Army @ Wake Forest preview

Wake Forest appears to have fixed whatever had gone wrong over its first five game - and that's bad news for Army as these two teams face off Friday night in Winston-Salem, N.C. The Demon Deacons have reeled off four consecutive victories after opening the season with losses in four of their first five games, and are coming off an 80-57 rout of Charlotte.

Things have gone so well for the Demon Deacons that they barely recall getting off to a miserable start; at least, that's how the players are letting on. "It's been awhile ago," said guard Keyshawn Woods, who had 15 points in the win over Charlotte. "We're making progress as a team and we're getting closer to where we need to be." With the ACC once again expected to be one of the most competitive conferences in Division I, Wake Forest will need to continue building on its momentum against lesser opponents - and the Black Knights certainly fit the bill. They're coming off a 71-66 loss to Binghamton in which they allowed the host Bearcats to shoot better than 51 percent from the field.

TV: 8 p.m. ET, ACC Network Extra

ABOUT ARMY (5-3): Black Knights freshman Alex King was one of the lone bright spots in Wednesday's defeat, scoring a career-best 15 points on 6-of-10 shooting in 21 minutes off the bench. Army has surprisingly been one of the best ball distribution units in Division I so far; they came into Wednesday averaging 18.9 helpers per game - 13th-most in the country - and dished out 17 assists in defeat against Binghamton. Jordan Fox paces the Army offense in scoring at 16.9 points per game, but has poured in a combined 32 points on 9-of-27 shooting over his past three games.

ABOUT WAKE FOREST (5-4): Junior guard Bryant Crawford leads the Demon Deacons in scoring at 16.3 ppg and comes into Thursday ranked sixth in the conference in free-throw success rate at 90.6 percent; he and Woods (87.1 percent, eighth) are the only teammates to rank inside the top eight in the ACC. Doral Moore adds 10.1 points and 8.3 rebounds and has been an unbelievably accurate shooter, connecting on an NCAA-best 83 percent of his field-goal attempts. He also has 16 of Wake Forest's 32 blocks on the season, including five in his past two games.

TIP-INS

1. The Black Knights have already had 20 players see the floor through their first eight games.

2. Moore hasn't missed more than two shots in any game this season.

3. Wake Forest has allowed opponents to shoot 38.3 percent from long range, good for 295th out of 351 Division I teams.

PREDICTION: Wake Forest 86, Army 66