The Washington Post published a very nice, but somewhat dispiriting profile of Miami head coach, Jim Larranaga yesterday. I should probably rephrase that: the situation in Miami doesn’t seem great, but Larranaga seems up for the challenge. When the architect of George Mason’s miraculous Cinderella run accepted the job in Miami, he didn’t know the setbacks he was in for: a soon to explode NCAA bomb,  a knee injury to Reggie Johnson, and a torn ACL for Julian Gamble are just the highlights of what looks to be possibly the toughest head coaching gig in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

Miami opted to go the safe route with Larranaga (Credit: Nick Wass/Associated Press)

That said, Amy Shipley’s take has more than a few whiffs of optimism, mentioning the busy schedule of the coaching staff, the appeals to self-help culture (apparently, Miami will be living by The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People this season), and the somewhat mind-boggling revelation that the coaching staff was sending out a thousand emails a day, three to four days a week. Obviously, the profile is fairly interesting, painting Larranaga as a hard-working guy who is doing his best to help the Miami program turn the corner. The piece ends on an ambiguous note, suggesting that while Larranaga will persevere, it might not be enough to overcome all of Miami’s troubles.

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Despite a minor kerfuffle over Andy Glockner dinging Duke‘s schedule for not playing “true” road games, I think that we can all agree that non-conference road games are a thing of beauty. While old conference rivalries are their own distinct joy, and an on-going series between non-conference foes can be reliably entertaining (Kentucky vs. North Carolina, for example), there is something special when a team goes somewhere it has never been before and takes on the challenge of playing in hostile territory. And while prime time showdowns between two big schools in power conferences are entertaining, it is almost always better when Goliath comes to visit David.

This season, we have more than a few of these lopsided showdowns in the ACC. And, again, apologies to schools who scheduled great games at semi-neutral sites, but we will be focusing on the “true” road games.  Sorry, Duke. It is great that you are playing Temple, but it’s a shame that it is at the Wells Fargo center. Sorry, Maryland. It’s even cooler that you are taking on Temple at the Palestra, but for now, let us give credit to teams that are willing to go head first into the belly of the (mid-to-low-major) beast.

Coming Off A NCAA Tournament Appearance, UNC Asheville Will Take On North Carolina at Home

After last season’s atrocious showing, a loss to just about anyone would not be too surprising for Wake Forest. That said, the showdown with neighboring High Point University in High Point could spell trouble if the Panthers smell weakness and decide to go for the weakened Deacons’ collective jugular. Fellow ACC basement-dweller Georgia Tech has scheduled a whole host of road games on hostile courts. While they should be able to take on the not-so-terrifying lineup of Tulane, Savannah State, and Fordham, a loss to any one of these teams could put an end to any modicum of momentum Georgia Tech might hope to carry into the conference season. The Citadel gets points for sheer chutzpah by scheduling Clemson for their home opener, and Clemson gets kudos for accepting. Getting the most dominant basketball school in South Carolina to come to your house to open the season is a bold move. There is no doubt that the Bulldogs and their fans will be amped for this game, and the Citadel will certainly give Clemson their best.

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Last season, there was no sight that brought a grimace to a North Carolina fan’s face quite like watching John Henson walking to the free throw line. Henson shot 48.2% while attempting the second most free throws on his team. Of course, this figure is somewhat misleading: Up until February 22, Henson shot a miserable 38.9%. After February 22, he shot 66.0%. What happened? It’s hard to say. The question that remains is which of these two free throw shooting rates is the “true” Henson? This may seem like a relatively minor issue, but considering the importance of Henson to the top-ranked Tar Heels, the foul-shooting problem constitutes a potentially serious liability. Fortunately for basketball fans, Ken Pomeroy is on the case, using a very clever method for projecting John Henson’s likely free throw shooting percentage for the coming season. North Carolina fans, though, aren’t going to be thrilled with the results.

Is John Henson's Mid-Season Improvement At the Charity Stripe Real?

It turns out that sudden, drastic improvements in free throw shooting tend to be flukes. Typically, a bad free throw shooter will modestly improve from season-to-season, so Ken Pomeroy suggests that the low to mid-fifties might be a good starting point for predicting John Henson’s season free throw shooting percentage this year.  I tend to agree. Of course, Henson isn’t the only player in the ACC who has a hard time cashing in the freebies. Let’s take a quick look at the worst free throw shooters in the league (who attempted at least 40 free throws last season).

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The two big stories to come out of the conference realignment circus in the past few days involve Missouri, Texas Christian University, and the Big 12, yet both of these stories have potentially huge ramifications for the ACC. Despite a an attempt at a unity-preserving meeting of the Big 12 schools, it didn’t take long for Missouri’s wandering eyes to fix on to the greenest of green pastures of the SEC. The implications of this move would leave the SEC set at a balanced and reasonable number of 14 teams, making a raid on the ACC football powers like Virginia Tech, Miami, Clemson, and Florida State moderately less attractive. In turn this means that the ACC is more likely to not make additional moves, standing pat itself at a reasonable 14 teams (with a willingness to grow only if Notre Dame is involved). The end result of this domino effect, at least according to some Connecticut fans, is that UConn looks increasingly less likely as a candidate to move to the ACC.

The Wheel of Conference Affiliation Continues to Spin

Now, today, Texas Christian University threw a monkey wrench into all of this conference alignment calculus. Instead of eventually going to the Big East, TCU has received an invitation to join the Big 12, an invitation that TCU seems almost certain to accept. This is not great news for the Big East which seems to be showing more and more stress lines these days. The departure of TCU doesn’t bode well either for West Virginia or Louisville staying in a league that’s about to become even less of a factor in football. If those schools leave, then it seems like Notre Dame’s current positive feelings about the Big East may soon diminish, and maybe the ACC starts to look like an okay place to be. UConn would be only too happy to come along, but it seems that many Connecticut fans see the TCU news mostly as a bad omen, projecting a future where the Big East remains drained and the Huskies are stranded in the ruins of a once great conference.

For the ACC, the story is much simpler: Barring a now-unexpected SEC raid on ACC teams, or some really panicked maneuvering on the part of Connecticut, the Atlantic Coast Conference seems unlikely to expand anytime soon.

The lack of basketball being played right now is upsetting, and though Midnight Madness draws near, the gap between that and actual games is still disconcerting. To add even more heartache, NBA labor talks broke down yesterday making the possibility of at least some professional games soon less likely. The San Antonio Spurs’ French star Tony Parker showed his lack of confidence in the labor process by signing with the French team ASVEL recently. Things are not looking good for basketball fans who want to see their favorite players in action. Desperate times call for desperate measures, so without further adieu, I’d like to present the ACC Fan’s Guide to French Basketball.

The Ligue Nationale de Basketball is actually one of the better international leagues outside of Spain and it has the added benefit of being chock full of former ACC players. The league is divided into two divisions: Pro-A and Pro-B. Each division has eighteen teams and follows a relegation model where the worst two teams in Pro-A are relegated to Pro-B while the winner and runner-up of Pro-B is promoted to Pro-A. For now, let’s just talk about Pro-A, which begins its season on Friday, October 7, conveniently providing the basketball junkie with a quickly delivered fix.

Malcolm Delaney is Gone From Virginia Tech, But For Now, You Can Watch Him In France

The highlight for ACC fans might be seeing recent Virginia Tech standout, Malcolm Delaney playing on Élan Sportif Chalonnais based in Chalon-sur-Saône. Chalon is a talented team and features another ACC veteran in Alade Aminu out of Georgia Tech.  For North Carolina fans, Paris-Levallois Basket offers a chance for Tar Heel fans to witness a reunion of 2005 national champions Jawad Williams and David Noel. For those who want to see a reunion of the 2009 national champions, I have to direct you to Slovenia where Danny Green and Deon Thompson play together for Union Olympija.

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The Academic Progress Rate, a measure designed to roughly measure the academic performance of student-athletes that was instituted by the NCAA in 2005, has mainly been the scourge of schools that already have insufficient resources. While Southern and Grambling struggle to move beyond the post-season bans brought on by a failure to meet the required APR, the power conferences remain mostly unscathed by the increased academic requirements. The past year was an exception, however, when none other than the national champion, Connecticut, received a two-scholarship penalty and notice that future violations could result in much more severe penalties, including a postseason ban.

Georgia Tech Has an Academic Progress Rate Problem

The ACC, in the short history of APR, has largely been untroubled by the sanctions that result from this policy. The exception, however, has been Georgia Tech. Georgia Tech had the number of men’s basketball scholarships it could offer reduced by two during the 2007-08 season, and this year will have to work around another scholarship reduction. For a Yellow Jackets team that is coming off a disastrous season, has a new head coach, and that will basically have no true home court for the coming season (splitting time at the Arena in Gwinnett and Philips Arena in downtown Atlanta while awaiting completion of a new home), the scholarship reduction seems like salt in an already significant wound. While new head coach Brian Gregory seems cautiously optimistic, it looks like Georgia Tech may have to juggle far too many problems at once.

On the positive side, the conference as a whole has done very well at meeting the Academic Progress Rate requirements. Outside of Georgia Tech, Florida State is the only school that is dangerously close to missing the APR cutoff, scoring a 926 last year when the cutoff for immediate penalties is at 925.  The rest of the conference seems to be in pretty good shape, with Duke , North Carolina State, North Carolina, and Virginia Tech all receiving APR Public Recognition Awards from the NCAA, and the others safely above the cut line (currently, and at the 930 cut line which goes into effect soon).

A couple of weeks ago, Andy Glockner called out Duke in a column discussing teams that had easy non-conference schedules. The main thrust of his problem with Duke’s schedule was this:

There’s nothing wrong with the slate, per se. I just hate that Duke is only willing to play “road” games (outside of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge) if the game is moved to a pro arena in the opponent’s city.

This is almost a fair point. Sure, it seems a bit hypocritical for Duke to get so much mileage out of their home court while refusing to play on the home floors of their opponents, but I’m not sure I’d put Duke in the “Honorable Mentions” of a column about the teams with the easiest non-conference schedules.

Despite Duke's Tough Home Court Should the Devils Be Criticized For Not Playing Enough True Road Games?

I’m not the only one who thinks this either.  Dana O’Neil, breaking down the non-conference schedules for every ACC team, ultimately gave Duke the top rating for the toughest schedule in the conference. Considering that Duke is playing Ohio State in Columbus,  and Michigan State, Washington, and probably UCLA or Kansas on neutral courts, I think this is more than fair. Sure neutral court wins are less impressive than true road wins, but that’s still a hell of a murderer’s row that Duke will be facing this year.

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Gary Parrish makes an interesting case for this year’s North Carolina team as the best Roy Williams coached Tar Heel team ever.  He thinks that they will be better than both the 2005 and 2009 national champions. This is a bold claim, but he’s absolutely right given the criteria he’s using. Parrish makes the point that when all is said and done, this team will have more NBA draft picks and All-Americans than any of those other UNC teams. This is probably accurate. That said, it’s not a very good way of measuring how skilled a team is. Both NBA draft picks and All-American selections are measures of individual, subjective perception. These are measures that are grounded, ultimately, in opinion. It’s a fair way to look at teams, but for my money, I would rather evaluate and rank these teams by their actual on-court performance. So, for that, let’s take a look at out old friend, tempo-free efficiency statistics.

2011-12 Tar Heels Will Probably Not Be Roy William's Best Team Ever

Given the fact that the 2011-12 North Carolina team has yet to play a single game, we are going to have to make some assumptions to compare them to the 2009 and 2005 teams. Fortunately, this shouldn’t be too hard since this year’s team is mostly identical to last year’s team. UNC has already lost Leslie McDonald to injury, but should return Reggie Bullock back from his own injury.  No rotation players were lost to graduation or the NBA Draft aside from Justin Knox, and the team gains a number of skilled freshmen, headlined by P.J. Hairston and James McAdoo. So, let’s start with the 2010-11 team as the baseline and we can adjust from there. That team put up a 112.1 in adjusted offensive efficiency while posting an 88.5 in adjusted defensive efficiency. This would put the adjusted efficiency margin at +23.6 points per hundred possessions. This is quite good. But how does it compare to the two national title teams?

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Some afternoons, we’re going to do our best to point you to the developing stories and thoughtful writing from all over the ACC that has turned up during the course of the day.  So without further ado, here’s your Afternoon Delight.

Barnes And Three Teammates Set Wooden Award Record

• Four players from North Carolina have been named to the Wooden Award Preseason Top 50 list. Harrison Barnes, John Henson, Kendall Marshall and Tyler Zeller all made the cut for consideration of the most prestigious individual award in college basketball. Four guys picked from one school is the record in the history of the list, which is impressive for UNC, but less impressive for the rest of the conference; outside of the Carolina four, not a single other ACC player was tabbed. Who do you think should have made the cut? Matt’s got some thoughts that he’d like to share with you tomorrow.
• Jeff Borzello, of course, has the recruiting scoop for this weekend. While NC State had the big score landing Rodney Purvis, Wake Forest took an important step forward after last year’s disastrous season by landing 6’6″ small forward, Arnaud Adala-Moto. Likewise, North Carolina finally closed the deal on the big 6’10” Joel James. Both are nice gets, but Adala-Moto’s recruitment is an incredible sign for the Wake Forest faithful that Jeff Bzdelik might just be able to turn this thing around.
• Unfortunately, things seem increasingly dire at Maryland, with a mounting school-wide budget problem being compounded by an athletic department that has been operating with monetary losses for the past few years. While there has been movement to look for answers, it seems like so far there’s been little action. In late September, the Washington Post reported on a forum, open to the public, where ideas on how to fix the budget problem were solicited.  Sadly, the most widely suggested idea was that excessive profanity in the Comcast Center has been keeping families from taking in Maryland basketball games.
• A student paper for Boston College, The Heights, weighs in on expansion. For BC, the glass is half-empty and Matt Ulrich lays out the case for why the addition of Syracuse and Pittsburgh will hurt the Eagles in recruiting and league play. Boston College, positioned as a league middleweight, can’t help but see two to four extra losses in ACC play and tournament dreams that will now be even harder to achieve.

A couple of weeks ago, though by now it seems much longer, the ACC made waves with one of the biggest coups in conference realignment: stealing Syracuse and Pittsburgh from the apparently less than watchful auspices of the Big East. While this move would seem to bring even more talent into the already loaded Atlantic Coast Conference, the conference might have trouble retaining the talent.

The ACC, it seems, has a transfer problem. Looking at Ken Pomeroy’s list of Division I transfers who are eligible to play this coming season, the numbers seem a little startling: there are less than half the number of players transferring in to the ACC as those who transferred out.

An exodus?

Now, considering there are only five players coming in and eleven players leaving, this issue might seem insignificant. It might be insignificant. This season could be an aberration, and this player movement maybe means nothing. However, outside of a few marquee transfers (notably the Wear twins leaving North Carolina to play at UCLA and Miami stealing Kenny Kadji from in-state rival Florida), the trend seems to reflect very talented players who are content to move down a level for more playing time and a chance to star.  When talented role players feel like the stage is already too crowded and seek greener pastures, does this constitute a real problem? Is there such a thing as an oversaturation of talent and do ACC fans need to worry about it? The addition of Syracuse and Pittsburgh seems to speak to a prevalent mentality that the league can never have enough talent, but the movement of the players themselves suggests otherwise.