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ACC Basketball Weekly Review

 

 

Scores

Tuesday, January 17

Florida State 84, Maryland 70

Wednesday, January 18

Miami 76, Clemson 73

Thursday, January 19

North Carolina 62, Virginia Tech 68

Duke 91, Wake Forest 73

North Carolina State 76, Boston College 62

Virginia 70, Georgia Tech 38

Saturday, January 21

Florida State 76, Duke 73

Wake Forest 71, Boston College 56

Clemson 64, Georgia Tech 62

Temple 73, Maryland 60

Sunday, January 22

Virginia Tech 47, Virginia 45

North Carolina State 78, Miami 73

Can you possibly believe it? Can you even begin to put the pieces together and comprehend what has just happened in the Atlantic Coast Conference? The 1983 North Carolina State Wolfpack wrote the book on college basketball miracles - only the 1985 Villanova Wildcats can truly compare to what N.C. State did 29 years ago. However, the ACC is creating a smaller-scale yet still remarkable story in 2012. The Florida State Seminoles have managed to do the unthinkable: beat North Carolina and Duke in the same season.

It was one thing for Florida State to beat North Carolina on Jan. 14 at home in Tallahassee. Everything went right for the Seminoles that day. They were playing at home. North Carolina was flat. Florida State showed the urgency and desperation of a team trying to get back in the NCAA Tournament mix after absorbing some bad losses in late December and early January. Florida State scored ten - TEN! - points in the first half of a Dec. 30 loss at home to Princeton. Really - ten points to a decent but hardly imposing Ivy League team at home. The mind reels trying to understand just how anemic and ineffective Florida State had been at the offensive end of the floor this season. That's saying something, too, because coach Leonard Hamilton's FSU teams have historically been very poor on offense while being spectacular on defense. A 46-41 loss to Harvard on Nov. 25 in a Thanksgiving weekend tournament typified everything that was both good and awful about FSU basketball in the Hamilton years. However, the loss to Princeton severely dragged down the quality of the Seminoles' resume, and a subsequent loss to a very mediocre Clemson club wounded FSU's NCAA prospects even more. How was this team - after regrouping to beat North Carolina - ever going to find the scoring punch and resilience to win at Duke and conquer Cameron Indoor Stadium, one of the most impregnable courts for a visiting team in all of college basketball? The Seminoles didn't figure to have much of a shot at all, not against a Duke club that, for all of its weaknesses on the road, had not lost a home game all season and rarely walks off Coach K Court in defeat.

However, Florida State managed to slay the dragon, stunning the Blue Devils on a three-point shot by Michael Snaer as time expired. A mad dash from the bench engulfed Snaer in a wild postgame celebration. In the span of eight days, FSU went from NIT likelihood to near-lock for the NCAA Tournament. Few teams across the United States are likely to be able to match the pair of trump-card-style wins the Seminoles have: Duke and UNC, sitting in a tree, locked into the Noles' portfolio through Selection Sunday.

It's really rather amazing Florida State - this Florida State team - could pull off the Tobacco Road double.

Had FSU not won, other stories would have received bigger headlines: Virginia Tech upsetting Virginia on the road; North Carolina rebounding from its loss to FSU while also losing wing defender Dexter Strickland for the year with an ACL injury; and North Carolina State moving to 4-1 in the league with a win at Miami. However, Florida State winning at Duke is going to leave a deep mark on this ACC basketball season.

 

 

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Staff Writer