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Thursday, January 8, 2009
Parity in ACC?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
In football, the ACC took parity to a new level.
Everyone but Duke and Virginia finished 5-3 or 4-4 in conference play, and all of those 10 teams played in bowl games.
Wins won’t be so evenly distributed in basketball. But perhaps there will be more parity than some first thought.
As ESPN’s Andy Katz noted following Boston College’s 85-78 upset of North Carolina, the Eagles were picked to finish 11th in the preseason poll. And last year, Miami made the NCAA tournament after being picked last.
“Everyone on a given night can win in our league,” Miami coach Frank Haith told Katz. “There are no bad teams in this league. BC was picked 11th. They’re a confident team and going into this game you could see they were a confident team. It just shows how competitive our league is. Carolina will bounce back, but our league is going to be competitive.”
Today, five ACC teams are ranked: Duke (No. 2), UNC (No. 3), Wake Forest (No. 4), Clemson (No. 12) and B.C. (No. 17).
Clemson and Wake Forest are undefeated, Duke and Carolina are not. Tech is one of three ACC teams with five losses, along with Virginia and Va. Tech.
Do you think parity will reign in the ACC this year?
