1. The Agony (via Air Balled Free Throw) and The Ecstasy (via Tar Heel Blog): Life wouldn’t be complete without both perspectives on one of the best ACC games of the season. Only Syracuse’s win over Duke in the Carrier Dome topped North Carolina eking out a win over NC State last night. Of course there was weird officiating, but the fun was watching Marcus Paige and T.J. Warren trade buckets down the stretch (both finished with career-high nights). Voting for first-team All-ACC will be brutal this year.
2. Fayetteville Observer: Speaking of TJ Warren, Bret Strelow brings up an interesting fact. Warren is likely to be the first player from the Triangle to make first-team all-conference in two decades. Strelow looks at Warren’s ascent from sixth man to possible ACC Player of the Year. Here’s hoping that NC State gets another shot at the Tar Heels in the ACC Tournament in two weeks.
3. Syracuse Post-Standard: Patrick Stevens is watching the bubble. Historically he’s done an excellent job in picking the NCAA Tournament field, so definitely pay close attention to his work. NC State’s loss probably pushes the Wolfpack into longshot territory for the moment. I only see five (maybe six if a couple of the top tier lose in the conference tournament) ACC teams making the Big Dance as of right now. The question is whether NC State, Florida State, Clemson or Pittsburgh will nab another spot by finishing strong. There just aren’t many great wins on the resumes of NC State or Pittsburgh, but there are some real head-scratching losses for Clemson and Florida State.
4. Raycom Sports: This is old(ish) news, but with the ACC Tournament around the corner it makes sense to talk about now. The ACC decided it would be a good idea to put Miami between Duke and North Carolina’s fan sections this year in Greensboro Coliseum. That’s a sliver of a buffer. And the Florida State-Boston College crescent is the only thing keeping the Tar Heels from becoming a Duke-NC State sandwich. What really stands out about the seating chart is how small Pittsburgh‘s section turned out to be. Welcome to the ACC!
5. Winston-Salem Journal: In case Wake Forest fans want to forget the present in favor of better times (read: postseason times), there’s a new book out on Bones McKinney, the baptist preacher and head coach who led the the Demon Deacons to the Final Four a half-century ago.

mpatton (576 Posts)

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 27th, 2014 at 7:31 am by Matt Patton and is filed under acc, microsites, morning 5. Tagged: nc state, north carolina, patrick stevens, seating chart, tj warren, wake forest. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.