ACC Basketball Roundup(1/8)

Upsetting the upsetters.

• Coach Al Skinner, you just knocked off the #1 team in the nation on their home floor and broke into the Top 25, how are you going to celebrate?

  Skinner: We are going to lose to Harvard.

  Wait, what?

  I will let you decide whether this reflects poorly on UNC because they lost to a team that could not beat Harvard or as william said earlier, deprives the BC win in Chapel Hill any real meaning by proving the unpredicatablily of college basketball.  I do know that Harvard has never, as long as Harvard has played basketball and polls have existed, ever beaten a ranked team.  BC should feel great shame to the point I think we should jettison them from the conference.

• But BC is not alone in the world of embarrassing losses to teams with three digits in their RPI column and the words play-in game attached to their conference champion.   Enter Maryland who I thought, at the very least, did themselves a huge favor by rolling Michigan State during the Old Spice Classic and Michigan in the ACC/Big Ten Walkover.  How silly of me.  Losses to 6-7 MEAC teams have a way of clinging to you like a plague when the time comes for the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee to evaluate your 19-12, 8-8 ACC mark after you lose a Thursday game during the ACC Tournament.  No wonder Gary Williams wants a bigger tournament, he cannot even beat the cupcakes on the schedule.
• The game of the night or so ESPN told us, was Davidson visiting Duke where we all had high hopes Stephen Curry would come out and do unholy things to the Devils defense.  Not so much.  Curry did get 29 points but started slow as Davidson fell into a 25 point chasm they managed to climb out in getting the lead down to eight before they ran out of miracles.  Duke is a good defensive team but their offense is still lacking.  Duke still opts to milk the clock when leading against a dangerous opponent and that lack of agression invites comebacks as it did two years ago.
• Aside from 2-3 more random non-conference affairs, it will be all ACC play from now until the ACC Tournament.  Aside from UNC-Wake on Sunday, Duke travels to FSU for a Saturday game which will be entertaining for no other reason than there is a distinct possiblity Ryan Reid might try to break Greg Paulus in two at some point during the contest.

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