1. Louisville Courier-Journal: Arguably the ACC’s best team may be about to get a lot better. The undermanned result against Virginia (which has always played kryptonite to Rick Pitino’s teams) aside, Louisville‘s Quentin Snider has been cleared to practice. There’s still no concrete timeline on his return to game action, but the Cardinals are a much scarier offensive team with Snider on the floor — especially since Tony Hicks broke his hand.
2. ACC Sports: While the world outside is chaotic, a well-worn (at least by Jon Rothstein) phrase still applies. Death. Taxes. And NC State‘s coach finding a warm seat after failing to meet expectations. Mark Gottfried  — someone who does not have a track record of sustained coaching excellence — was a hire in Raleigh that always came with an expiration date. And that’s why a season where the Wolfpack have plenty of talent but few quality wins to show for it is so important. The most damning part of NC State’s play this year hasn’t been its record; rather, it’s been the occasional appearance of quitting. Many times that has meant Dennis Smith playing his own game; sometimes it’s been lukewarm moral victory talk from Gottfried after an embarrassing loss; and other times it’s been a veteran player getting left behind on an important road trip. Gottfried has earned another chance because he’s shown considerable success during his tenure with the Wolfpack, but fans are right to worry that this season’s disappointment fits very well with his career pattern.
3. South Florida Sun-Sentinel: Thanks to a win against Virginia Tech, Miami is probably on the right side of the bubble for now. Unfortunately for the Hurricanes, their closing ACC schedule makes achieving .500 in conference play look like an uphill battle. A trio of away games at Louisville, Virginia and Florida State are nearly guaranteed losses; a home game against Duke and a road trip to Virginia Tech certainly won’t be cake walks either. Without a legitimate non-conference win to hang its hat on, Miami will likely need a decent showing in Brooklyn to feel secure on Selection Sunday. Jim Larranaga is right to point out that youth is his team’s biggest hurdle, but the flashes his team has already shown should frighten ACC opponents about the Hurricanes’ future.
4. Raleigh News & Observer: Roy Williams was all class when talking about Grayson Allen before tonight’s battle between Duke and North Carolina, describing the attention Allen has gotten as “way, way out of proportion.” And he’s right. Of course, Duke brought some of this on Allen because it never suspended him last season and his “indefinite” suspension earlier this year was for only one game. But ESPN‘s coverage of Allen has bordered on farcical, perhaps topped by Michelle Beadle calling for an opponent to knock him out. Here’s hoping tonight’s game is good enough to outshine the controversy.
5. The Pitt News: The eight-game losing streak is dead! Pittsburgh finally notched its second ACC win (the Panthers beating Virginia will never make sense) thanks to playing an outmatched Boston College.

EXTRA: Get ready.

mpatton (576 Posts)

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 9th, 2017 at 8:01 am by Matt Patton and is filed under acc, microsites, morning 5. Tagged: boston college, grayson allen, louisville, mark gottfried, miami, nc state, pittsburgh, quentin snider, roy williams. 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.