ACC is losing its elite status   Reply
My friend John Feinstein posed a simple question.

“Since the [Atlantic Coast Conference] expanded in 2005, how many teams other than Carolina have been to the Final Eight, let alone Final Four?”

Figuring there was no trick involved, I took a very educated guess.

“Ah, none?” I said, full of hope.

“Correct,” he declared.

Whew. Glad I passed the test.

But it got me to thinking. What is the real story concerning the balance of power in men’s college basketball? I mean, the talk always seems to be centered around the plight of the so-called midmajors, and their quest to secure what they feel are their well-merited at-large spots in the field of 65 on Selection Sunday. And this was a disastrous year for them, with only four of the at-larges going to a school outside the six power conferences, as we like to call the Big East, ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Southeastern, and Pac-10.

The chatter this year concerns the Big East, which began play yesterday afternoon with four of its members still alive as we have whittled the field from 65 to eight. There is a very real chance of us waking up tomorrow morning to have a 1985 redux, with three teams carrying the banner of Dave Gavitt’s inspired creation into the Final Four. And, please, make no mistake. The Big East is a monument to one man. No one else possessed the foresight, political skills, and downright charm to pull it off.

We know without question that the Big East reigns supreme in 2009. It may not have the eventual champion when the final buzzer sounds in Ford Field a week from tomorrow, but it will have dominated the field.

But what really has been going on in the five years since college basketball’s big upheaval, which resulted in Big East charter member Boston College aligning itself with the ACC, and the Big East, responding to football concerns, turning itself into a 16-team monster in basketball?

Here’s a breakdown of the available Sweet 16 and Elite Eight slots occupied by the power conferences since 2006, the first year of the expanded, 16-team Big East.

Sweet 16 Eight Eight

Big East 14 8

Big 12 8 6

Pac-10 9 4

ACC 6 3

SEC 6 3

Big Ten 5 2

Now here’s a further breakdown. It’s interesting to see just how many schools are involved in these slots.

Pac-10 (8): UCLA, Arizona, Washington, Oregon, Southern Cal, Washington State, Stanford, and Arizona State.

Big 12 (6): Oklahoma State, Texas A&M;, Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma, and Missouri.

Big East (7): Connecticut, Pittsburgh, Louisville, Villanova, Georgetown, West Virginia, and Syracuse.

Big Ten (5): Illinois, Michigan State, Wisconsin, Purdue, and Ohio State.

SEC (5): Florida, Kentucky, LSU, Vanderbilt, and Tennessee.

ACC (4): North Carolina, Duke, North Carolina State, and Boston College.

Is it possible the ACC isn’t all it thinks it is? Where is Maryland, the 2002 national champion? Where is Clemson? Where is Florida State? Where is Virginia Tech? Where is Miami, which was a No. 2 seed when Boston first welcomed the NCAA as a first- and second-round site in 1999? And, most disturbingly perhaps, where is Wake Forest, a school that takes basketball very seriously? Wake’s demise was the biggest shock of this year’s tournament, not just that the onetime No. 1-ranked team in the country didn’t get out of the first round, but also that Wake was utterly demolished by Cleveland State.

But the ACC really does have a lot of ‘splainin’ to do. It’s not supposed to be a big deal for a conference like that to have someone get to the Elite Eight. Duke players used to think it was in the school charter, but the Blue Devils haven’t been there since 2004.

In that period, Big East members Louisville, Connecticut, Villanova, Georgetown, and Pittsburgh all have made it to at least one Elite Eight, with West Virginia and Syracuse making it into the Round of 16. That’s deep depth.

Another question: What’s going on in the SEC? We know Kentucky is in upheaval, but the league has more problems than just the situation in Lexington. Since Florida won its second national championship in succession two years ago, not a single SEC team has made it to the Elite Eight. For years, the SEC regarded itself as the unappreciated league that would make its big statement at tournament time. But the only statement the league has been making the past two years is, “You’re right. We really do stink.”

Meanwhile, we folks east of the Sierra Nevadas must listen to the annual bleats of the people in the Pac-10, who believe all of us Eastern sophisticates suffer from a terminal case of “East Coast bias,” never recognizing the great achievements of the Pac-10. Now while that league may not be quite as good as its adherents say it is, we must acknowledge its depth. The Pac-10 has had the most widespread representation in the Round of 16 over the past four years, and that doesn’t include a decent California team. There is also a pulse once again at Oregon State, where Craig Robinson, the brother-in-law of the hoopster in chief, has brought immediate respectability.

CONTINED

Check out the Big 12. There’s lots of quality depth in that league, too. As for the Big Ten, the truth is it’s not as good as its propagandists say, but neither is it as boringly woeful as its critics maintain.

So, back to the question that triggered all this. Is the ACC in danger of becoming the next Conference USA? Is Carolina in the process of separating itself from the rest of the league the way John Calipari and Memphis have made themselves an untouchable power in their own league? Yes, I know that Duke actually won the ACC tourney, but it’s rather obvious that when Ty Lawson is healthy and ready to play, no one in the ACC, Duke included, can stay with the Tar Heels.

This is not a problem in the Big East. Louisville, UConn, Pitt, Villanova, Syracuse, West Virginia, and Georgetown (two years removed from a Final Four) all can play, and none of them are going away. That Cincinnati-Providence tier isn’t bad, either.

Anyway, the ACC had better stop kidding itself. It may not even be No. 2.

Link: http://www.boston.com/sports/colleges/mens_basketball/articles/2009/03/29/acc_is_losing_its_elite_status/?page=2

Today as the Elite Eight winds down and Bracket Nation braces for the Final Four, the Atlantic Coast Conference finds itself with one team ? North Carolina ? standing among the best of college basketball. And with the way the Tar Heels sometimes play defense, or maybe we should say don’t play defense, that number could be zero very soon, making this the second time in three years the ACC hasn’t had representation in the Final Four.

Even for the most partisan ACC supporter outside of Chapel Hill, for the sake of your conference’s national standing, it probably wouldn’t kill you today to root for North Carolina and its Deputy Dawg coach to beat Oklahoma, which, of course, for some of us won’t be easy. As Lt. Frank Drebin once said in describing why women and cops don’t mix, “It’s like eating a spoonful of Drano. Sure, it’ll clean you out, but it’ll leave you hollow inside.”

Actually, hollow itself is just what the ACC did in 2004 when it sold its soul and swiped “football powers” Virginia Tech, Miami and Boston College away from the Big East for the sake of having a conference championship football game that some greedy network would swoop up with its million of dollars. The ACC would be a superpower in both football and basketball, or so it thought, and the Big East would be left to start a playground league until it finally dried up and went away.

Never, however, underestimate the power of New York City and Madison Square Garden, the world’s most famous sports arena, where the Big East plays its season-ending tournament. As the ACC gloated, Big East followers whined foul, but the leaders of their conference went out and raided other conferences ? just as the pompous ACC had done to them ? and brought in South Florida, Cincinnati and Louisville as full members, and DePaul and Marquette for all sports except football.

It was survival of the fittest and Big East basketball is now the fittest of them all, armed with the best players from the hottest basketball hotbeds in the country ? most notably New York, Philadelphia, Washington-Baltimore ? who get to show their stuff every March in Madison Square Garden, receiving the best national exposure a college basketball player can receive.

What has been the most memorable college basketball game of the season so far? Why Syracuse’s and Connecticut’s six-overtime epic, of course, played in the Garden during the Big East Tournament quarterfinals ? three days before the NCAA tournament field was even drawn.

At the time of the ACC’s ill-fated raid of the Big East, coaches such as Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski and Maryland’s Gary Williams, fierce on-court rivals, stood as allies against the expansion of the conference, with Williams’ rationale being the ACC should strengthen what is already strong, and what the conference had long been known for ? basketball. Yet Williams didn’t carry his school’s vote on the expansion as only Duke and North Carolina voted against it.

As it turns out, K and Williams were right as the raid on the Big East has become the ACC’s Dieppe with its football equally as mediocre as it ever was, and its treasured conference championship football game unable to cut it in Florida, having been moved to North Carolina where it still didn’t sell out. The regular-season basketball schedule, once the symmetry of winter, is now a cause for Tylenol, as ACC fans never know who their team plays next; and the basketball conference itself, once the elite of the elite, despite what the regular-season RPI says, can now only be described as one of the better conferences in the country behind the Big East, which, oh, by the way, became the first conference to put four teams in Region finals.

And if that’s not depressing enough, how does a trip to Blacksburg, Va. in the dead of winter grab you, as even the term “Blacksburg in the spring” sounds ominous. It is the ACC’s Fayetteville, Ark., of which former Arkansas football coach Lou Holtz once said isn’t the end of the world, “but you can see it from here.”

A North Carolina win today would be nice for the prestige of the ACC, but would hardly restore the luster the conference has itself thrown out the window the past five years. They wouldn’t listen to Coach K (for once), and they wouldn’t listen to Gary Williams. Perhaps the ACC should have consulted with that known bracketoligist Aesop, who once said, “Greed destroys the source of good.”

Both the Big East and the ACC are getting what they deserve.

Link: http://www.times-news.com/localsports/local_story_088001517.html?keyword=secondarystory

These “+big east/-ACC” posts are becoming so common that I’m beginning to think that an inferiority complex is to blame.

Don’t shoot the messenger. No inferiority complex here. Perhaps a case of narcissism though during the season and pre post season from the ACC’s followers side however.

Reality sometimes sucks!

I think the BE and ACC are the top two hoops leagues as I’ve said many times before.

TBE - 29 March 2009 05:44 PM

Don’t shoot the messenger. No inferiority complex here. Perhaps a case of narcissism though during the season and pre post season from the ACC’s followers side however.

Reality sometimes sucks!

Substitute Big East for ACC here after this weekend! Hahahahaha!

Should the BE be looked at as a conference with no teams able to close the deal? Just a question. Again, I could care less about the ACC teams as a unit.

UNC 98 - 06 April 2009 08:56 PM

Should the BE be looked at as a conference with no teams able to close the deal? Just a question. Again, I could care less about the ACC teams as a unit.

Well I think your right. The big boys choked. But maybe the BE is the best conference throughout but doesn’t have the best team in the country… maybe the BE has four or so Elite teams but not the best team. Beating Mich State in Mich is a tall task. I didn’t think Nova matched up very well with you guys. I was shocked Louisville and Pitt lost.

So obviously your right…. the BE doesn’t have a team that can close the deal. But we sure have the teams to get there. Like half of them in the Final Four and the one wasn’t even in the Top 5 of the Big East.

if UNC hangs on then 4 out of the last 9 years the ACC has won the championship… clearly an inferior conference, I guess the globe has sour grapes cuz the be isn’t in the championship game this year