ACC Basketball Weekly Review

Scores

Monday, December 5

Florida State 76, Charleston Southern 51

Tuesday, December 6

North Carolina 97, Evansville 48

Memphis 71, Miami 54

Virginia 68, George Mason 48

Wednesday, December 7

Duke 87, Colorado State 64

Georgia Tech 68, Georgia 56

Virginia Tech 78, Rhode Island 67

Wake Forest 87, High Point 83

Maryland 77, Mount Saint Mary’s 74

Thursday, December 8

Providence 64, Boston College 57

Saturday, December 10

Duke 86, Washington 80

North Carolina 84, Long Beach State 78

Arizona 63, Clemson 47

Georgia Tech 65, Savannah State 45

West Virginia 77, Miami 66

Seton Hall 68, Wake Forest 54

Sunday, December 11

Florida State 75, UNC-Greensboro 60

North Carolina State 65, North Carolina Central 60

Virginia Tech 73, Norfolk State 60

Boston College 66, Stony Brook 51

It’s early in the season, but after roughly four weeks of basketball, there’s Duke and North Carolina, and then there’s everyone else in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The league as a whole did not fare well in non-conference play, especially this past Saturday. Clemson took it on the chin against Arizona, Miami got whacked by one of Bob Huggins’s less imposing teams at West Virginia. Wake Forest got popped by Seton Hall, and Georgia Tech’s win came against a cupcake, offering little in the way of substantial value to the league. Georgia Tech did win at Georgia earlier in the week in what was one of the ACC’s better non-conference conquests, but the Yellow Jackets – with four losses already – are not about to contend for the NCAA Tournament.

Florida State won two paycheck games, but the Seminoles need to test themselves against upper-tier competition before their bonafides can be known for certain. It appears that coach Leonard Hamilton will once again have a great-defense, no-offense team on his hands, but that offense will have to do enough to carry Florida State to a number of marquee wins… wins that have yet to materialize.

One team to keep an eye on in this league is Virginia. The Cavaliers defeated a quality Michigan team earlier in the season in the Big Ten-ACC Challenge, and they rocked George Mason by 20 points this past week. If Tony Bennett’s team doesn’t run out of gas in February the way it has in previous years, it could contend for a tourney ticket in March. Bennett knows how to dictate tempo and get his teams to play the way he wants them to. If Virginia continues to control the pace of every game it plays, it will flourish and be a royal pest to its foes.

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Staff Writer