If free throws were really free, then Ish Smith could be All-ACC.
Free, by one definition, means costing nothing, gratuitous. But the rules of basketball require a player to actually make a free throw to get the point.
No one can appreciate the irony better than Smith, a senior point guard for Wake Forest whose inability to consistently make foul shots has exacted a price on his own fortunes and, on a few occasions, those of his team.
No current guard in the ACC is quicker, none is more experienced and none has made more clutch plays over his career. But even after making seven of his last 11 free throws, Smith is shooting 43 percent from the free-throw line.
And a point guard who misses that many foul shots is a liability when he and the game are simultaneously on the line.
"It's a concern of ours, and we're working on it, but we can't dwell on it," Coach Dino Gaudio said. "He's going to be out there for us.
"He's got to be out there for us."
The curious part of Smith's problems is that he has shown he can make foul shots. His improvement from 29 percent as a sophomore to 79 percent as a junior was hailed as one of the real success stories of last season.
Then he opened this season by missing 19 of his first 29 attempts.
Smith, an effervescent, positive person by nature, insists that he hasn't lost his touch. But he obviously, in the very least, has misplaced it.
"I'm not worried about them, and I know for me to become one of the best point guards in the country, I've got to knock those down," Smith said. "I think God has blessed me with some talent, but to become upper echelon where I want to be, I've got to knock those down.
"It's no pressure. I'm just really going up there to knock them down, and I think there's going to be a snowball effect."
The last two games have been a source of encouragement. Smith corrected a flaw that had developed since last season, where he was holding the ball in front of his eyes and, thus, leaving his elbow pointed out.
"We showed him every made free throw from last year," Gaudio said. "We pulled every tape and showed him every made free throw."
Smith made 2 of 2 against Richmond and 5 of 9 against Xavier.
"The sophomore year it became mental," Smith said. "Last year, I just stepped up, and it became a snowball effect when I kept knocking them down. This year, I started out slow, but hopefully, I'll pick it up toward the end of the year.
"One thing it is not is mental. This year, obviously you've seen me, and I've been going to the basket more than ever. But it hasn't become mental at all, and it probably won't be."
Smith, after being relegated to a reserve role last season, is on pace for his best season. Coming off his career-high 28-point performance against Xavier -- when he hit all three of his 3-point shots, including two late that were two of the game's biggest baskets -- Smith is averaging 12.9 points. His previous best was the 8.7 points he averaged as a freshman, when he led the ACC with six assists a game.
Through the first 13 games this season, Smith ranks second in the ACC with 35 minutes a game, fourth with 5.8 assists a game, fifth with 1.8 steals a game and fifth with an assist-to-turnover ratio of 2:1. He also has blocked 10 shots, a remarkable statistic for a 6-0 guard.
"The thing about him is, I know it's in the back of his mind but it doesn't affect any other aspect of his game," Gaudio said of Smith's travails at the line. "That's the big thing with him. Some kids would dip their heads, but I'll tell you what, he guards, he rebounds, he goes and runs the show.
"He doesn't let it bother him."
dcollins@wsjournal.com
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