A Ship Lost at Sea: ACC mid-season report.

Deny thy Commissioner and refuse thy name;
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,
And I'll no longer be a Blogger.

Tis but thy losses that is my enemy;

Thou art thyself, though not a crummy league.

What's crummy league? it is nor hand, nor foot,

Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part

Belonging to college basketball. O, be some other name!

What's in a name? that which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet;

So ACC would, were he not ACC call'd,

Retain that dear perfection which it owes

Without that title. ACC, doff thy name,

And for that name which is no part of thee

Take all myself.

Wait seriously, ACC, where are you?

With bated breath, we here at LCB watched the beginnings of the fledgling ACC schedule with great expectations. For all we could tell, the out-of-conference tom-foolery and skullduggery was exactly that; upsets and upsetting early losses would be of no consequence come conference play. The rightful order and suprememcy of ACC teams would again come flying out of the ashes of early season missteps and the power players in the league would come out swinging.

Oops. Not exactly happening is it? UNC, taking by far the biggest fall of any team in the league, is now an 8 loss team and no longer in the top-25. This team is so stacked with young talent, it practically oozes upside, but the McD's AAs haven't gelled and consequently the Heels have suffered. Things are not quite so baby blue anymore on Franklin street.

Then lets focus on their 15-501 rival: Duke. Considered the league favorite, Duke can't buy a win on the road. They've lost to NC State and GA Tech, which are not in-and-of-themselves bad losses, but more a telling sign of the great fragility of Duke's offensive abilities in rowdy arenas. All of that aside, Duke has looked like a strong ACC team of old. That is, until this past weekend. Playing at Georgetown in a top 10 ACC/Big East showdown, Duke got thump, run out of the gym and deflated to the point that televisions around Durham began flickering off with more than 10 minutes to go in the second half. Before the game, certain analysts had been touting Duke as the savior of the ACC, that a big win over Georgetown would raise the rest of the ACC out of the dark hole into which it had plunged so quickly.

Oops. That didn't happen either. Duke lost big, getting stomped in the process. But how about the supposed dark horses in the league? Virginia, NC State, Maryland? Surprise of surprises, if there was ever a year that scrappy veteran teams could make a play for an ACC title it would a year like this, when the rest of the league cannot seem to tie their shoes correctly without picking of a foul or getting injured.

Maryland, per the usual Gary Williams magic, has jumped out to lead the league in conference wins and has looked like the big kid on the block. But sadly, in this year's ACC, the big kid is a 98 pound weakling, visciously pounding its fists into other 98-97-96 pound weaklings around it. Sounds like College Park doesn't it?

Virginia, on the other hand, was considered to be the weakest of the bunch, a virtual speed bump come ACC play. But despite LCB's pre-season prediction that Virginia would be terrible, they haven't been. In fact it's been just the opposite, they've been prowling the eastern seaboard like a ravanous wolf, tearing into the flesh of already haggard UNC, NC State, and Georgia Tech squads. Be on alert basketball fans, UVA continues to lurk around corners, waiting for their next surprise victim to come stumbling up the block.

Now, you may presume that I am only speaking to the woes of the "power programs" and inferring that they are the woes of the conference in turn. Perhaps I am regarding the newly found parity in the ACC with a sneering sense of elitism. But this isn't my point. Congrats to UVA, NC State, and Maryland for exceeding expectations. But the real issue that concerns me the most is that the prestige of the ACC is slipping this season. The Big East, Big Ten, and Big 12 are all more talent laden conferences full of dangerous teams. And not surprisingly, the ACC's performance against them this season is scary. Duke, the supposed leader of the conference, got slammed by Georgetown, a good, but not fantastic Big East team on Saturday. UNC has now lost to College of Charleston, Texas, and Syracuse. Oh and remember the surprising Maryland squad? They've now been squarely beaten by Villanova, Cinncinati, Wisconsin, and William & Mary.

In conclusion, I'm going to do something I don't often do; I'm going to quote Roy Williams in a non-sardonic manner:

"How can you go any lower? Be honest: How can it be any worse than it is right now?"

Very true, Roy, Dag-snake-it and dog-gone-gummit, you're right. I'm not sure it could be much worse, short of Boston College going on a monster run and winning the conference tournament, I don't think the ACC could sink any lower. The ACC of old, gleaming with the pride of powerful teams, it's sails full of tournament bound winds, now lays in disrepair, in a foggy haze where not so much as a breeze comes flittering past. I for one hope the crews of the respective vessels can find the NCAA waters before the sharp rocks of the offseason come crashing into the hull, but only time will tell.

2009-2010 ACC Previews: Georgia Tech

LCB believes that while teams have been playing games since the start of November the real college basketball season does not begin until conference play is in full gear. Over the next couple of weeks, we will preview each ACC team by remembering some of the conference's past players that may have gone forgotten in some circles.

Season Outlook: With a red, wispy bob of hair and a lean, sinewy frame, Luke Schenscher waltzed his way into the National Championship game and ACC fans' hearts forever. This Australian ex-pat was little more than a 7-foot disappearing act during certain big moments in his career, and yet in other, less important games he was something akin to a Kareem Abdul-Jabbar reincarnate; tossing goofy sky hooks with a childish grin splashed across his pan flat face. I watched Paul Hewitt don his finest Schenscher face last spring, grinning ear to ear, as top big man Derrick Favors signed with his home state school in what is promised to be a job saving one-and-done season. But this team will have it's Schenscher moments nonetheless, varying wildly from game to game and possession to possession, never quite maintaining the momentum and consistency to get back to the National title game. Derrick Favors comes in like a primed depth charge, ready to blow the roof off ACC competition. But at 18 years old, and with NBA dollar signs glistening in his eyes, let's hope Favors doesn't eat too many Vegemite sandwiches this season, sending an upside-laden team back to the Georgia swamps with a belly ache.

Key Players: F Gani Lawal (Jr.) and G Iman Shumpert (So.)
Top Newcomer: F Derrick Favors (Fr.)

Record at Time of Posting: 8-2

Teach's Prediction: 4th in the regular season

Langston's Prediction: 3rd in the regular season

Iceman AD's Prediction: 5th in the regular season

Key Games:

L Dayton 63-59
W Siena 74-61
W USC 79-53
L Florida State 66-59
@ Georgia 1/5
Duke 1/9
@ Virginia 1/13
@ North Carolina 1/16
Clemson 1/19
@ Florida State 1/24
Wake Forest 1/28
North Carolina State 2/6
@ Miami (FL) 2/10
@ Maryland 2/20
Boston College 1/27
Virginia Tech 3/6

Georgia Defeats #7 Georgia Tech: 'No Smiles Until There's Two Zeroes'

The cold Gatorade and ice of victory splashed onto Mark Richt's Carthaginian neck with little over a minute to play, but the celebration was met with a harsh glare and the words: "No smiles until there's two zeroes on the clock." The scoreboard read Georgia 30 Georgia Tech 24, but Georgia's coach was not happy before or after time ran out on the game of old fashioned hate; and why would he be? This battle was merely a step along a path; a pass between mountains; a test showing how many travails still lie before this coach and his program.

Even in this victory, the Bulldawgs continued to commit stupid penalties that kept their opponent's drives alive, showed an inability to make key tackles, and an overall inability to stop Georgia Tech's unique rushing offense, and as a result, Mark Richt sounded like a man at his wit's end after the game. Despite being the victor on this lone Saturday, this red and black general recognized that Rome was still not conquered.

This competitive fire and lack of satisfaction with his eighth win over the Yellow Jackets in nine years is exactly why most Georgia fans will continue to support Richt despite a somewhat disappointing season. In his interview directly after the final whistle, one could tell that despite his two underclassmen running backs, Washaun Ealey and Caleb King, rushing for 183 and 166 yards he was not resting on his laurels. Richt did not praise his team's success on the ground Saturday; instead, he sounded like a man who realizes that this team did not play up to his expectations in this game or this season. He sounded like a man with work to do; his mind on the grand timeline of history, while lesser men focus only on the moment. Mark Richt recognizes that last night's victory against his state rival means little if it does not mold these young men into a team capable of winning much more.

Georgia spent the last two seasons as a factor in the BCS race, but this year the team faltered out of the gate, losing to then #9 Oklahoma St., cooling fans' expectations for the season. At the time, the Dawgs' preseason #12 ranking seemed way too high, but then the team rattled off three straight wins against South Carolina, Arkansas, and Arizona St., with Joe Cox looking more than capable of replacing last year's number one pick in the draft Matthew Stafford. Then an unsportsmanlike penalty against AJ Green, in the game against LSU, crushed all that optimism like an aluminum can at a tailgate, and the Tigers beat the Dawgs by a touchdown; and the following week Georgia's defense made Jonathan Crompton of Tennessee look like a first round draft pick, as the Volunteers stormed the Dawgs 45-19. The rest of this season was a story in how inconsistency can derail a season, as the penalties and turnovers in big games continued to mount, costing series, yielding games, losing seasons.

Mark Richt and his staff attempted to curb these problems, devoting extra sessions in practice to fumbling drills and adopting a zero tolerance policy on penalties, but none of that changed the results on the field, and Georgia finished the 2009 regular season 7-5, the most losses in one season since Richt became head coach.

Usually, in college football, a win against a top ten team feels like a huge triumph that keeps a team and its fanbase satisfied until at least the next kickoff, but last night's game appeared to leave Richt anything but satisfied; and that sentiment is contagious. After seeing his response, one could not help but reflect on the intricate details of Georgia's victory: the lead was built while Tech quarterback Josh Nesbitt was out of the game with an injury, the rushing numbers were probably inflated by an injury to Tech's starting defensive tackle, and UGA corner Brandon Boykin committed a pass interference penalty, in the end zone, on third down, setting up Tech's last score, cutting Georgia's lead to six. This victory happened in spite of the same mistakes that plagued Georgia's season all year.

One could dwell on all the previous mentioned circumstances, growing frustrated and depressed in the process, or one could acknowledge that Mark Richt took a team with 77 freshmen and sophomores and won seven games with them, defeating three of the team's major rivals, going 4-4 in America's toughest conference, to finish number three in the SEC East. These tasks were accomplished the year after Georgia's program lost its starting quarterback, starting running back, and most consistent wide receiver to the NFL draft, in a season where the team's best player, AJ Green, did not play in three of the team's final four games. While this team has its flaws and may need to replace its defensive coordinator, Mark Richt kept the team together and weathered the storm.

Now, with an extra month of practice thanks to another Bowl bid, this team is ready to march out of the Gatorade-flavored snow and ice of the Alps and lay siege to the kingdoms and empires of Saban and Meyer. After all, Mark Richt and his armies seek more than a win against the Yellow Jackets--the dream of a championship still alludes these riders of elephants, and these setbacks grow more and more frustrating, causing one to wonder how long the tides of history will allow a team to sit outside the gates of Rome before either the city or the army are razed from the field for good, and, judging from his mood last night, Richt recognizes his difficult position within the crux of college football, the SEC, as a teetering between being the dominant power in the Mediterranean or a scorched field of salt. These next few years will seal the fate on how people remember Mark Richt's tenure.