- Mode Analytics: Fair warning — you can spend hours with this visualization of where college basketball teams recruit. The only thing that I’d like to see from this is more years included. Obviously with relatively small rosters, things will fluctuate. Fun ACC fact number one: Georgia Tech is by far the most local recruiting school with 13 (!) players coming from Georgia (which is one shy of North Carolina, Duke and NC State’s collective haul in North Carolina). Fact number two: Duke doesn’t have more than two players from any given state (and only Illinois and Indiana border one another).
- Washington Post: Good stuff by Alex Prewitt putting Maryland‘s resume in (damning) context. To make a long story short, Maryland needs to turn things around. The Terps dug a huge hole in non-conference play, which means there’s no margin for error going forward. But as a (gulp) NIT bid becomes the expectation, what does that mean for Mark Turgeon? He’s had three years at Maryland and done well on the recruiting trail, but his teams haven’t been able to live up to their potential. What’s even more concerning is that, apart from his tenure at Wichita State, there’s not an obvious upward trend at Texas A&M or Maryland. Now I’m a firm believer of giving a coach four years except in extraordinary circumstances, but Turgeon’s seat is going to be very warm next year if things don’t improve soon.
- Charlottesville Daily Progress: Tyler Ennis isn’t the only freshman point guard turning heads in the ACC. London Perrantes has been a pleasant surprise for the Cavaliers in taking over for the offensively challenged Jontel Evans. Perrantes — as shown by the incident with Okaro White (a significantly bigger and older player) — doesn’t have a confidence problem. And what’s scary is Perrantes is an elite free throw shooter. If his jumper starts falling, Virginia will be nearly impossible to guard.
- Charlotte Observer: North Carolina isn’t an enigma anymore. Right now they just look like a team that isn’t very good. A lot of different people Andrew Carter interviewed talked about the Tar Heels’ toughness. Roy Williams even harkened back to Tyler Hansbrough as a model of a player who didn’t shy away from contact. That said, there’s still plenty of time for this team to turn things around. They have three great non-conference wins and at least three more chances for more marquee victories this season (to go with a very important match-up in Tallahassee). They might not want to exacerbate things by losing to Clemson on Sunday, though.
- Troy Nunes is an Absolute Magician: As someone who only watched the Big East peripherally, it’s interesting to hear Syracuse discussing whether Pittsburgh is one of its rivals (it actually sounds very similar to Duke fans discussing Maryland). There is also good bit on Dujuan Coleman’s injury impact on Syracuse going forward. And if you still have time, make sure to check out ACC Hustle, a short adapted screenplay of David O’Russell’s most recent film.