Team Preview: Presbyterian Blue Hose

Presbyterian comes into Tuesday night's game with a 5-6 record, but has won two in a row (including one against Auburn). Wake Forest currently sits at 6-5 on the year, and is coming off a loss at Xavier 83-75.

Before we jump into the stats, I will go ahead and say that this game will probably be a lot closer than people think. In my predictions I am going to stop using the KenPom and the AccuScore projections to make my pick because I don't think that we are going to mirror those projections very closely against mid-major teams. Although they may pick Wake Forest to win by 10-15, at this point we could lose to anybody, and will likely win any remaining games by less than 10 points. This is especially true for the game tonight. The Blue Hose stayed close with Kansas State early in the year, and also just beat Auburn (likely the only BCS team worse than us). So show up at the Joel tonight and give your support to the Deacs, they need it.

Now let's hope I put the reverse jinx on us and the Deacs go out on Tuesday and win by 30+.

Click through for statistical previews, as well as a roster and schedule for the Blue Hose

To put it in simply terms, Presbyterian is not very good at offense, and even worse at defense. They run a very slow, deliberate offense, but don't get a very good point per possession out of it. They are an example of a team that slows it down to limit possessions, yet still does not see a lot of benefits from it. Their eFG% is pretty good, and they are like Wake Forest in that area. The Blue Hose do not force a lot of turnovers, yet turn the ball over a lot too. Offensive rebounding has been a big problem for them this year, as well as getting to the free throw line. Just looking at the Four Factors makes me wonder how they have managed to win 5 games, yet they are similar to Wake Forest many of the same sectors. Perhaps this is more revealing about Wake Forest than it is Presbyterian. It would appear that they are disciplined when it comes to fouling. They rank 5th in the country in defensive FTA/FGA. This could also be a byproduct of slowing the game down, but they still do not send opponents to the line a lot.

Wake Forest has to find a way to shut down Al'Lonzo Coleman tonight. Not only is he averaging 14/8/3, according to KenPom, he takes 31.4% of their shots when he is on the court (66th in the country), and more importantly when he is in the game, 36.6% of the Blue Hose possessions end with a Coleman made shot/missed shot/turnover. That means he is going to do something with the ball when he gets it, and we need to be prepared for it. Unfortunately, at 6'7, 230, I am not sure who is going to guard him. I would assume that we will use a mix of zone and man like we have been doing. One thing that I think Coach Bzdelik will do to start is put Mescheriakov on him (6'8, 215) to try to frustrate him early.

Some other interesting tidbits about Presbyterian:

• Khalid Mutakabbir is 3rd in the nation in percentage of team minutes played at 96.2%. Pierre Miller is 13th at 92.8%.
• Mutakabbir is also ranked 3rd in true shooting % at 73.8. He is 21-25 (FT), 28-53 (2PT), and 22-32 (3PT). His numbers are eerily similar to Gary Clark's.
• Presbyterian's bench has accounted for 18.1% of all the team's minutes this year, which is 342nd in the nation (or the 4th smallest in the nation this year).
• The tallest player on the team is Joshua Clyburn at 6'8, and he only plays 18% of the team's minutes in a game. The 2nd tallest is Coleman at 6'7. 

Schedule

Scores & Schedule

	Date	Opponent	Result	Tickets	Audio/Video	Video Highlights
	Fri, Nov 12	at Vanderbilt	L 47-88	--	--	--
	Thu, Nov 18	at (3) Kansas St.	L 67-76	--	--	--
	Sat, Nov 20	at Eastern Kentucky	W 67-66	--	--	--
	Mon, Nov 22	at Bucknell	L 47-71	--	--	--
	Tue, Nov 23	at James Madison	L 56-65	--	--	--
	Wed, Nov 24	Princeton	W 69-67	--	--	--
	Thu, Dec 2	at Liberty	L 61-70	--	--	--
	Sat, Dec 4	at Virginia Military	W 92-78	--	--	--
	Sat, Dec 11	at (15) Missouri	L 55-70	--	--	--
	Wed, Dec 15	Jacksonville St.	W 74-70	--	--	--
	Sat, Dec 18	at Auburn	W 62-59	--	--	--
	Date	Opponent	Time	Tickets	Audio/Video	Video Highlights
	Tue, Dec 21	at Wake Forest	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Dec 23	at Old Dominion	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Fri, Dec 31	at Winthrop	6:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sun, Jan 2	at Navy	1:00 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Jan 6	Gardner-Webb	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Jan 8	N.C. Asheville	7:30 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Jan 13	at Charleston Sou.	7:30 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Jan 15	at Coastal Carolina	4:30 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Jan 20	High Point	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Jan 22	Radford	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Jan 29	Winthrop	7:30 pm	--	--	--
	Tue, Feb 1	at High Point	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Feb 3	at N.C. Asheville	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Feb 5	at Gardner-Webb	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Feb 10	Coastal Carolina	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Feb 12	Charleston Sou.	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Tue, Feb 15	at Radford	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Thu, Feb 24	Virginia Military	7:00 pm	--	--	--
	Sat, Feb 26	Liberty	7:30 pm	--	--	--
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Predictions

KenPom- WFU 76- Presby 65

My Prediction- WFU 72 - Presby 68

• Wake gets out to another slow start as Coleman has his way for the first 4-5 minutes. We bounce back and take a 5-7 point lead at the half. Presby cuts into that lead and maybe takes the lead for a minute or two around the 12 minute mark of the 2nd half. JTT leads the way for Wake with 21 points, and Travis gets yet another double double to pull away at the end. We hit our free throws this time, and the margin could be a little wider. Al'Lonzo Coleman is going to destroy us on the glass. He gets 25% of all defensive rebounds when he is on the court. That alone should amount to 8-9 rebounds. Throw in 3-4 offensive boards, and he ends up with 16 points and 12-13 rebounds

AccuScore- WFU 77- Presby 61

AccuScore Winning Percentage

AccuScore simulated this game over 10,000 times

Presbyterian

Wake Forest

11.6%

88.4%

Presbyterian

Forecasts PTS FGM FGA FG% FTM FTA 3PM 3PA AST STL TO OREB TREB BLK Al'Lonzo Coleman 11.7 4.4 9.5 46% 2.9 4.9 0.1 0.4 2.2 0.7 5.3 2.0 6.9 0.3 Khalid Mutakabbir 8.9 3.1 6.8 45% 1.7 2.4 1.0 2.3 2.0 1.3 3.5 0.6 2.6 0.3 Jake Troyli 8.8 3.2 7.5 43% 1.8 2.3 0.5 1.4 0.4 0.5 1.9 0.7 3.5 0.3 Josh Johnson 8.2 2.7 7.3 37% 1.5 2.0 1.3 4.3 2.2 0.8 1.9 0.4 2.9 0.3 Pierre Miller 7.5 2.6 6.9 38% 0.9 1.3 1.3 3.9 3.3 0.8 3.2 0.5 2.8 0.0 Zach Faircloth 5.1 1.9 5.1 37% 0.2 0.5 1.2 3.5 1.2 0.8 1.8 0.3 2.0 0.1 Walt Allen 5.0 1.9 4.0 46% 0.5 0.8 0.8 2.3 1.3 0.4 1.3 0.5 2.9 0.1 Ryan Hargrave 4.7 1.7 4.1 41% 0.8 0.9 0.5 2.0 0.4 0.5 1.0 0.7 2.6 0.1 PRESBY Benchwarmers 0.8 0.4 0.7 55% 0.0 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.6 0.1 TOTAL 60.8 21.9 51.9 42% 10.3 15.2 6.7 20.1 12.9 5.9 20.1 6.0 26.8 1.5

Wake Forest

Forecasts PTS FGM FGA FG% FTM FTA 3PM 3PA AST STL TO OREB TREB BLK J.T. Terrell 13.9 4.3 10.2 42% 3.2 4.3 2.1 4.7 2.0 1.3 2.2 0.6 1.9 0.0 Travis McKie 13.4 4.6 8.5 54% 3.7 5.2 0.5 1.7 1.5 2.0 1.6 2.6 8.6 0.4 Ari Stewart 12.7 4.5 10.9 41% 1.8 2.2 1.9 5.6 1.5 1.0 2.1 1.7 6.5 0.0 C.J. Harris 11.0 3.0 6.7 45% 4.0 4.9 1.0 2.6 3.7 1.7 2.2 0.1 3.2 0.0 Gary Clark 10.2 3.4 7.2 48% 1.8 2.4 1.6 3.1 1.6 1.4 1.0 0.9 2.9 0.1 Nikita Mescheriakov 5.7 1.8 3.3 55% 1.6 1.9 0.5 1.1 1.5 1.1 1.6 1.8 3.2 0.0 Ty Walker 4.9 1.9 4.1 46% 1.1 2.0 0.0 0.0 0.7 1.7 0.7 1.6 5.3 2.0 Carson Desrosiers 3.8 1.4 3.5 40% 0.9 1.1 0.1 0.2 0.4 0.3 0.8 0.9 3.1 0.5 WF Benchwarmers 1.5 0.6 1.5 42% 0.2 0.3 0.0 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.5 0.1 TOTAL 77.0 25.6 55.9 46% 18.2 24.4 7.6 19.1 13.0 10.6 12.4 10.4 35.2 3.3