Just over two minutes into Monday night’s matchup between Boston College men’s basketball and Wake Forest, DeMarr Langford Jr. made a sharp backdoor cut, shaking his defender, and received a perfect pass from Makai Ashton-Langford. It was just the play that BC needed to start the game with momentum on its side.
But Langford missed the dunk.
This play set the tone for a brutal night shooting for BC (8–10, 3–5 Atlantic Coast), which suffered its largest loss of the season, falling to Wake Forest (17–4, 7–3) by a final score of 87–57. Quinten Post led the Eagles in scoring with 13 points, and Ashton-Langford tallied 10 despite converting on just three of his 16 field goals.
Although BC came into the game just over 48 hours removed from its home victory over Virginia Tech, there was little resemblance between the two performances.
“We played 36 hours ago,” head coach Earl Grant said in his postgame press conference. “We played great, and we played hard. You gotta get back up and do it again. I thought mentally, we just didn’t have the juice we needed on both ends of the floor.”
In the first half, the Eagles struggled to get anything going on the offensive end, as the team shot just 20.6 percent from the field.
The Demon Deacons produced a well-distributed first half of offense, with three players tallying at least eight points. A 3-pointer at the first-half buzzer from Jaeden Zackery kept the game within reach, but BC headed into the locker room facing a 15-point deficit.
The second half was more of the same. Wake Forest maintained its dominance on both the offensive and defensive sides of the ball and quickly saw its lead grow to become insurmountable. Senior guard Alondes Williams built upon his standout season, notching 20 points and seven assists in the game, leading the Demon Deacons in both categories. Five players reached double figures for Wake Forest.
“Against a team like this, we have to capitalize on our opportunities, because they’ve proven they can score,” Grant said. “When we weren’t scoring, I thought it affected our defense, and we didn’t bring the energy and intensity we needed to stop them.”
Wake Forest looked unstoppable on offense, shooting 29-of-54 for 53.7 percent from the field. In contrast, the Eagles hit on just 18 of their 71 shots and finished with a field goal percentage below 26 percent for the second time this season, the first occurring in their 57–49 loss to Rhode Island.
“We’ve gotta learn from it. We’ve gotta watch the film and be honest with each other,” Grant said. “And then we’ve gotta move on.”
Featured Image Courtesy of Walt Unks/Winston-Salem Journal via AP
