1. Charlotte Observer: Saying Florida State didn’t have an answer for Brice Johnson on Monday night would be quite an understatement. Johnson’s ridiculous stat line was immediately overshadowed by the prime time Big Monday game between Kansas and Oklahoma, but it truly was a performance for the ages. Patrick Stevens puts the performance in perspective by noting that an ACC player has only put up as many as 39 points and 23 boards on four previous occasions. And none of those instances came after 1964. The Tar Heels’ defense will give themselves a lot of teams chances to stick around games, but when their two-point jump shots are falling (which happens at a higher clip than any team in the country), they’re nearly impossible to beat.
2. Syracuse Post-Standard: Syracuse‘s first two losses were easy to write off, as Miami may wind up as the best team in the ACC and the Oakland Zoo makes Pittsburgh a brutal place to play. But a home loss against Clemson? That’s a bad look. Part of the problem was that the game featured the smallest Carrier Dome conference crowd for a conference game in the last 15 years. The Orange could easily wind up 1-8 in ACC play if they’re not careful (the trip to Winston-Salem won’t be a cake walk), but it was also the last game without the services of Jim Boeheim, so maybe his return will right the ship. Syracuse looks all out of sorts right now.
3. Charlottesville Daily Progress: The ACC is going to be absolute mayhem this year. A few teams may end up rising above the fray, but Virginia Tech knocking off Virginia on Monday night seems like a sure sign of things to come. This was Buzz Williams’ first big win since taking the helm in Blacksburg, but it definitely won’t be his last (relatedly, the last two games mentioned in this M5 definitively establish that Boston College is at the bottom of the league). The top teams all have flaws and there are five of them. Don’t write off any team besides the Eagles at home this season.
4. Raleigh News & Observer: Before the season you could count me among the vocal skeptics who thought that the 30-second shot clock would not produce much change in college basketball. So far, though, both scoring and possessions are up (a renewed interest in calling the games tighter has helped too). As Andrew Carter points out in his article, 11 of 15 ACC teams last year failed to average 70 points per game. Thirteen teams are doing so this year. It doesn’t hurt that the league also sports four of the five most efficient offenses in the country (North Carolina, Duke, Virginia and Notre Dame), according to KenPom.
5. Fayetteville Observer: Bad news for NC State‘s Terry Henderson, as head coach Mark Gottfried said he won’t be back in action for at least two to three weeks. Normally a player like him would redshirt after missing so much time, but since Henderson is a transfer who has already sat out a year (a sixth year of eligibility is generally only granted when two seasons are missed for injury), it’s unlikely that his request would be granted. If healthy, Henderson would provide some much-needed outside shooting on the wing for the Wolfpack.

mpatton (576 Posts)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 6th, 2016 at 8:01 am by Matt Patton and is filed under acc, microsites, morning 5. Tagged: brice johnson, duke, florida state, jim boeheim, nc state, north carolina, notre dame, syracuse, terry henderson, virginia, virginia tech. 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.