Deacon Beating

Well, yesterday may have been the best 40 minutes of BC basketball against a league opponent this decade. The Eagles absolutely positively destroyed Wake Forest at Conte, 112-73, in a game where everyone came to play, and I mean everyone. You could tell the Robert Morris loss must have stuck in their craw all week, because they jumped all over the Deacs from the opening tap, racing to an 11-0 lead and never really looking back. Ty Rice was spectacular, registering a 32 point, 8 assist, 2 steal command performance, but the role players chipped in steller performances as well, particularly John Oates, Rakim Sanders, Biko Paris and Corey Raji. Even whipping boy Tyler Roche woke up to bury three straight treys in the decisive stretch of the second half. This was just a great, great game for BC, one I hope they can build on as surprising Miami comes to town Tuesday night. As I have said in prior posts, if BC can finish 9-7 in conference play and win a game in the ACC tourney, they would be 19-12, and probably on the right side of the Bubble. That means they just have to go .500 the rest of the way, very much doable in a top heavy conference this year.

Looking ahead, BC catches a break with this year's ACC scheduling. At this stage, there appears to be only three elite teams in the league, UNC, Duke and Clemson, but fortunately the Eagles only have to play those three teams four times combined. And if you're going to lose, you might as well lose to the best team in the country, as your Strength of Schedule/RPI skyrockets just by showing up, another factor the NCAA committee looks at closely. So watch BC climb the RPI charts when they play the Tar Heels home and away, win or lose.