The Liberty Flames men’s basketball team will take on Wake Forest in Winston-Salem on Tuesday night. Tip-off is scheduled for 7pm at the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum. The game can be seen on the ACC Network. This will be the 2nd ever meeting between the two programs with Wake Forest winning the first matchup, 81-47, in 1997.
Wake Forest is led by 4th year head coach Danny Manning who guided the Demon Deacons to the NCAA Tournament last season for the first time since the 2009-10 season. Manning came to Winston-Salem after a 2-year stint as Tulsa’s head coach. The Greensboro, North Carolina native starred at the University of Kansas in the 80s before he was the #1 overall pick in the 1988 NBA Draft. Manning had a 14 year NBA career.
The Demon Deacons opened the season Friday night with an 85-83 loss at home to Georgia Southern. Wake was led by a trio of scorers that combined for 65 points led by Keyshawn Woods’ 25. ESPN 100 prospect Chaundee Brown made his debut with 21 points and 9 rebounds. The 6’5″ freshman wing is the highest rated recruit to sign with Wake Forest since 2008.
“Wake is really well coached,” Ritchie McKay said. “They have a great guard line. They’re bigs I’m not as familiar with because they lost Mitoglou and Collins. I’ve coached in that arena before, and it’s a really tough place to win. They usually get a great crowd and they’re ACC, so we will have our work cut out for us.”
This will be Liberty’s first meeting with an ACC school since December 29, 2015 when the Flames lost to Notre Dame, 73-56. Liberty has lost 22 straight non-conference road games with the last win coming on December 31, 2012 against Western Carolina.
