Deacs Defeat Buccaneers in Friday Battle.

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. - Back home in Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum for the first time in nearly three weeks, Wake Forest men's basketball (3-3) hosted Charleston Southern (2-4) for a Black Friday afternoon matchup (Nov. 24). The Demon Deacons outscored the Buccaneers in the second half by a margin of 43-24, while also playing stellar defense, to run away with a 71-56 victory.

Wake Forest dialed in as a unit on both ends during the final 20 minutes, holding CSU to a scoring drought of nearly five minutes and tallied a 43.8 field goal percentage for the game. Drawing a number of fouls to reach the bonus early, the Deacs went 24-of-27 from the charity stripe (88.9 percent).

The Deacons moved to 4-0 all-time versus Charleston Southern.

For the fifth time this year, four Wake Forest individuals recorded double figures in points. Cameron Hildreth led the way, posting 21 points while shooting 6-of-9 from the field and making all eight of his free throw attempts. The 6-4 guard was aggressive on the glass – collecting seven rebounds.

Kevin Miller (14 points), Andrew Carr (12 points) and Hunter Sallis (12 points) all rounded out the Deacon scoring quartet. Carr snagged a season-high 10 rebounds, four of which were offensive, and Sallis scooped a season-best three steals. Miller and Hildreth each handed out three assists.

Freshman forward Marqus Marion competed for 27 minutes to contribute in a well-rounded fashion, finishing with five points, four rebounds and two steals. His classmate, Aaron Clark, made his collegiate debut, picking up a steal and a block in just over seven and a half minutes played. Zach Keller added five points.

The Deacons were at their best near the rim, outscoring the Buccaneers 28-16 in the paint. Wake Forest also gave up zero points in transition (11-0 on fastbreak points).

Wake Forest remains in Winston-Salem for the next six games of 2023. First, the Deacs will face the Florida Gators inside LJVM Coliseum next Wednesday (Nov. 29), as part of the inaugural ACC/SEC Challenge.

Tip is set for 7:15 p.m. and the game will air live on ESPNU.

How It Happened

An early free throw from Zach Keller got the first point on the board for Wake Forest.
A coast-to-coast layup from Hildreth a couple minutes later gave the Deacs the 3-2 lead.
Sallis got on the board with a right-wing three for the 6-2 lead on the next possession.
A Sallis-to-Marsh dunk put the Deacs up three, 8-5, at the 14:21 mark of the first.
A drive from Miller tied it up at 10 two plays later.
- Another Miller bucket tied it at 12 at the 10:42 mark.
After a small CSU run, Marion hit a right-wing three to cut the Deacs' deficit to four, 19-15.
Two free throws from Carr got Wake Forest back within four, 21-17, at the seven-minute mark in the first half.
Sallis' second three-pointer of the game put the Deacs within three, 23-20.
An and-one conversion from Miller cut the Deacs' deficit to seven with 2:56 to go in the first half.
Hildreth hit his first three from the left corner to put the Deacs back within four with under two to go.
- On the next possession Sallis hit a jumper to put Wake Forest on an 8-0 run and within two points, 30-28, with 59 seconds left in the half.
Wake Forest went into the half down 32-28.
- Sallis led the Deacs with eight points and Carr had a game-high four rebounds in the first 20 minutes.
Keller started the scoring for Wake Forest in the second half to get his squad within three early, 33-30.
A jumper from Miller ended a short CSU run, putting the Deacs back five with 16 minutes to play.
Miller and Keller kept the Deacs within five, 39-34, with an alley-oop connection.
Two free throws from Miller out of the media timeout put Wake Forest back within three.
- A defensive stop and a driving layup from Hildreth on the next play had Wake Forest within one, 39-38.
Two defensive stops and two free throws from Hildreth gave Wake Forest its first lead, 40-39, since the first half.
Two free throws from Carr ended a small scoring drought for Wake Forest and kept the lead, 42-41, with 11:08 to play.
Sallis extended the Deacon lead with two more free throws on the next possession, 44-41.
Three defensive stops and three more free throws from Carr put Wake Forest up 47-41 and kept the Deacs on a 15-2 run over six-plus minutes of play with less than nine minutes remaining in the game.
A driving layup from Hildreth after back-to-back stops from the Wake defense put the team up, 49-43, with 7:20 left to play.
Four free throws on two consecutive possessions from Hildreth maintained Wake Forest's lead, 53-46.
Hildreth put himself on a 6-0 run with a driving layup to extend the Deacs' lead to nine, 55-46, with 5:30 remaining.
Sallis added to the offensive momentum with a bucket of his own to put the Deacs up by 10, 57-47.
A Miller-to-Carr dunk maintained Wake Forest's 10-point lead.
Carr got his first make of the game from beyond the arc with a right-wing three-pointer to put Wake Forest ahead, 62-51, with 1:44 to play.
Miller got a baseline steal off a Bucs inbound play to put Wake Forest up 66-52.
Hildreth extended the lead, 68-53, with a driving bucket at 1:04 left to play.
Wake Forest defeated Charleston Southern 71-56.

Stats of the Game

Andrew Carr registered his first double-double of the year, finishing with 12 points and a team-high 10 rebounds.
- The senior also recorded a block for the sixth-consecutive game with one against CSU, and is now five blocks away from 100 in his career.
Wake Forest suffered only three turnovers in the second half while outscoring Charleston Southern 43-24 for the final 20 minutes of action.
The Demon Deacons have had at least one player with 20-or-more points in each of the first six games this season.
- Cameron Hildreth - 33 points vs. Elon (11/6)
- Andrew Carr - 24 points vs. Elon (11/6)
- Kevin Miller - 22 points vs. Georgia (11/10)
- Hunter Sallis - 20 points vs. Utah (11/16)
- Hunter Sallis - 24 points vs. Towson (11/17)
- Kevin Miller - 25 points vs. Towson (11/17)
- Hunter Sallis - 22 points vs. LSU (11/19)
- Cameron Hildreth – 21 points vs. Charleston Southern (11/24)
The Deacons finished 24-of-27 (88.9 percent) from the free-throw line during Friday afternoon.

Key Moment

Over 2:26 minutes of play during the second half, Wake Forest locked in to make four defensive stops ahead of the media timeout at 12:33 – forcing turnovers by Charleston Southern.
- Cameron Hildreth then earned his way to the free-throw line after going for a high floater on a drawn foul, making both tries at the stripe and giving Wake Forest its first lead of the half (40-39) and going on an individual 6-0 run to extend the advantage.

Coach's Comments

"We started the game the right way but then it turned and we were kind of playing on our heels to catch up the entire first half. Going into the game, we wanted to win the glass, we did plus two, but we gave up seven offensive rebounds in the second half. We still gotta clean that up. We didn't give up one point in transition, that's outstanding. Our ball-screen coverage was really good. Guarding the ball was poor in the first half, but a lot better in the second. In the second half, we limited their threes. We turned them over nine times and they shot 27 percent in the second half. We were .88 defensively for the game and .70 in the second half, which are really good numbers. Aaron Clark sparked us coming off the bench. Defensively, he made some good plays. He was physical, made a great play at the rim on a back door. It wasn't a pretty game, but as a team that averages 78 points a game, they got held to 56, so that's a positive. We made free throws, we put pressure on them off the bounce, we were 24-for-27. That's part of the game. We did a good job of that as well." - head coach Steve Forbes

Up Next

Wake Forest remains in Winston-Salem for the next six games of 2023. First, the Deacs will face the Florida Gators inside LJVM Coliseum next Wednesday (Nov. 29), as part of the inaugural ACC/SEC Challenge.

Tip is set for 7:15 p.m. and the game will air live on ESPNU.

Next Event

Team Stats

Cameron Hildreth

Kevin Miller

Andrew Carr

Hunter Sallis

Players Mentioned

Andrew Carr

Aaron Clark

Cameron Hildreth

Zach Keller

Marqus Marion

Kevin Miller

Hunter Sallis

Wake Forest Athletics