Deacs stop Cavs 69-57

WINSTON-SALEM -- There's a saying among creative people that amateurs borrow and professionals steal.

Wake Forest, using a defense closely associated with the family of Coach Tony Bennett of Virginia, did a hit job on the Cavaliers worthy of a professional in yesterday's 69-57 cakewalk in front of 13,831 at Joel Coliseum.

Ish Smith continued his all-conference-caliber play with 21 points, seven rebounds, six assists and two blocks and Chas McFarland contributed 16 points and six rebounds, but it was the way the Deacons shut the Cavaliers down with their Pack-line defense that allowed them to race out to a 24-point lead midway through the second half.

"So much of the credit goes to the Bennett family — Tony and his dad Dick," Coach Dino Gaudio of Wake Forest said. "I'm glad we guarded as well as we did today and our kids did a really good job on the defensive end of the floor."

Dick Bennett refined the defense at Wisconsin-Green Bay, Wisconsin and Washington State that Gaudio turned to two seasons ago in an attempt to shore up a glaring weakness in the Wake Forest program. While doing so, Gaudio had numerous conversations with Tony Bennett, who succeeded his father as head coach at Washington State.

Yesterday, while facing that defense, Bennett's Cavaliers had to hit 11 of their final 16 field-goal attempts to shoot 34 percent. Even with a 26-14 surge over the final eight minutes, Virginia was never closer than 10 in the second half of their first conference loss.

Wake Forest improved to 14-4 and 4-2 in the ACC with its 10th victory in 12 games. Virginia, which opened the ACC season with victories over N.C. State, Miami and Georgia Tech, fell to 12-5 and 3-1.

"I talked to Dino over the years, thinking, `Hey great, we'll never play against each other.' " Bennett said. "But here we are.

"But it's an effective defense, especially if your shot is a little off. It's hard to break down. There just aren't as many holes in it as I saw on our end, and I think as you get better defensively your anticipation gets better and you understand the focus of it.

"I think my dad would probably disown me, and claim Dino as a son after this game. He's Italian, so I guess it wouldn't matter. We're all family."

Virginia's struggles offensively had Bennett second guessing his decision to sit star guard Sylven Landesberg, last season's ACC Rookie of the Year, for the rest of the half after Landesberg picked up his second foul with 12½ minutes remaining. Down 15-6 at the time, the Cavaliers closed to 18-14 before Wake Forest retaliated with a 16-1 surge capped by C.J. Harris' 3-pointer at the buzzer.

"Landesberg is one of the best players in the league," McFarland said. "When he went out, that helped us a lot. Obviously it hurt them.

"It did give us a little more confidence defensively."

Bennett also pulled Mike Scott, the Cavaliers' second-leading scorer, after Scott picked up his second foul with eight minutes left in the half. But the 34-15 halftime deficit was more attributable to Landesberg playing only eight minutes in the half.

Landesberg had four points at halftime, but hit 4 of 7 field-goal attempts in the second half to lead the Cavaliers with 18 points.

"Usually I hold a guy out if he gets two fouls, and we just stuck to that," Bennett said. "We talked about it on the bench, and all of a sudden there's maybe 2½ and three minutes left and we said, `Boy to put Sylven back in now might be foolish if he picks one up.' Then they hit the last second 3 of the half and it stretched out.

"But I might have to reconsider thinking about that. Being down what we were down at the half, that's hard to overcome against a team like this that defends as well as they do."

The Deacons began the game like they face the Virginia defense every day in practice — which they do — by scoring their first seven shots on layups on the way to a commanding lead. With Smith making 7 of 10 from the floor and McFarland 7 of 9, Wake Forest shot 52 percent from the floor in both halves, for its fifth-best shooting performance of the season.

"Nobody scores in our practice," Harris said. "So it helps a lot that we're used to them jumping to the ball, and we know where they're going to be a help-side.

"That really helped a lot."

The play that pried open Virginia's defense was the high-low pass from the top of the key inside. McFarland capitalized by scoring four of the Deacons first five field goals. Al-Farouq Aminu delivered 2 of his 4 assists in the first 5½ minutes.

"We knew they were going to front the post every time down so we tried to screen a little higher so the high-low would be there," Farouq made a couple of really good passes and so did everybody else, and that opened things up."

The Cavaliers also suffered from not having anyone who could stay with Smith. Freshman Jontel Evans started for the third straight game, but struggled both offensively and defensively. Calvin Baker, a senior who started six games earlier, didn't make the trip to Winston-Salem because of what Bennett termed a coach's decision.

"Your ball pressure has to be pretty good," Bennett said. "We know how quick Smith is, and I thought we were a little soft on the ball. And when you're soft on the ball defensively, that got us off on the wrong foot. We were almost too scared of it, perhaps.

"There were very physical and took it at us."

dcollins@wsjournal.com.
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