Sophomores Bryant Crawford and John Collins led a balanced first-half attack and Wake Forest was able to hold on and defeat a stubborn Radford squad, 80-59, in the teams' season opener Friday night at Joel Coliseum in Winston-Salem, N.C.

Collins recorded his first career double-double with 18 points and 12 rebounds in addition to blocking three shots to lead the Demon Deacons to the victory in coach Danny Manning's third season.

Crawford finished with 14 points, eight assists and a pair of steals while Keyshawn Woods came off the bench to chip in 14 points.

The Highlanders of the Big South were led by Ed Polite Jr.'s 11 points.

Manning's squad started last season strong, but faded at the midway point and lost 15 of its last 16 games to finish 11-20 and 2-16 in ACC play.

This preseason Manning has stressed fundamentals and that attention to detail paid off early on Friday.

Wake Forest (1-0) held Radford scoreless for almost the first four minutes in the game.

Polite finally cracked the scoring column for the Highlanders at the 16:18 mark, but that would be the only points Radford would score until Randy Phillips' layup made the score 10-3 with a little over 13 minutes left in the half.

That advantage was enough to carry the Demon Deacons to a 36-28 lead at the half as Radford (0-1) refused to cave in.

Collins paced Wake with six points, seven boards and three blocked shots in the first 20 minutes. Crawford added seven points.

Polite had seven points for Radford, which shot only 30.1 percent from the field in the first half. For the game, the Highlanders connected on 24 of 67 field-goal attempts (35.8 percent).

Devonnte Holland's layup got Radford to within six at the start of the second half, but Wake's depth and athleticism started to prevail. The Demon Deacons went on an 11-2 run to take the wind out of the Highlanders' sails and cruised from there.

The Demon Deacons went 32 of 65 from the field (49.2 percent).