1. Soaring To Glory: Five expectations for Boston College in the upcoming year. To make a long story short, the Eagles will get better and win more games (especially next season). Favorite expectation: “Victories in ACC game(s)”. I love it because it’s vague. If it’s just one game, are the rest moral victories? Halftime victories? The possibilities are endless. I do agree the Eagles should get much better as the season goes on. I’m not sure whether that’s worth two ACC wins, though the bottom of the conference is certainly weak enough.
2. Independent Weekly: Looking for a rant about Duke pasting Pennsylvania? You’ve come to the right place. Clearly, Adam Sobsey is tired of guarantee games that largely finance smaller athletic departments (seriously, check out Grambling State’s schedule starting with nine of 10 games on the road). Oh, it also has Star Wars references.
   

   At one point, Penn head coach Jerome Allen (a former four-year star player for the Quakers in the 1990s) could be heard calling a defensive set to his charges. He may have been saying ‘double flex’ or something like that, but mixed into the minor din of the sedate New Year’s Day crowd at Cameron, it sounded for all the world like he was shouting, ‘Boba Fett! Boba Fett!’ And indeed it would have taken a hired gun, a clone specimen, a rogue bounty hunter from the Dark Side, to give the Quakers a fighting chance last night. But, of course, Duke is the Evil Empire, right? Krzyzewski (and Calipari et al) have already recruited all the Boba Fetts. They go by names like John Wall and Austin Rivers—very obviously aliases. Some of them, like the Plumli, are even clone specimens.

3. Testudo Times: This article reads like a giant exhalation. And Maryland fans should be very pleased with the team’s December performance after a rocky start. Additionally, Pe’Shon Howard‘s return and Alex Len‘s debut give Mark Turgeon two more talented players to introduce into the rotation. The most interesting thing about the duo’s addition is the team’s new tempo. Without Howard and Len, Turgeon’s team looked like one of his past teams and was significantly below average in adjusted pace. Against Albany the Terrapins picked up the pace significantly, adding seven possessions (which would place them near the top of D-I). Keep an eye on this team’s style of play going into conference action.
4. Fayetteville Observer: Check out the key players for each ACC team as the conference looks to improve on a lackluster start. Personally, I totally forgot about Florida State’s Ian Miller (who failed to academically qualify last semester); he scored 17 in the Seminoles’ loss to Princeton.
5. The Sporting News: Old, wise coaches — Mike Krzyzewski and Roy Williams made the cut (and Gary Williams would’ve certainly made it had he not retired) — choose to avoid non-conference road games. To be clear, the coaches’ success probably plays an important role in being able to keep respect while avoiding the crapshoots that are road games. Invites to the NCAA Tournament are mainly about conference performance (for power conference teams at least).

GIF of the Day: Miami struggled to put UNCG away last night. This guy had a lot to do with it.

Awesome UNCG Alley-Hoop Against Miami (Mocksession)

1. Boston Globe: Al Skinner got fired from Boston College because of the perception that he wasn’t recruiting at the same level he used to (currently, he’s still looking for that next college job as an AAU coach). But if you look at the recruits he had lined up for the Eagles before he left, they’re all performing very well at various schools around the country. I still don’t see a go-to guy on Boston College’s team if you add this bunch to the roster, but it’s certainly worth mentioning after the Eagles fell to 5-8 after being blown out by Harvard.
2. Orangeburg Times and Democrat: It was a long flight home for Clemson after losing two of its three games in the Diamond Head Classic. Because of Oliver Purnell’s notorious non-conference schedules the Tigers are off to their worst start since 2003 at a disappointing 7-6. Despite generous preseason numbers, Clemson saw its ranking from Ken Pomeroy drop steadily over the first few weeks as the losses continued piling up. Barring a miraculous conference season (read: winning the ACC Tournament), it looks like Clemson’s streak of five straight NCAA Tournament appearances will end.
3. Washington Times: Maryland quietly bettered its resume with six straight wins, albeit against unimpressive competition. The Terrapins finally got a wire-to-wire win against Samford Saturday thanks to strong games from Pe’Shon Howard, Terrell Stoglin and Nick Faust. The win came after Mark Turgeon threw the entire team out of practice the day before. Faust finally found the basket from long range (playing off the ball has helped his game). Today the team looks to continue its winning streak against Cornell before heading into conference play.
4. Baltimore Sports Report: Luckily, expansion speculation and rumors have died down, but the moves from earlier this year leave several conferences with the challenge (or in the ACC’s case, opportunity) of rebranding (or reestablishing) the conference with its new members. The Big East has the most work to do, trying to move from a regional to national footprint, while the ACC looks to reclaim its basketball dominance with Syracuse and Pittsburgh preparing to join in the next couple of years. It was one thing to talk about, but the augmented conferences will be very interesting to watch going forward.
5. Wilmington Star News: What were the top 10 ACC stories of 2011? Brett Friedlander does a pretty good job paring the list down, but I totally disagree with his ordering. I know Miami‘s scandal has fallen out of the news with other scandals and its ongoing investigation, but it or conference expansion has to be number one. Mark Gottfried‘s hire was a big splash in North Carolina, but it was way less important than Gary Williams’ retirement or overall coaching upheaval for the conference. The list is still worth a read.

EXTRA: Finally, take a second and read over the inspiring story of a Duke fan who couldn’t pull against Pennsylvania yesterday because the school saved his life after his liver failed.

Last night we got the first glance of how Maryland will play with a full complement of players, and frankly, it looks pretty good compared to the shaky team that started the season. Point guard Pe’Shon Howard managed 11 points on only three field goal attempts while contributing eight assists and six rebounds against overmatched Albany. Meanwhile, Alex Len scored 14 points on nine shots while grabbing a team-high eight rebounds and three blocks. Both players demonstrated a bit of rust, turning the ball over a combined 11 times, but it’s easy to predict that to improve as both players get more live-game experience with their teammates. If these two can mesh with the rest of the team, the Terrapins become a much more dangerous team.

A Surprisingly Competitive Game

• Yale at Wake Forest at 7:00 PM

The days of the ACC running roughshod over the Ivy League seem to be coming to an end. With a ranked Harvard team taking on a pitiful Boston College team, the honor of the ACC largely rests in the hands of Wake Forest. If this game was in Connecticut, I’d pick Yale in an instant, but in Winston-Salem the game is more evenly matched. Yale is a legitimately talented team with the height and skills to match up against the Demon Deacons. Both teams rely heavily on getting to the free throw line and though this isn’t true 99% of the time people say it, this game may come down to who can make the most free throws.

For Fans Only

• Harvard at Boston College at 7:00 PM on ESPN3.com
• Elon at North Carolina at 7:00 PM on ESPNU
• Campbell at North Carolina State at 7:00 PM
• Georgia Tech at Fordham at 8:00 PM on CBS College Sports

All of these games look to be fairly lopsided affairs, though the one game where the ACC is an underdog (Boston College against Harvard) has the spice of regional rivalry and role-reversal power dynamics. The North Carolina State game will give Wolfpack undergraduates and Campbell Law students an excuse to yell at each other in their shared Hillsborough St. bars. Fordham is not a very good team, but they are playing at home against an inconsistent Georgia Tech team. The Jack Wooten Classic gives another former Tar Heel an excuse to return to the Smith Center, but beyond the appeal of watching a former walk-on serve as an assistant coach, this game should turn into a rout very quickly.

1. Washington Post: Alex Len, the 7’1″ Ukranian freshman is set to debut tonight as Maryland takes on Albany. Len was serving an NCAA suspension for violating amateurism policies while playing for a Ukranian club. The addition of Len to the lineup along with the recent re-entry of Pe’Shon Howard into Mark Turgeon’s rotation bodes well for a Maryland team that has under performed in the first season of the post-Gary Williams era.
2. Richmond Times-Dispatch: After the loss of two players to transfer, Virginia probably felt like it had something to prove against the over-matched Maryland-Eastern Shore Hawks. The Cavaliers stomped their opponents as they waltzed to the team’s best start in over a decade. As expected, Paul Jesperson burned his redshirt and made his debut in this game, spelling the starters admirably. The Wahoos look pumped and primed for conference play to begin.
3. Roanoke Times: The gradually unfolding story of the Virginia Tech placekicker robbing the home of Virginia Tech shooting guard Dorenzo Hudson is getting stranger and stranger. After the kicker and his friends allegedly invaded Hudson’s home, looking for marijuana that Hudson’s roommate had taken, the two roommates later went out to find the three invaders and got into a physical conflict. If this is news to you, you aren’t alone, considering that the Hokies athletics director Jim Weaver stated that he had no knowledge of this second confrontation. He was also quick to shoot down the idea that the basketball team had a “marijuana problem,” an idea that has apparently been floating around since forward Jarrell Eddie was charged with marijuana posession in the spring.
4. Duke Basketball Report: Barry Jacobs takes some time to look at the free throw dominance of Atlantic Coast Conference teams in the past decade. Very few teams have managed to make more free throws than their opponent attempted, but currently North Carolina, Virginia, Duke, and Maryland all belong to this rare club. Though Jacobs acknowledges that all four are unlikely to maintain this status until the end of the season, teams that have managed free throw dominance over the course of a whole season have been wildly successful in the NCAA Tournament.
5. ESPN: Robbi Pickerall profiles Denzel Robinson, a member of North Carolina‘s junior varsity team and son of assistant coach Steve Robinson. Since he was twelve, Denzel Robinson has watched his father and Roy Williams coach from the end of the bench, first at Kansas and now at North Carolina. Robinson has had a closer view of the players and coaches than just about anyone, and now, playing his second year of JV basketball, he seems poised to try out for a varsity roster spot next year, potentially earning a spot back on the bench where he sat for so many years.

1. Washington Post: The big news this weekend comes from Virginia as K.T. Harrell and James Johnson have both decided to transfer.  Johnson was a redshirt freshman who saw very little playing time, but Harrell was a key rotation player who waged a fairly successful freshman campaign, routinely knocking down big shots from beyond the arc and starting 15 games. Harrell, however, has struggled on offense this season and has seen his minutes drop. Both players cited a lack of playing time as the reason for transferring. Coach Tony Bennett doesn’t seem very concerned with these decisions, noting that transfers are becoming more common and that he’s had at least one player leave his program every year that he’s been a head coach. While Bennett might be unworried, at least one player transferring every year probably seems too high for Virginia’s fans.
2. Fayetteville Observer: Bret Strelow has some interesting speculation about the rapid fire re-commitment and then de-commitment of Torian Graham. Apparently, while Graham definitely wants to play for North Carolina State, someone else is preventing him from doing so. He brings up the oft-discussed possibility that the Wolfpack is waiting to make sure that Graham meets the necessary academic qualifications to play college basketball, but he also brings up a more insidious theory where a relative, hanger-on, or handler is pushing Graham to sign with a more high-profile program. While this theory doesn’t yet have any hard confirmation, it’s an intriguing story. Hopefully, it’s not true.
3. Washington Times: On Friday, Pe’Shon Howard made his season debut for Maryland. Howard has been out with a broken foot,  but played 30 minutes against Radford. The return of the talented guard is a huge boost for the Terrapins who haven’t yet seen the kind of stellar play they had been expecting of freshman guard Nick Faust. The Saturday reinstatement of freshman big man Alex Len is expected to be another significant gain for Maryland. Len has been serving an NCAA suspension related to his time playing with a professional club in the Ukraine.
4. Soaring to Glory: It’s been a rough year for Boston College fans, and it doesn’t look like things are going to get any easier. Soaring to Glory breaks down the remaining Eagles schedule and tries to predict how may games this team can actually win. Spoiler Alert: Not many.
5. Tobacco Road Blues: Chanukkah is nearly over, but it’s not too late to acknowledge the proud tradition of Jewish basketball at Duke and North Carolina. While Jon Scheyer gets the first spot on this list, the great Lennie Rosenbluth is probably the greatest son of David to play in the rivalry: In case you’re unfamiliar with the name, Rosenbluth averaged 28 PPG during the Tar Heels’ undefeated 1957 season, capped off by a triple-overtime victory over Wilt Chamberlain’s Kansas team.

1. Wilmington Star News: North Carolina finally showcased its “championship potential” according to Brett Friedlander in its dominant buzzer-to-buzzer victory over Texas last night. The win also wiped away Roy Williams only winless series (against teams he’s faced multiple times since being in Chapel Hill). I would argue that the Tar Heels performance at Kentucky was nearly as impressive (they didn’t play as well, but it was in a very hostile environment against a much better team). Still, this was the team people expected when they universally picked the Tar Heels atop their preseason polls.
2. Durham Herald-Sun: This season is the first time in Austin Rivers‘ life that he’s been able to play in front of his dad. Unfortunately, he’ll have to readjust to his father’s absence with the NBA starting back up on Christmas Day. But it sounds like both generations enjoyed Doc Rivers‘ chance to watch his son start his career at Duke. It will be interesting to see how many more Duke games the Celtics’ coach will be able to attend this season, if any, with the condensed NBA schedule.
3. Hampton Daily Press: For the first time in a few years, Virginia and Virginia Tech appear to be the rulers of the state in basketball, as both ACC teams check in in the top-50 of the RPI. A down ACC will help the teams’ possibilities of making the Big Dance, but I still doubt the Hokies sneak in as an at-large. Last year, neither team made the NCAA Tournament, but five total schools from Virginia did. This year, one or two others may sneak in, but Virginia is the commonwealth’s best shot at an at-large bid.
4. Pensacola News Journal: Florida State‘s game against in-state rival Florida may not determine the success of a given season (like in football), but you can bet your bottom dollar that the coaches and players on both sides are fired up about the game. For the Seminoles, it’s a chance to touch up three early season mishaps. For both teams it’s a chance at a rival and probable NCAA Tournament team. It’ll be a fascinating match-up: elite offense versus elite defense.
5. Testudo Times: Maryland takes on Radford tomorrow. To be clear, Radford is not good this year. But Maryland fans are looking forward to this game, as it may be their first look at Maryland’s offense with Pe’Shon Howard (MVPe’) back in the line-up since he was forced to the bench with a broken foot in October. Howard’s return should take some of the pressure off Terrell Stoglin to create everything and possibly open up some looks for Nick Faust and Sean Mosley in the process.

First, it’s not really ACC-related, but this is a fantastic article on former Washington star Brandon Roy.

1. Fox Sports Carolinas: Starting next season the ACC is going to 18-game conference schedule in men’s and women’s basketball. Andrew Jones takes a look at the positive and negative effects of the change. I agree that it’s a positive that two conference games will replace two garbage “guarantee” games (hopefully). I don’t agree that the 12 extra losses will hurt the ACC. Obviously, each one of those losses is also a conference win. The key for ACC teams is getting prepared for conference season a little earlier than usual to take advantage of the game. One negative is the new schedule will almost certainly reduce the number of non-conference home-and-home series coaches are willing to schedule (specifically, keep an eye on Kentucky and Texas with North Carolina).
2. Tobacco Road Blues: Here’s a pretty fascinating interview with Steve Kirschner. Kirschner is the head of North Carolina’s basketball public relations. He’s got a pretty interesting perspective on current and past players, as well as the Duke-North Carolina rivalry and everything in-between. Specifically, his analysis of Kendall Marshall is very good. Kirshner described Marshall’s ACC Tournament championship game perfectly by saying the Nolan Smith made Marshall speed his game up and forced him to make mistakes.
3. Duke Basketball Report: Speaking of the sophomore Tar Heel point guard, Marshall looks ready to break the single-season assist record for the ACC. He’s on pace to average over ten dimes a game, and the Tar Heels are likely to play well over thirty games. It’s also impressive to look at the class years on the list of top assist totals. Seven of the top ten assist totals are from juniors and seniors. Marshall is on pace to pass all of them in another 20 games. If he plays four years, Bobby Hurley‘s ACC assist record could be blown out of the water (and imagine what Marshall could have done if he started from the beginning last season).
4. Baltimore Sun: Don Markus takes a look at five questions facing Maryland for when the Terrapins return from winter break. He sounds cautiously optimistic, especially with Pe’Shon Howard and Alex Len in the fold, that the Terrapins could be better than advertised. Len could be the real deal. If he is, there will be major changes in Mark Turgeon’s strategy (i.e., the ability to play inside-out, having to change the starting line-up, less of a height deficit, etc.). Basically, the point is that Maryland may look like a totally different team come conference play.
5. Winston-Salem Journal Now: Jason Capel was an all-conference player when he played for North Carolina. Now he’s coming back to coach Appalachian State in the Dean Dome, his first time in the arena since 2005. Capel doesn’t have any misconceptions about the juggernaut his Mountaineers are about to face: “I say it’s going to be fun now […] but if they go on a 20-0 run, it’s not going to be very darn fun.”

EXTRA: So Maryland students weren’t too excited to go to the Florida International game…

There was Sparse Attendance for Maryland's Game against FIU this Week (Photo: EB's World).

Matt Patton is the RTC correspondent for the Atlantic Coast Conference. You can follow him on Twitter @rise_and_fire.

Reader’s Take

Top Storylines

• Wake Forest’s Dynamic Duo: The Demon Deacons may not be the prettiest team to watch, but CJ Harris and Travis McKie are lighting up the box score. We knew (even if I, in a gaffe of all gaffes, left him off my All-Freshman team last year for Ryan Harrow) Mckie was going to be one of the ACC’s top players this year, but Harris has been a very pleasant surprise. The pair are efficiently combining for nearly 57% of Wake Forest’s points through the first 10 games of the year. Harris has already made as many threes as he made all last season on 18 less attempts, and he’s significantly more effective inside the arc. It remains to be seen how Harris will adapt to the defenses of ACC play, but so far he has to be leading the “surprise of the year” category.
• Duke’s Post Presence: That’s right: after two solid years of berating the Plumlees as overrated and generally poor basketball players, it’s time to give credit where it’s due. Mason Plumlee has developed into a very good big man. No, he can’t make a free throw to save his life, but he’s much better offensively everywhere except the boards than he’s been the last few years. He developed a couple of solid post moves, stopped turning the ball over as much and learned to hold his ground on defense. If he can either learn to crash the offensive glass or hit 60% of his free throws, I’m confident in saying he’ll be one of the top three or four bigs in the ACC this season.
• That’s right, the ACC Digital Network launched this season. Check out JR Reid break down North Carolina‘s softness and the conference power rankings. So far the coverage is fairly limited, but as it expands this could become one of the better sources of information for ACC fans.

Power Rankings

1. North Carolina (8-2) stays atop the rankings with a hard-fought win over Long Beach State, which better get rewarded by the Selection Committee in March for playing such a tough non-conference schedule. The Tar Heels dominated on the inside with John Henson and Harrison Barnes leading the scoring, but it is worth noting that this is  another game where four Tar Heel starters played more than 30 minutes. Read the rest of this entry »

1. C-Ville: Storming The Floor‘s Eric Angevine hits a home run with his profile of Virginia center Assane Sene. Sene is from Senegal and has a very unique story. I don’t want to steal the story’s thunder, but let’s just say burritos, Taylor Swift and football all are discussed.
2. Wilmington Star News: Ty Walker is ready to “walk the walk” after serving a ten-game suspension resulting from an offcourt incident earlier in the year. He’s certainly saying everything right. And I think Jeff Bzdelik achieved his goal, which was “to help the New Hanover (NC) High product, who is on pace for a degree in communications in May, become a better man.” I don’t think that Walker is destined to have a Zoubek-esque turnaround this season, but I think he’ll be very important for Wake Forest’s relative success this season. Even if he doesn’t score a lot of points, if Walker can crash the glass and play solid defense in the middle, he’ll be a hugely important asset for the Demon Deacons.
3. Raleigh News & Observer: John Maddrey is a lawyer but — more importantly — he’s one of the statisticians behind the television broadcasts at ACC games. He’s had his position since 1982, meaning he’s covered 29 straight ACC Tournaments and 56 total Duke-North Carolina games. In a slower stretch of basketball, it’s always interesting to get a peek behind the curtain at how broadcasts work (I just wish Luke DeCock had asked him how the internet has changed doing game stats).
4. Washington Times: Patrick Stevens posts a collage of little nuggets from Maryland head coach Mark Turgeon. In a quick summary, Terrell Stoglin missed practice Thursday and Friday after tweaking his ankle; Pe’Shon Howard is out of his boot and doing some drills; he also praised Berend Weijs. But the most interesting part of the presser, to me at least, was Turgeon’s frustration with his non-stop schedule. It’s easy to forget just how much work goes into being a top-tier coach. In addition to the events and fundraisers he has to attend, Turgeon made it clear he didn’t like the team’s schedule during his last chance to retool before going into ACC play. It won’t lengthen his Christmas break, but I think Turgeon can spend plenty of time working on his own team (based on the quality of opponents the Terrapins face between now and then).
5. Miami Herald: Former Georgia Tech star Kenny Anderson was arrested Sunday for leaving the scene of an accident. But if you read a little closer, it sounds like he might have been charged with a more serious offense (I mean, he admitted to drinking, slurred his speech and crashed his Escalade into a tree… seriously, if you’re slurring your speech, you’re over the limit). Anderson is currently coaching at a private Jewish day school. He played for nine NBA teams during his 15-year career and made the All-Star game in 1994.

1. CBS Sports: Virginia Tech‘s Blacksburg campus was under lock down yesterday after a gunman killed two people before taking his own life. It’s been five years since the horrific shooting that shook the campus as well as the nation. If any small solace can be taken from the tragedy, it’s that Virginia Tech was uniquely well-prepared for dealing with this kind of emergency and the lock down and subsequent search for the shooter went about as well as could be expected. This is obviously a story bigger than basketball, but Seth Greenberg, aside from being stuck in his office for most of the day, seemed calm and unworried during the lockdown once he made sure his daughter, a student and cheerleader at Virginia Tech, was also safe.
2. Sports Illustrated: Luke Winn is at it again with his power rankings. For those interested in North Carolina, Winn breaks down the results of Tyler Zeller‘s second half possessions against Kentucky, as well as Anthony Davis’ second half possessions against North Carolina. The frustrating thing for Carolina fans will be the confirmation that yes, Zeller gets the ball in great position, but he often squanders it.  For Duke’s power ranking commentary, Winn shares an interesting Mike Krzyzewski anecdote from the Sportsman of the Year profile and somehow ties it to Austin Rivers.
3. Testudo Times: Pe’Shon Howard‘s recovery is going much quicker than most expected. The school posted a photo of Howard with his cast off and reports have him practicing with the rest of Maryland‘s team. The folks at Testudo Times are, in fact, incredibly optimistic about the recovery of Howard, speculating that he might play as soon as December 23. Howard, a sophomore point guard, could provide a great lift for this team. In his freshman campaign, the guard showed a real talent for distributing the basketball as well as hitting three-pointers. Last year, Howard famously hit a buzzer-beater to lead the Terrapins to victory against the College of Charleston.
4. Soaring to Glory: Boston College was the only ACC team to play last night and though they walked away with a loss against Providence, there is reason for hope. The Eagles finally started to look like a team playing with a consistency and chemistry that hadn’t been evident in past games for more than few minutes. Despite the loss and the ugly-looking statistics, I find myself agreeing with the author that this was perhaps their strongest team performance to date.
5. Sun Sentinel: Kenny Kadji has been effective coming off the bench for the Hurricanes. The Florida transfer isn’t starting, but he is averaging plenty of minutes at center, where Miami has been missing the excellent Reggie Johnson as he recovers from an injury. The 6’11” sophomore’s strong play has been an early highlight for a team that too often relies very heavily on guards Durand Scott and Malcolm Grant to carry the load. Kadji is one of three transfers who join Miami this season.