With an emphatic dunk, Boris Bojanovsky became the answer to a trivia question Thursday.
The Florida State center’s basket with four-tenths of a second remaining gave the Seminoles a 67-65 win over Maryland at the ACC tournament, ending the Terrapins’ stay at the conference’s most visible event in their final season as a member. The school will leave for the Big Ten next academic year, to be replaced by Louisville.
“We needed to win,” Bojanovsky said. “I’m sorry it had to be me.”
Maryland fans came out in force. The school sold out its allotment of tickets. Ticket re-sale website Stubhub saw an 8 percent increase in ACC tournament sales compared with last year from purchasers in Maryland. A Maryland fan held a sign that spelled out ACC as “Always our Conference of Choice.”
Wanting to witness the final tournament, Dave and Karen Latham of Baltmore came last week for the women’s tournament, also in Greensboro, and stayed. He is like a lot of Maryland fans who believe the ACC has not treated the school well.
Latham pointed out that the tournament, despite Maryland having been in the league since its founding in 1953, has been held in the Baltimore-Washington area only four times. By comparison, Atlanta has hosted the tournament six times, though Georgia Tech began competing in basketball in 1979.
“We always feel like we don’t get a fair shake,” he said.
Still, Latham was conflicted.
“Part of me is, like, ‘Yeah, good riddance,’” he said. “But I grew up with the ACC.”
Greensboro resident and Maryland grad Scott Rudolph, who in 1988-89 was the Maryland mascot Testudo and gained fame when he was tackled by the Virginia mascot and fractured the radial head in his arm, criticized Maryland’s decision, made largely for financial reasons.
“I don’t know of anyone who’s excited (about joining the Big Ten),” he said. “I grew up hating Duke. It just came naturally. Now I’ve got to learn to hate Purdue? It’s just not the same.”
Maryland great John Lucas, who will be honored this weekend as an ACC legend, supports the the move. He said that, because of the league’s expansion, “this hasn’t been the ACC for a long time.” He described the jump to the Big Ten as “a new journey.”
Band director L. Richmond Sparks, who has been at the school for 30 years and attended every ACC tournament in that span, spoke fondly of the friendships he made with colleagues around the league. The band’s play list, perhaps coincidentally, included Europe’s “The Final Countdown,” the Temptations’ “Get Ready” and Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run.”
Sparks praised the ACC, but said, “the world is changing. Athletics is changing. One day, we’re probably going to see four super-conferences.”
It is indeed a new day when college band directors speak with authority about super-conferences.
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