC
Clemson
14-5,8-5ACC
Deacons Drop Defensive Battle to Clemson on Wednesday Afternoon
2/24/2021 7:05:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Isaiah Mucius and Daivien Williamson combined for 29 points in the loss.
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Wake Forest fell to Clemson by a final score of 60-39 on Wednesday afternoon inside Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum.
Despite 29 points by the duo of Isaiah Mucius and Daivien Williamson, the Demon Deacons (6-12, 3-12) fell to Clemson (14-5, 8-5).
Williamson led the Deacons scoring effort with 16 points, highlighted by shooting a perfect 8-for-8 from the free throw line. The Winston-Salem, N.C. native has reached double-digits in 11 games this season, a team-high.
Mucius chipped in 13 points, good for his 10th double-digit outing of the year.
How It Happened
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Junior forward Isaiah Mucius knocked down his first triple to open up scoring for the Deacs.
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Sophomore forward Ody Oguama converted a 3-point play out of the under-12 timeout to cut the Clemson lead to three (12-9) with 11:31 to go in the first period.
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The two teams locked into a defensive battle down the stretch of the half. The Deacs entered intermission trailing the Tigers 29-15.
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With 14:23 remaining in the second half, Mucius made an and-one layup to put his scoring total over 10 points for the 10th time this season.
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Soon after the Mucius layup, Williamson stepped to the charity stripe and knocked down a pair of free throws to cut the deficit to 10 (38-28) with 14:02 left to play.
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Despite the offensive struggles, Williamson crossed the 10-point threshold for a team-high 11th time this season with 2:49 left.
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Wake Forest eventually fell to Clemson, 60-39.
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Williamson finished with a team-high 16 points, while Mucius added 13 points.
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Stat of the Game
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Wake Forest netted all 10 of their free throw attempts this afternoon. The last time the Deacs shot 100% from the stripe on at least 10 attempts came during the 2010-11 season, when the team also shot 10-for-10 from the line against North Carolina.
Straight From Forbes
"Clemson has a very good basketball team. They are very tough minded on defense and on offense. They have a tough mindedness to themselves to not only defend you but also come down and run their offense and get the shots they want, and they make them. They are very good at executing and they are very defensively on the ball. They're physical. We couldn't screen, not only lateral screens but even ball-screens we had a hard time with because they were so physical.
I thought today we showed a little toughness and urgency than what we did the last couple games. There was definitely some fight there. We just had some breakdowns. We did a poor job of hedging. We were hedging ball-screens with the five and the ball was still turning the corner. When you hedge the ball-screen one of three things is going to happen, either the guard is going to dribble towards half court, he's going to pick up his dribble, or he's going to run over you. Most of the time, Honor and Trapp and those guys were just beating the hedge and that made it hard on us. Guards were behind the play a lot defensively. They're physical. They set really physical screens and you could tell in the maturity of their bodies.
Offensively, there's no way we're going to win shooting 25 percent from the field. I thought we missed a ton of open shots, especially early. We got a lot of shots at the rim where we just didn't finish and that's deflating to your team when you get good shots and you can't make them. I thought we got a lot of open threes too. We had some possessions where they got us and guarded us well but we had some possessions where we got wide open looks and we couldn't finish. When that happens, it's tough to win."
Up Next
Wake Forest will be back in action Saturday afternoon against Virginia Tech for the first of a two-game road trip.
Tipoff against the Hokies is set for 4:30 p.m. and the game will broadcast on ACC Network.
