FSU Basketball: Will Noles make up ground in next couple of games?
By Kelvin Hunt
FSU basketball has been rather Jekyll and Hyde since beginning ACC conference play earlier this month. Can they put it together in the next couple of games?
FSU basketball (14-5, 2-4 ACC) got a much-needed win over Clemson earlier this week after losing back-to-back games against teams they should have beaten in Pittsburgh and Boston College.
Nevertheless, the Noles are in the bottom half of the conference with 12 games remaining. The good news?
About seven of those remaining are games the Noles should win over be favored to win. If they were to win seven of the remaining 12 that would put the Noles right were they were last season at .500 in conference play.
Ironically, the Noles entered the NCAA Tournament as a No. 9 seed last season and that’s where the latest projections from ESPN’s Joe Lunardi have them.
They have two winnable games in coming up against Miami and Georgia Tech. They’ve already beaten Miami once this year and Georgia Tech is just one game ahead of the Noles in conference play with that game being at home.
The question is will this team start to put it together like last season’s team? They’ve been terribly inconsistent with shooting, three-point shooting and defense since conference play began.
They’ve been playing hard for the most part, but not smart when it comes to shot selection and the sheer amount of fouls they are committing.
The second half against Clemson could be foreshadowing of what’s to come as the Noles put it together to overcome an eight point deficit to win by double digits.
I also think it’s a confidence thing too. The team hasn’t been shooting well and some of those shots finally began to fall.
This ‘Noles team can beat a lot of teams by shooting 45 percent from the floor and over 30% from three-point land while crashing the boards and not turning the ball over 15 times a game.
Next. 3 Takeaways from 'Noles win against Clemson. dark
The next two games will be telling. If they win both I think they’ll be in good shape going forward. They’ll travel to Miami Sunday for a 6 p.m. showdown on ESPNU.