ACC Morning Five: 11.14.11 Edition

Posted by mpatton on November 14th, 2011

  1. Charlotte Observer: The biggest news around the conference (and country for that matter) is Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski attempting to pass Bob Knight as the all-time winningest coach in men’s D-I history Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden. The Charlotte Observer has two terrific articles up on Coach K’s early years as well as his relationship with Bob Knight. Both articles help frame Krzyzewski’s coaching career by looking at his roots. I expect there will be plenty of great content from around the country on Krzyzewski and the milestone this week, so definitely keep an eye on our Morning Fives for more highlights.
  2. Associated Press: In news that didn’t surprise many college basketball fans, CJ Leslie has been suspended the first three games of NC State’s season for $410 of improper benefits. According to the university, a former NC State student let Leslie borrow his car and paid for his apartment application fees. Losing Leslie hasn’t hurt the Wolfpack so far, as they beat UNC Asheville (who gave North Carolina more of a game than it bargained for yesterday), and absolutely eviscerated Morehead State in their first two games. I’d be surprised if any more of this came from the NCAA investigation.
  3. Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Speaking of suspensions, Georgia Tech’s Glen Rice, Jr., was also suspended the first three games of the season for a “violation of team rules.” That’s fairly harsh punishment for an internal violation, which I and Atlanta Journal-Constitution‘s Mark Bradley take to mean new coach Brian Gregory means business:

    “Brian Gregory isn’t a smooth talker. Ask him the time and he’ll tell you, but he won’t give you a tutorial in watchmaking. He’s a Chicago guy, and he’s as subtle as Dick Butkus. What has passed for standard operating procedure at Tech won’t cut it with this coach, who’s known, in suitable unadorned fashion, as BG.”

    Gregory’s squad is off to a great start after dominating Florida A&M Friday.

  4. Wilmington Star-News: Mark Gottfried has been “part salesman, part carnival huckster” trying to get the word out about his NC State team (and inspire some confidence in a weary and wary fanbase). Probably my favorite anecdote from the article is when Gottfried threw his jacket in disgust after a questionable foul call. The problem is that no one initially saw it, so he threw it again to the pleasure of the RBC Center crowd. NC State has a history of and Gottfried looks to try to join those ranks.successful, super-energetic coaches
  5. Raleigh News & Observer and Winston-Salem Journal: Jeff Bzdelik has his work cut out for him in his second season as Wake Forest’s coach after an abysmal 8-24 first campaign. He’s instituted a motion offense to help account for lack of a post presence. But both of these articles focus on Bzdelik’s optimism on the upcoming season. No, the Demon Deacons aren’t going to compete for the ACC crown this year, but he believes that he’s starting to build a solid foundation for future success. He also has a good 2012 recruiting class that should infuse much-needed talent and size to the Demon Deacon roster next season.
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ACC Morning Five: 11.11.11 Edition

Posted by mpatton on November 11th, 2011

ACC Basketball is upon us! The conference kicks off basketball with a bang tonight. Only two of the games are televised; luckily, they’re two excellent games. North Carolina is taking to the high seas to play Michigan State in the Quicken Loans Carrier Classic at 7:00 PM EST on ESPN. Meanwhile on ESPNU, Duke welcomes the talented Belmont Bruins to the unfriendly confines of Cameron Indoor Stadium in what many are (and should) be predicting as a potential upset at 9:00 PM EST. But on to the links!

  1. Columbia Daily Tribune: Former Miami coach Frank Haith‘s new job didn’t get started off as planned. In addition to cries of dismay from fans at the hire (and apparently the Columbia Daily Tribune, which offers this description of Haith’s departure from Miami: “A guy facing an NCAA Tournament-or-unemployment season at the basketball backwater of Miami was suddenly in charge of a senior-laden team built to contend for a Big 12 title”, Haith brought baggage after the Miami scandal hit like a ton of bricks over the summer. However, his luck since coming to Missouri hasn’t been the best either: Mike Anderson left him no recruits for this season; he lost an incoming transfer and had another player leave; and he lost one of the team’s most pivotal players in Laurence Bowers to injury. Ouch.
  2. Boston Herald: Steve Donahue is very, very patient. It’s hard to tell from reading this article whether Donahue is patient or just resigned. While it’s true you want to ground yourself in reality, it won’t help you recruit: “He’s conceded that he won’t win recruiting wars with ACC powers Duke and North Carolina for blue chip prospects.” The fact is, a good recruiter absolutely can win those battles (see: Sean Miller at Arizona or even Mark Gottfried at NC State in recent weeks). Boston College has something to offer high-level recruits that Duke and North Carolina do not always have available, though: playing time. The article also makes a great point that Donahue has a history of starting slow, as his teams faced losing seasons in his first six years at Cornell.
  3. Burlington Times-News: With the additions of Pittsburgh and Syracuse, the ACC won’t just see its overall basketball talent increase, but it will also have to change scheduling dramatically. Currently teams play 16 games, four of which include home-and-homes against rivals (i.e., Duke plays North Carolina and Maryland twice every year) and three other rotating home-and-home series. But the addition of two more teams will mandate the conference move to at least an 18-game conference season (basically, the same parameters would exist with two more one-time opponents factored in). Nothing is as satisfactory as a round-robin schedule where everyone gets two shots against everyone else, but conference expansion has made that impossible.
  4. Richmond Times-Dispatch: The writers over at the Richmond Times-Dispatch put together five trivia questions about the ACC. One very interesting fact I found was that Florida State has never won an ACC title (with the Seminoles’ last basketball title of any kind coming in 1978 in the Metro Conference). Although I’m going to disagree with number four: James McAdoo is not this year’s Harrison Barnes. Partially because Barnes came into last season so hyped (but mostly because guys like Barnes and Jared Sullinger returned for another year of college), the media hasn’t crowned any freshmen as the next big thing this year. If there’s an apt comparison for McAdoo, it’s Marvin Williams (the most gifted member of the Tar Heels’ 2005 National Championship team, who also came off the bench).
  5. Asheville Citizen Times: Looking for a pie-in-the-sky local preview of the UNC-Asheville vs. North Carolina game coming up this Sunday? Then the Asheville Citizen Times is your paper! The piece actually points out a couple of interesting tidbits: (1) the last time Roy Williams generously christened a non-BCS arena, the Tar Heels lost to College of Charleston in 2009 (the year after the National Championship); and (2) the Tar Heels won’t arrive in Asheville until 5:00AM Saturday morning before the Sunday game because of a cross-country flight back from tonight’s Carrier Classic. UNC Asheville is the favorite to repeat in the Big South and to receive a 16-seed for the Big Dance.

EXTRA: Former Duke basketball player Reggie Love will leave the White House by the end of the year. Love is currently working on an MBA from the prestigious Wharton School of Business at Penn and cited focusing on education as the reason for his departure. In addition to missing a very valuable teammate for pick-up hoops games, President Obama will also miss Love for his cultural influence: “The president also credited Love for expanding his musical repertoire, introducing him to artists like Nas and Lil Wayne.”

Image of the Day:

The Aircraft Carrier Setting for Tonight's Game between Michigan State and North Carolina Looks Epic

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ACC Early Signing Period Recap

Posted by mpatton on November 10th, 2011

With Signing Day buzz dying down, it’s time for a quick recap of the early signing period so far. Right now, the ACC has received 39 letters of intent and sports five classes in the top 25 according to ESPN. NC State leads the way with the third-ranked 2012 class, but North Carolina is close behind with the fifth-ranked class. Wake Forest, Maryland and Virginia check in with classes ranked #15, #17 and #18, respectively.

All Eyes Now Turn on Where Shabazz Muhammad Will End Up

A couple of big prospects are still on the board though, including top-ranked prospect Shabazz Muhammad, who is down to a number of high-profile schools including Duke. Tony Parker also still has Duke in the mix (and many analysts predict him signing with the Blue Devils in the spring). Amile Jefferson is also looking at nine schools including NC State, Maryland, Miami and Wake Forest (NC State is considered to be the favorite). All three are considered consensus five-star recruits.

You can find complete the roster signings after the jump.

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Florida State’s Defense: SI Tackles Defensive Metrics

Posted by mpatton on November 10th, 2011

The last few years have seen increasing acceptance of tempo-free statistics like rebounding percentage, true shooting percentage and the all-encompassing offensive rating. Extrapolating team statistics with a handy usage percentage, those statistics have become the best method for describing players. ESPN doesn’t list a player’s usage and offensive rating next to his name in the starting lineup, but it does prominently showcase stats on its website (albeit largely for the NBA). College basketball bloggers are still the most prevalent disciples of Jon Gasaway’s and Ken Pomeroy’s movement, but coaches aren’t far behind.

While a player’s offensive contributions can be fairly assessed with offensive rating and usage, individual defensive metrics have been hard to come by. This year’s Sports Illustrated preview may be a huge step forward with Luke Winn and Audacity of Hoops‘ David Hess stepping up to deliver a defensive rating.

Is Bernard James the Best Defender in the Country?

Fair warning, the article on the web isn’t formatted very well, but the magazine piece should be significantly better. The five teams covered were Florida State, North Carolina, Ohio State, Connecticut and Vanderbilt. The findings are enlightening. Here’s a large image of all of the tables if you want to see the different teams. For now, I’ll just look at Florida State.

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ACC Morning Five: 11.10.11 Edition

Posted by mpatton on November 10th, 2011

[ed. note — for some reason, this scheduled post did not publish this morning; for that oversight, we apologize.]

  1. Tar Heel Fan Blog: In honor of tomorrow and the inaugural Carrier Classic, Tar Heel Fan Blog has Top Gun quotes applied to the North Carolina basketball team. These are absolutely hilarious. I was going to quote my favorites and realized that almost all of them count. Well here’s a shot anyway.

    John Henson blocks a shot: “Negative Ghost Rider the pattern in full.” (h/t: @SamWalkerOBX)
    A player attempts to make a play, fails, and turns the ball over [Author’s Note: this is also called “The Plumlee Post Move”]: “Son, your ego’s writing checks your body can’t cash”
    Roy [Williams] puts Blue Steel in the game: “Too close for missiles, switching to guns.” (h/t @tarbender2)

    The moral of this story is that Twitter memes are awesome (and ACC Basketball starts tomorrow).

  2. Grantland – ESPN: Mark Titus (Club Trillion) gives his ACC preview with a nice dose of subjectivity. He joined the Bernard James bandwagon, which I’ve been driving since this offseason. I have a few disagreements though. The first is that Harrison Barnes is underrated by casual college basketball fans. Maybe it’s because I live in ACC country, but casual ACC fans do not underrate Barnes. Most acknowledge his slow start last year, but he’s one of the top two choices to win National Player of the Year (with a player in Jared Sullinger who was much more consistent)! My other qualm was putting Duke as the most overrated team. I agree Duke is overrated nationally (the “most” is a stretch, but since only Duke and North Carolina are ranked from the ACC…), but this is an ACC preview. You could believe Duke is overrated if you think Florida State will take second place, but otherwise you’d think Duke is correctly rated. Regardless, it’s a fun article.
  3. Raleigh News and Observer: Caulton Tudor thinks NC State can be the third best team in the ACC. No not this year, but consistently. I’ll hesitantly agree with him, but one thing beat writers often struggle with is tempering expectations for the teams they cover. It’s human nature to see the positive spins and start to empathize with people you see every day. But this article really undercuts both the recent success of Florida State (the clear third best team in the league the last couple of years) and the fact that the league’s relative slump is probably cyclical. Not to mention the fact that Syracuse and Pittsburgh are joining, which isn’t going to make the ACC any easier. All that said, I agree that a 9-7 ACC record is a perfectly reasonable goal for NC State this season.
  4. Washington Times: It’s been going under the radar recently, but Maryland‘s athletic department is in serious financial trouble. So much trouble in fact that the Terrapins have reportedly decided to cut both men’s and women’s varsity swimming and water polo to help rein in the costs. Currently, Maryland has 27 varsity teams, which is good for third in the ACC behind North Carolina and Boston College, but the Terps are not alone in getting rid of its swimming programs: just in the ACC, Clemson is also currently “phasing out” its swimming programs.
  5. Fox Sports Carolinas: Andrew Jones joins the band of reporters who are cautiously optimistic about Seth Curry‘s second shot at taking over the point guard position at Duke this year. An interesting point is that Mike Krzyzewski “insists that his team really doesn’t have a point guard, that once the ball gets in motion on offense the players just play. The Devils run a motion offense, do a lot of read and reacting, which stems from the motion, and sometimes run set plays.” That could be true, but it’s tough to run an effective offense without someone who can handle the ball and make plays when the game is on the line. Will that be Curry?

EXTRA: Covers.com released the Caesar’s over/under of conference wins for some of the top basketball teams in the country. Duke and North Carolina are the only two ACC teams to make the list. The casino places the line for the Tar Heels at 14.5, meaning the Tar Heels can only lose one game (I’d take the under; North Carolina wasn’t a juggernaut last year and the Heels should be beatable this year). Duke’s line is listed at 13, which seems very high as well. Maybe Duke will get things together, but based on the team’s exhibition struggles, the Blue Devils will drop at least three games in conference play. Other highlights include Ohio State set at 15 (the Buckeyes play 18 conference games), and Harvard set at 12.5 (the Ivy League has a 14-game schedule).

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ACC Morning Five: 11.09.11 Edition

Posted by mpatton on November 9th, 2011

  1. Washington Post: Mike Scott will be very important for Virginia, and in more ways than filling up the stat sheets. Sure his double-figure scoring and double-figure rebounding should help a middling offense and horrendous offensive rebounding squad improve in those areas this season. But more importantly, he’ll draw defenders and allow Joe Harris to move back to small forward. That’s fairly significant, as Harris (a 6’6″ sophomore) was forced to play the power forward spot despite being the team’s most consistent outside shooter last year. Scott should also keep defenses honest in the paint, which should allow an already very good perimeter shooting team more openings. Basically, Mike Scott is the only reason it’s not laughable for the media to rank Tony Bennett’s squad fourth in the conference, as the WaPo observes.
  2. Charlotte Observer: A hallmark of Mike Krzyzewski-coached teams is gritty, overplaying man-to-man defense that’s especially effective in keeping opponents from getting open perimeter looks. However, a quick glance at Duke‘s backcourt (Seth Curry, Andre Dawkins and Austin Rivers) doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence. The questions proved legitimate in Duke’s preseason scrimmage, as D-II Bellarmine managed to knock down eight outside buckets. Duke doesn’t have much time though, as Belmont made over nine threes a game last season (at a 38% clip). Oh, and the Bruins won 30 games last year and bring back nearly all of their talent. Do I hear a non-conference upset special brewing in Cameron Indoor this Friday?
  3. Fayetteville Observer: Speaking of Duke generalizations, Bret Strelow breaks down the importance of big men for the Blue Devils’ upcoming season. And if you look at the roster, it makes sense. How many teams have two athletic 6’10” players and a 6’11” guy who gets buckets? Not many. But Duke’s current frontcourt has had limited success so far, even if Miles Plumlee, Mason Plumlee and Ryan Kelly all seem capable of breakout seasons. They’re also fighting against the stereotype that Duke big men struggle. Exhibition play tends to overrate frontcourts mightily (if you ask the above question about a D-II school, no matter what caliber, the answer will be an emphatic “no”), but the Plumlee brothers have looked especially good. To live up to its top-five potential Duke needs one of its forwards to have a star campaign.
  4. Charlotte Observer: Mark Gottfried didn’t hear a lot of compliments about his team when he first took the job. The trouble seems as much coach-related as talent-related, though — in a recent interview, Scott Wood “basically admits practice used to be ‘just throwing the ball out there and shooting it.’ Now practices have a lot more drills.” That’s the sort of culture Gottfried was facing when he moved to Raleigh. From player quotes such as these, it sounds like Gottfried has the team buying into his style; and if he wins there, players will keep buying it.
  5.  Richmond Times-Dispatch: Potential breakout candidate Erick Green may miss Virginia Tech‘s season opener against East Tennessee State with an “Achilles’ strain”. The Hokies have already lost JT Thompson to a season-ending injury, and definitely can’t afford to lose Green too. Green is expected to be the star, both on offense and defense, for Seth Greenberg’s team in its latest pursuit of an invitation to the Big Dance. Here’s to hoping the rash of preseason injuries doesn’t carry over into the regular season because it feels like there have been way more injuries than usual this year.

In honor of the opening of college basketball season, Sports Illustrated has a slideshow of college basketball previews going back as far as the early 1960s. The most interesting (with borderline-racist undertones) image is probably the 1967 cover calling for a 12-foot basket, but I’ll leave you with NC State legend David Thompson. Thompson led the 1972-73 Wolfpack to an undefeated season averaging nearly 25 points a game (ironically his least dominant statistical season).

NC State's David Thompson Led the Wolfpack to an Undefeated Season in 1973

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Will Anyone Pass Coach K?

Posted by mpatton on November 8th, 2011

CBSSports.com’s Jeff Goodman and other college basketball analysts on Seth Davis’ show Courtside discussed whether or not anyone will be able to catch Mike Krzyzewski‘s 900-and-counting win total when the venerable Duke coach decides to hang it up. Monday, Goodman asked the active coach closest to Coach K, Jim Boeheim to ponder if he stood a chance. Boeheim gave himself no chance whatsoever and even stated that, “I think Mike will coach another ten years.” If that’s true (I for one, don’t think Krzyzewski will coach more than five more), Coach K will end up with somewhere between 1150 and 1200 wins, putting the record essentially out of reach barring an unprecedented career spanning six decades.

As for his best guess, Boeheim mentioned West Virginia’s Bob Huggins as the most likely active candidate for passing Coach K. Goodman did the math: “[Huggins] has 691 career victories. Let’s say he goes 12 more years (until he’s 71) and averages about 25 wins per year. […] That would put him just shy of 1,000 victories.” Barring a sudden retirement, Krzyzewski should pass the 1,000 win mark sometime in the next four years.  Here are other coaches who could (somewhat feasibly) pass Coach K.

Active Coaches That Could Pass Coach K in Wins.

Update: John Gasaway of Basketball Prospectus pointed out a slight wrinkle with Boeheim’s guess that Huggins could pass Coach K: 71 of Huggins’ wins were at Walsh, which was not Division I and therefore would not count on his D-I record.

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ACC Preseason All-Conference Teams

Posted by mpatton on November 8th, 2011

Now that our individual team previews are done, it’s time to look at individual players. With only five all-ACC selections from last season returning there are plenty of open spots to fill, so here are our Preseason all-ACC Teams for the 2011-12 season.

2011-12 Preseason All-ACC Teams

Looking at our projections, North Carolina, Miami and Duke lead the way with eight, six and five selections, respectively. No surprise with Harrison Barnes checking in as the consensus ACC Player of the Year, or Austin Rivers as the ACC Rookie of the Year (though Kellen wants to keep an eye on Maryland’s Nick Faust for the ROY award).

My personal honorable mentions are Virginia Tech’s Erick Green, Maryland’s Sean Mosley and NC State’s Richard Howell. I’m especially surprised Mosley didn’t show up on any of the teams, but his middling campaign last season probably did him in. Green appears to be in the right place to take over for departing Hokies Malcolm Delaney and Jeff Allen, but he’s got a ways to go based on the Virginia Tech games I went to last season. Finally, Howell had a sneaky good season last year for the Wolfpack and could be a great frontcourt presence alongside CJ Leslie.

My biggest reach was putting Terrell Stoglin on the first team. He was a decent player last year (who averaged over 20 points per game pro-rated at 40 minutes), but he’ll really need to make some waves if he wants to crack the first team this season. Malcolm Grant and Kendall Marshall are the safer choices for that final guard spot. My reasoning is that Marshall will be hidden statistically behind Zeller and Barnes. In general, Roy Williams point guards are under-appreciated because they don’t put up sick numbers, but with Marshall the case is a little different. He’s a very polished player, but I see him as the perfect complimentary player. North Carolina wouldn’t be nearly as good as a team without him, but by himself he’s not spectacular. Thus, I voted him onto the second team in favor of Maryland’s ascendent sophomore.

On the second team Kellen and I differed on power forwards: he chose Mason Plumlee; I chose Travis McKie. Again for me the key was relative importance. Mason Plumlee may be more talented than McKie, but I’ll be shocked if he’s as important for Duke as McKie is for Wake Forest (and really I’m not sold that McKie isn’t more talented). Duke’s bigs are certainly going to be critical this year, but I think the mere fact that there are three of them (Mason, Miles and Ryan Kelly) will dilute each one’s share of the limelight. I did include Miles on my third team because reports from Durham laud him as Duke’s backbone.

However, both of our teams (mine especially) did a lot of projecting for this season. The only locks feel like Harrison Barnes, Tyler Zeller and Mike Scott (and it’s conceivable Zeller falls to the second team depending on his role). Player and coach turnover left the ACC relatively unknown this season, but Friday players start earning their spots.

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ACC Morning Five: 11.08.11 Edition

Posted by mpatton on November 8th, 2011

  1. Scout – Inside Carolina: This is a terrific article on Michael Jordan‘s recruitment to North Carolina from Al Featherston. Everyone has heard about how Jordan was cut from his high school team duing his sophomore year before later etching his place in basketball history in Chapel Hill and the NBA. Jordan wasn’t actually a national prospect until Roy Williams let the cat out of the bag (first to a media friend) against Dean Smith’s wishes. It also probably helped that fellow North Carolina powers, Duke and NC State, were between coaches at that point. The story also gives an interesting look at national recruiting three decades ago, long before the Internet, when coaches basically relied on two summer camps to see the top prospects.
  2. Washington Post: It’s easy to wonder if Seth Greenberg is on the hot seat based on Virginia Tech’s recent love of the NIT-side of the NCAA Tournament bubble. But don’t forget that the year before Greenberg arrived in Blacksburg, Virginia Tech was 3-9 in the Big East, good enough for last place. He’s made the Hokies into a perennial 20-win team on the brink of its first NCAA Tournament in years. Also with the construction of a new state-of-the-art practice facility, I think Greenberg will continue to see recruiting success in southwest Virginia.
  3. USA Today: The Carrier Classic is back in the news, but this time with more philosophical questions. The game is on Veteran’s Day (this Friday), and will be played on the deck of the aircraft carrier which carried Osama Bin Laden’s body to its burial. Speaking with Islamic scholar Akbar Ahmed, Marlen Garcia cleared up any questions about insensitivity with regards to Islam. Luckily she doesn’t believe that there are any — which should allow fans to enjoy the game for what it is instead of worrying about its setting and any indirect political fallout. However, fans should worry about the weather… yes, even in San Diego.
  4. Orlando Sentinel: Florida State‘s record may be a perfect 2-0 after exhibition season, but Leonard Hamilton still has a lot of things he’d like to work on. Most notably, the turnover bug (nine in the second half of a dominating win over Georgia Southwestern) is still troubling the Seminoles, who finished ranked #311 out of 345 teams by Ken Pomeroy last season. The good news is that both Bernard James and Michael Snaer played very well, and the team’s smothering defense only allowed Georgia SW to make eleven shots from the field on four assists. There’s still definitely room for improvement, but I’m bullish (which is definitely the word of choice) on FSU coming into this year.
  5. Burlington Times News: If you can get past the terrible title pun, this article is actually informative. While initial reports had NC State’s lone senior CJ Williams out for a few weeks with a hairline fracture in his thumb, he was cleared by the doctors and suited up for the Wolfpack’s exhibition against Flagler. Williams went 2-3 from beyond the arc and dished out five dimes in an inconsistent NC State effort. The real offensive star of the game was sharp-shooter Scott Wood, who caught fire going 6-8 from downtown. NC State’s first game is at home against UNC Asheville.

And finally, in memory of one of the greatest heavyweight boxers ever, check out Mark Kram’s 1975 piece on “The Thrilla in Manilla” between Muhammad Ali and the recently-departed Joe Frazier (you can also watch the fight below). Frazier was by all accounts one of the toughest fighters who ever lived. He was born in Beaufort, South Carolina, and spent his formative years working on a farm. His professional career was headlined by three fights against Muhammad Ali. Frazier died on Monday after battling liver cancer for the last few months of his life.

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ACC Morning Five: 11.07.11 Edition

Posted by mpatton on November 7th, 2011

  1. Fox Sports Carolinas: Fox Sports‘ Andrew Jones offers a throwback list of the top ten players “capable of significantly enhancing their team’s fortunes.” I only call the list throwback because Jones ignores the two extreme geographic points of the ACC (Boston College and Miami) when constructing his list. In general I agree with all of his selections, though I possibly would’ve substituted Miles Plumlee for Ryan Kelly based on recent reports. For Boston College, I would’ve chosen Danny Rubin (the most productive of the Eagles’ only three returning players), and I would choose sophomore Rion Brown for Miami.
  2. Boston Globe: Speaking of Boston College, Patrick Heckmann is hoping to make an impact on the Eagles this year, coming by way of Germany. This Globe piece gives a little insight into the recruiting world for international prospects, and Heckmann is a frosh out of Germany with a pretty unique story. He’s also a 6’6″ slasher who will get plenty of playing time for a young team. The story offers an especially interesting look at Heckmann’s decision in choosing Boston College over playing for a club team in Germany.
  3. Fayetteville Observer: Looking for more lists? Bret Strelow and Sammy Batten compiled a pretty interesting list of superlatives for ACC basketball that will definitelybe good for starting debates. Sure, Milton Jennings is a great breakout candidate and Staats Battle definitely has the coolest name in the conference, but is Andre Dawkins really the most underrated dunker? He dunks almost rarely, which makes each time feel special, but we need to see more frequency in order to garner a superlative. Also, I wonder why they chose to ask a freshman (Wake Forest’s Travis McKie) about the toughest arena. For the record he chose Clemson’s Littlejohn Coliseum, though this coming year will be McKie’s first trip to the unfriendly confines of Cameron Indoor Stadium.
  4. TarHeelBlue.com: North Carolina and NBA legend James Worthy will be elected into the college hoops hall of fame alongside of Virginia’s Ralph Sampson. Worthy was the first overall pick of the 1982 NBA Draft, led the Tar Heels to Dean Smith’s first NCAA Championship that same year (scoring 28 points on 13-17 shooting in the championship game), and is already a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
  5. Searching For Billy Edelin and Fayetteville Observer: A couple of ACC previews and predictions with more “controversial” picks. For Nick Fasulo at Searching For Billy Edelin, the conference is down. Fasulo’s most interesting predictions come in his individual accolades, where he picked Jim Larranaga as Coach of the Year and Tyler Zeller as Player of the Year. Personally, I see Zeller as more of a complement (as he was at the end of last season), but “everything is in place for this guy. Assuming he stays healthy, there should be no […] unexpected things to limit his production,” Fasulo tweeted. The Fayetteville Observer‘s contrary nature shows up in its projected finish: Unlike the media, the newspaper projects Virginia to finish eighth in the conference (NIT-bound), while Miami takes the fourth place spot and earns an eight-seed in the NCAA Tournament.

Around the greater world of college sports, one of the most sickening alleged scandals in the history of college athletics came to light over the weekend. In a story that will turn your stomach, former Penn State football defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky has been accused of 40 crimes (21 felonies and 19 misdemeanors) involving eight sexual abuse victims who were minors at the time. The worst part is that the PSU athletic department reportedly knew about some of the crimes and never reported them to the proper authorities despite extensive discussions internally. While the article is tough to read, Sara Ganim of The Patriot News does a great job breaking down the details of the case. As of today, Penn State Athletic Director Tim Curley has been placed on administrative leave and Senior Vice President for business and finance Gary Schultz has stepped down (both have been accused of perjury), but I’d be surprised if the punishments end here based on the heinous nature of these allegations.

Picture of the Day:

Len Bias Posts Up Michael Jordan in 1984. (Manny Millan/SI) h/t SI Photo Blog

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