Halloween has come and gone, the leaves have begun to change, and the clocks have been set back an hour. That can mean only one thing—it is officially basketball season. The Wake Forest Women’s team starts things off against USC Upstate at 5:00 PM, followed by the Men’s team taking on Maryland Eastern Shore at 8:00 PM. Between the overwhelming success of the football team and the lack of expectations for both basketball teams this season, I won’t blame you if the start of basketball completely snuck
up on you this year.
This is probably a watershed season for both squads—the Men’s and Women’s basketball teams are at a critical moment for the future. The men’s team is coming off of their worst season since Steve Forbes took over as head coach in 2020. The women’s team hasn’t hit 5 conference wins in the last 3 seasons. Both programs have just 1 NCAA tournament berth in the last 15 years, both losing in the first game they played. That is simply not good enough. That combined with how much college sports are changing every year, it feels like the Deacs are on the brink of becoming stuck in irrelevancy in what was once their flagship sport.
While coaching is certainly an aspect of that, neither team has really been set up for success by the athletic department. According to CBS Sports, the average cost of an ACC Men’s roster is the lowest of all major conferences at nearly $12 million this season—3 teams (Louisville, UNC, Duke) spent over $20 million, 4 teams (Miami, SMU, Pitt, UVA) are over $12 million, and 3 more (Syracuse, State, Clemson) are over $10 million. Per the same article, Wake Forest is only getting a reported $5-7 million to build their roster, putting them in the lowest tier of all major conference teams. If the men’s team isn’t getting even half of what they need to compete, I don’t think its a huge leap to assume the women’s team isn’t getting anywhere close to enough either. It shouldn’t come as a surprise, then, that both team’s leading scorers bolted in the transfer portal in the offseason—Juke Harris (21.4 ppg) transferred to Tennessee, while Grace Oliver (14.3 ppg) transferred to Boston College.
Steve Forbes has come up short in the past and has failed to make the NCAA Tournament in his first 6 years as the head coach, there is no denying that. But when Wake is getting outspent by multiple mid-major programs, it’s hard to be confident that a change in coaches will accomplish much of anything.
The women’s team’s struggles are nothing new—the Deacs have made the NCAA Tournament just twice in the program’s history and have only 5 seasons above .500 in the last 25 years. While that should not be acceptable, its hard to blame Gebbia for underperforming at a historically difficult job. So, while it should be a make or break season for both head coach, there is no guarantee that changes will be made given another lackluster season.
This year will be a revelation for Wake Forest fans—without significant changes to every facet of the basketball programs, the performance of the teams on the court this season will probably be what is in store for Wake for the foreseeable future. Let’s hope they punch significantly above their weight.
