Re: The media-led narrative...

BigCUFan®

CU Medallion [64593]

TigerPulse: 100%

Posts: 88998

Joined: 3/27/01

The media-led narrative...

Feb 27, 2023, 12:13 PM [ in reply to They're currently on the outside looking in, but should... ]

that the ACC is a weak basketball conference is a complete load and frankly, I'm sick of hearing it.

You hear this same bull$#!7 virtually every time a national analyst is discussing the NCAAT and that is reflected in the rankings, because the pollsters are listening to this same garbage.

What you don't hear is that the ACC came out on top of the Big Ten in the annual ACC/B1G challenge, a result that included the league’s 14th-place team, Notre Dame, putting an 18-point beatdown on Tom Izzo’s Michigan State Spartans.

You also won't hear that teams like NC State and Pittsburgh are much different teams than they were several weeks ago. They have improved significantly now that their lineups, aided by the transfer portal, have established a chemistry and identity.

Something else you're not going to hear is that last year, despite a cumulative NET of No. 5 that resulted in only 5 teams placed into the field of 68 (the fewest since expanding to 15 in 2014), the ACC still ended up with 3 teams in the Elite 8 and half of the Final Four. That Elite 8 total was the same number as the Big 12, Big Ten, SEC and Big East had combined. So clearly, they got it wrong.

What you do hear is that the ACC comes in as the 7th rated conference behind the Big East and Mountain West.

The top teams in the ACC are pretty darn good, but it doesn’t look like it if your evaluation is based on the NET rankings (which no one seems to understand), in part because the games in November and December are weighted differently than the games are once conference play begins.

So is it perception or reality that the ACC is down? Are some historically great teams having bad years? Absolutely! Have some of the ACC's brand name programs failed to lived up to preseason expectations? Yes they have. Are there four elite teams in the league right now?. No. Is there a lot of parity within the league among a lot of really good teams? Without question.

You never hear that about the Big Ten or the Big XII or the SEC.

The top teams in the ACC can play with the best teams in any league and last years NCAAT more than supported that.

End of rant !!!!