Let’s see here – huge win over rival in most hyped game of the season on Saturday. The next Saturday, another big out-of-conference game that sure to get a ton of national attention. And in between, some little conference road game against a lower-tier team. Nothing to worry about right? Wrong.
Seemingly in an attempt to make my Rest Week post look dumb mere hours after I posted it (which actually isn’t too bad for me), Wake went down to Tallahassee tonight and lost to a team that previously failed to beat Texas A&M – Corpus Christi and Florida International.
It was actually a very entertaining game. In the first half, Von Wafer did his best Tim Pickett impersonation, lighting the Deacons up for a career high-tying 25 points. (aside: did you know that Von’s first name is actually Vakeaton? It’s a Swahili name meaning roughly “Yeah, boy! That’s what I’m talkin’ about!”) Behind Wafer’s hot hand, FSU broke out to a 19 point lead before settling down to a 14 advantage at the break. After taking 13 shots and hitting 9 for his 25 in the first half, Wafer evidently grew a mustache at half-time, because his teammates could no longer find him. He took only 3 second half shots and finished with 30 points.
Wake slowly whittled the lead down in until they finally tied it at 65 just after Adam Waleskowski fouled out by committing a charge and then screaming “bull shit” at the ref for a technical and his fifth foul. It seemed at that point that Wake had the momentum and would take over the game, but they never could.
Al Thornton took over where Wafer left off, scoring most of his career high 26 points late to fend off the Deacons.
The game seemed set for an incredible conclusion when Taron Downey was fouled while attempting a game-tying three pointer from 25 feet with just four seconds left. Downey swished the three, giving him a free throw for the win. Now, I should mention here one of the incredible sub-plots of this game. You might recall that Wake went 32-32 from the line against Carolina on Saturday? Well, to this point in tonight’s game, they were 18-18 from the line, for 50 consecutive free throws, an NCAA record. 50 in a row! As a point of comparison, JJ Redick, who is now officially the best free throw shooter in college basketball history, set the ACC record with 54 in a row a couple of years ago. So Wake as a team, had nearly matched the efforts of the best shooter ever. Incredible.
Back to the game – Downey at the line for the win. 50 free throws in a row. Downey missed it. Overtime.
In overtime, it became the Todd Galloway show. Galloway, the diminutive Seminole point guard, averages less than 6 points a game and hadn’t hit for double figures since November. Well, all he did was score nine straight points at a critical juncture in the overtime to give the Seminoles the win. Galloway finished with 21 points, a career high. If you’re keeping track, that’s three different Noles with career highs tonight.
All in all, it was a pretty damn fun game to watch. There were a ton of dumb plays down the stretch by both teams, but there were enough big shots to offset that.
I guess it’s not Rest Week after all. There are no rest weeks this year.