FanPost

Morehead St.; Ohio St.; Wake Forest

Morehead St. -I don't know a thing about them. I hope we win.

Ohio St. - Despite my near-constant Big Ten bashing campaign, I really haven't seen OSU play more than 20 minutes this year. You know why? Because the Big Ten is unwatchable. Does that mean they can't win? Perhaps not, but it means Pitino's assistants better get jacked up on Red Bull before studying game tapes. That is, of course, assuming we can get by Morehead St.

Wake Forest - I feel I'm much closer to my depth here. I've watched wake play on and off all season and a definite trend emerges.  You might think it is as simple as good wake, bad wake. But I really think there is something deeper and more diseased at work in their losses. Something much less solvable then "get your head in the game."

First let's applaud them on an excellent first half of the season. They played very well, surprised everyone and won 16 straight, earning the a No. 1 ranking in week 10 (thanks in no small part to the Card's victory over Pitt) before going 8-6 over the second half of the season. So what happened? How does a team storm through their early season only to get stifled by Va. Tech; Ga Tech; Miami; & NC State in three weeks?  Well, despite the fact that they did close out their season well with wins against Md. & Clemson (before losing to Md in the ACCT) the only explanation I can come up with is that people start seeing them coming and were able to solve them. They can rebound and shoot a high percentage when Teague penetrates. They are NOT (despite some claims) a good 3 pt shooting team. In fact they rank almost dead last in the ACC in that category shooting 31%. And with 13 assists and almost 16 TOs a game, one might be led to believe that with this team, if you cut off the head, the body will die.

Does this make them less dangerous for the cards? It doesn't make them less dangerous, it just makes then less dangerous then the highlight reels would l suggest. Will we beat Wake if both teams make it to Indy? I don't know - Teague is a great guard who could go berserk. But I think that their weaknesses and our specialty match up very well for the cards. Pressure the hell out of Teague, he'll make mistakes. Close the lane, he'll start jacking 3s and he's not all that hot out there. Wear them down (there is a considerable dropoff in minutes after their 6th man) and we should be able to take care of business. You know, if we can get by Morehead St. and Ohio St.

Go Cards!.