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WINSTON-SALEM — On this night under the tie-dyed sky, Wake Forest's other star burned brightly and scorched N.C. State.

James Johnson scored 28 points and grabbed 18 rebounds — both career highs — to lead No. 13 Wake Forest to an 85-78 victory over the Wolfpack on Thursday night at the Joel Coliseum.

For most of the season, the 6-foot-9 sophomore forward has played a workmanlike supporting role to sophomore point guard Jeff Teague and his gaudy average of 20.3 points per game.

Not Thursday. Not when the Wolfpack (15-11, 5-8 ACC) held Teague to 12 points on 3-for-12 shooting. Not when Johnson helped Wake Forest (21-5, 8-5) pile up a 42-27 edge in rebounds.

"It was just time for me to come out and show some of the stuff I've been working on," Johnson said. "&ellipses; If they put a big (man) on me, I tried to go by him. And if they put a guard on me, I tried to post up."

It sounds simple, and it looked just as easy when Johnson scored eight of his points during a game-changing 20-2 scoring run midway through the first half. By the time it was over, the Demon Deacons went from trailing 22-19 to leading by 15 points, their largest lead of the night.

"James has been a warrior for us the last couple of games," Wake coach Dino Gaudio said. "He's been outstanding. He's the barometer for our team.

"He has it all from here down," Gaudio said, holding his hand level with his neck, "but when he gets the rest involved, when he's ready to go, then he really plays well. I was proud of him tonight."

Wake got key contributions from a couple of supporting players. Backup point guard Ish Smith scored 18 points off the bench, and 7-foot center Chas McFarland finished with 15 points and eight rebounds.

It was McFarland's first double-figure scoring game since Jan. 14 at Boston College, a drought of 10 games.

Wake needed every bit of its big early cushion, as N.C. State rallied and cut the lead to two points four times in the second half. Wake answered each time, never surrendering the lead.

"I thought we did a good job coming back after that first half," said Wolfpack center Tracy Smith, who scored a team-high 18 points. "But they got every big rebound. I don't feel like we blocked (Johnson) out as good as we could have."

Clinging to a 61-58 lead, Wake went on a 9-3 scoring run to stretch the lead back out. Ish Smith capped it with a 3-pointer with one second left on the shot clock.

N.C. State cut it to 74-71 on Courtney Fells' 3-pointer, but Johnson answered with back-to-back buckets inside, first on a drive to the basket and then on a dunk off Ish Smith's lob pass with three seconds on the shot clock.

"I thought our guys hung in there, made a run, got back in there," N.C. State coach Sidney Lowe said. "They had a couple of guys that made some big plays for them. James Johnson played well. A couple of times we had the shot clock against them and Ish made some big plays that let them keep their momentum going."

Ben McCauley and Farnold Degand scored 12 points apiece for the Wolfpack. Brandon Costner and Dennis Horner both had 10.

Costner, N.C. State's leading scorer at 14.3 points per game, wore a protective sleeve on his right arm that stretched from his wrist to his bicep with a pad at the elbow. Costner banged the elbow hard on the court in the Wolfpack's victory over Virginia last time out, when he was held scoreless for the first time this season.

NOTES: Wake freshman Al-Farouq Aminu, who took just three shots in the loss at Duke, played his second straight subpar game. He was 0-for-6 from the floor and scored just three points on free throws. ... Wake Forest hits the road for its next two games, then wraps up the regular season at home against Clemson on March 8. ... N.C. State plays its next two games at home — against Maryland at 7:30 p.m. Monday and Boston College at 7 p.m. Thursday — and finishes at Miami on March 7.

Contact Jeff Mills at 373-7024 or jeff.mills@news-record.com

N.C. STATE (15-11)

FG FT Reb

Min M-A M-A O-T A PF PTS

TSmith 20 7-11 4-4 1-4 0 2 18

Costner 36 4-13 0-0 0-7 4 3 10

McCauley 34 6-9 0-1 3-8 2 1 12

Fells 23 3-8 0-0 1-2 0 3 8

Gonzalez 22 3-7 0-0 0-0 6 3 8

Degand 19 5-8 2-4 0-1 5 2 12

Williams 24 0-5 0-0 0-0 1 2 0

Horner 22 3-4 2-2 1-3 1 3 10

Totals 200 31-65 8-11 7-27 19 19 78

Percentages: FG .477, FT .727.

3-Point Goals: 8-23, .348 (Fells 2-3, Horner 2-3, Gonzalez 2-5, Costner 2-6, Williams 0-3, Degand 0-3).

Team Rebounds: 2.

Blocked Shots: 3 (Costner 3).

Turnovers: 8 (Gonzalez 3, Degand 2, Williams, Costner, Fells).

Steals: 6 (McCauley 2, Fells, Williams, Horner, Costner).

Technical Fouls: None.

WAKE FOREST (21-5)

FG FT Reb

Min M-A M-A O-T A PF PTS

Aminu 24 0-6 3-4 3-8 1 1 3

McFarland 29 7-9 1-2 4-8 0 3 15

Johnson 33 12-16 4-5 3-18 2 1 28

Teague 33 3-12 6-7 0-2 4 1 12

Williams 29 1-4 0-0 0-0 3 2 2

Clark 16 2-5 0-0 1-1 0 0 5

Smith 25 6-8 4-4 1-2 1 1 18

Weaver 2 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0

Woods 9 1-1 0-0 0-2 0 1 2

Totals 200 32-61 18-22 13-42 11 10 85

Percentages: FG .525, FT .818.

3-Point Goals: 3-13, .231 (Smith 2-3, Clark 1-3, Johnson 0-1, Teague 0-3, Aminu 0-3).

Team Rebounds: 1.

Blocked Shots: 5 (McFarland 2, Teague, Woods, Johnson).

Turnovers: 12 (McFarland 4, Teague 3, Johnson 2, Aminu, Smith, Williams).

Steals: 3 (McFarland, Aminu, Williams).

Technical Fouls: None.

N.C. State 35 43 -- 78

Wake Forest 43 42 -- 85

A—14,108. Officials—Mike Wood, Tony Greene, Raymond Styons.