1. Raleigh News & Observer: Everyone put your hands together for NC State! That’s right, the Wolfpack got their first conference win at Pittsburgh. The Panthers’ league record is a little shinier than their non-conference play merited (they only beat one top-100 team according to Ken Pomeroy), but going to Pittsburgh and coming out with a win says a lot about Mark Gottfried‘s team. At least for tonight NC State was a good shooting team, led by Cat Barber‘s 31 points on 18 shots (he went 14-14 from the charity stripe). But even more promising was holding a good offensive team at bay on the road.
2. Hampton Roads Daily Press: Buzz Williams knows that his team’s record is likely a mirage. But he knows that it’s progress that the Hokies find themselves in situations where games can go their way. And he talks about exploiting small things–out of bounds plays and drawing fouls–to make his team more competitive. Both also are of utmost importance in close games when each possession matters a little more.
3. USA Today: This is a good story from Nicole Auerbach on Malik Beasley (and Dwayne Bacon, but he’s really just mentioned as Beasley’s friend and the other freshman star). Beasley’s parents are both actors, but his father also played basketball at a high level. The preparation he put in over the summer getting to know Leonard Hamilton’s system and his future teammates while taking summer courses is a little like learning lines.
4. Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Georgia Tech is a better team than a lot of people know. While the team’s conference record looks like Wake Forest and Boston College, the Yellow Jackets are much more efficient (62 according to Ken Pomeroy; 59 according to Jeff Sagarin). That should pay dividends at some point, though it may be too late to save Brian Gregory’s job. Gregory will have plenty of time to plan for this Saturday when Louisville comes to town, and that’s the kind of win that could start turning heads.
5. Syracuse Post Standard: So Mike Krzyzewski wasn’t happy about the no-call on a rebound at the end of Duke‘s third straight loss (though possibly it was karmic justice for another controversial no-call). But the real reason to bring up this article is to touch on Coach K snubbing a few Syracuse players in the handshake line. Handshake lines are stupid, but this controversy may be even stupider (or Boeheim could be sticking up for a friend).

mpatton (576 Posts)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 20th, 2016 at 9:35 am by mpatton and is filed under acc, microsites, morning 5. Tagged: buzz williams, cat barber, duke, Dwayne Bacon, georgia tech, malik beasley, mark gottfried, mike krzyzewski, nc state, pittsburgh. 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.