Miami Preparing for Challenge Against ‘Very Potent’ Wake Forest

Entering their home matchup against Wake Forest, the Miami Hurricanes, as victors of their last five games, are one of the hottest teams in the ACC. This win streak has featured a grueling road contest against a ranked Clemson team, a dominance of Duke and most recently, a triumph over North Carolina.

UM faced adversity against the Tar Heels, with starting forward Norchad Omier out for chunks of the game due to foul trouble. Head coach Jim Larrañaga thinks this win showcased his team’s preparation and created opportunities for other Hurricanes to succeed.

“I thought our guys were very well prepared to play Carolina on the road,” Larrañaga said. “I think our guys are playing with a good deal of confidence and they are learning that there’s no one player that has to have a great game for us to succeed.”

The Hurricanes will once again be challenged on Saturday at 2 p.m. with the Demon Deacons coming to town. Wake Forest has won its last three games and is led by ACC leading scorer and assist leader Tyree Appleby.

The former Cleveland State and Florida transfer has had a career year with Wake Forest. Appleby is averaging 18.6 points and 6.2 assists per game, both of which are career highs for the senior guard.

“Leading scorer of the league. He’s also good at finding the open man. He gets the big guys involved, gets them layups and dunks. He gets his shooters 3-point shots. He’s a terrific all-around player,” Larrañaga said about Appleby. “We have a number of guys, Nijel Pack will probably start on him, Bensley Joseph will guard him a lot, maybe Isaiah [Wong]. You got to keep a fresh body on him all the time because he’s gonna have the ball in his hands a lot.”

Appleby isn’t the only Demon Deacon that UM must gameplan against, as Wake Forest also features the ACC’s leading 3-point shooter in Damari Monsanto.

The South Florida native and former Eastern Tennessee State transfer has upped his game to a new level after a solid first season with Wake Forest last year. Monsanto is averaging 13.4 points per game in his junior campaign and is shooting 40.2% from deep on eight attempts per game.

Wake Forest also rosters a lot of size, with five of its rotation players measuring in at 6-foot-10, which is taller than any player on Miami’s team playing at least four minutes per game.

“The first thing is they are huge. I don’t know if they’ll start their big team but they have five guys 6-foot-10 or bigger,” Larrañaga said about Wake Forest. “The second thing is they’ve got terrific guard play … It’s a challenge for us to guard these guys cause they’re a very potent offensive team.”

Miami’s matchup against Wake Forest will air on RSN.