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ACC Basketball Weekly Review

 

 

Scores

Tuesday, January 10

North Carolina 73, Miami 56

Florida State 63, Virginia Tech 59

Wednesday, January 11

Maryland 70, Wake Forest 64

Georgia Tech 82, North Carolina State 71

Thursday, January 12

Duke 61, Virginia 58

Boston College 59, Clemson 57

Saturday, January 14

Florida State 90, North Carolina 57

North Carolina State 76, Wake Forest 40

Boston College 61, Virginia Tech 59

Sunday, January 15

Duke 73, Clemson 66

Maryland 61, Georgia Tech 50

Duke held off Virginia to stem the bleeding. Boston College surprised Clemson to let the Atlantic Coast Conference know that it can win a conference game every now and then. Georgia Tech surprised North Carolina State to make its presence felt. However, the main story from the past week of ACC basketball could only come from one place: Tallahassee, Florida. It was in this college town that the normal order and nature of things was decidedly thrown off course.

In a game that showed why college sports is unpredictable the Florida State Seminoles gave the North Carolina Tar Heels a thorough beating on Saturday afternoon.

The Seminoles started the game on fire on offense, making all of their shots from three point range making the score 9-2 before Carolina could blink. Sure, the game was just a few minutes old at the time, but a tone had been set. As the first half went on and the Tar Heels' shots began to fall, the Seminoles just kept up the pace in a way that should have been to North Carolina's advantage... but wasn't. Florida state was using the faster tempo to beat the Tar Heels' taller players downcourt, and when that didn't work they seemed to make most of their jump shots. Florida State guard Deividas Dulkys was supposed to be in a bad shooting slump before this game, but the Lithuanian didn't get the memo. He led the way for his team with 32 points and 8 for 10 shooting from three-point range, both career highs.

The matchup wasn't all one-sided in the first half. Toward the close of the first half North Carolina showed some good signs of life - more so on defense than in its ability to score - but the Heels did manage to close the gap a little going into halftime down only by eight points. The score was 36-28 by the halfway mark.

At the start of the second half the Seminoles came out trying to make a statement and succeeded. They flatly outhustled the Tar Heels to 50/50 balls and rebounds while continuing to shoot the lights out from all over the court. The Tar Heels on the other hand were totally cold shooting the ball even missing layups. Their normal star players like Harrison Barnes, who only made 5 of 13 shots from the field, were the worst offenders. Not only did Barnes not get enough shots; the shots that he took were not falling, killing his confidence along with the team's sense of purpose.

The way this game unfolded was so unexpected; therefore, in light of some of the ugly fights that have happened around the country (Xavier-Cincinnati, Oregon State-Arizona) and the way the fans were chanting and preparing to rush onto the court at the game's completion, both coaches - Carolina's Roy Williams and FSU's Leonard Hamilton - met when the ball went out of bounds with 14 seconds still on the clock and shook hands early so that most of the North Carolina team could exit just a little bit before things might get nasty.

Then again, something nasty did happen... to North Carolina's basketball reputation.

 

 

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Staff Writer