Last night’s games weren’t terribly pretty and they didn’t all work out the ACC’s way, but I’ll take it. The Good Guys went 3-2 to push the overall “Challenge” lead to 4-2. With five more games tonight, the ACC just needs to win two to make it eight for eight in “Challenges” against the Big Ten.
Maryland had the best win last night, knocking off Illinois in Champagne, where they hadn’t lost to a non-conference team in 51 games. Even with the win, the Terps found a lot of things to work on. They blew a large early lead by getting sloppy with the ball and failing to ever block out even once. Fortunately, one of those point guards I’ve talked about, Greivis Vasquez, put the team on his wiry shoulders in the second half and personally secured the win. I’d like to see one of the seniors step up in those situations, but a freshman is better than nobody.
Duke and Georgia Tech both won home games a bit too snuggly. Neither game should have been as close as it was, but a win’s a win, right? I couldn’t watch the Tech game, but Duke looked particularly lost on offense. If Greg Paulus doesn’t get his game together, the Blue Devils are going to struggle at times this year.
FSU got spanked as expected by Wisconsin and Miami blew a golden chance to steal a win from Northwestern. The Hurricanes got the ball down two with almost 13 seconds left. Jack McClinton, who scored 30 jogged up the court, giving the defense time to get set, and then launched a contested 25-footer. He didn’t even think about passing. Stupid. The smart, easy play is to just put your head down and drive to the hoop. They don’t want to foul, so they’ll probably give you an easy layup and possibly a three-point play. If they collapse, kick it out for an open three. Oh well.
The big game tonight is obviously Ohio State at UNC, but I’m pretty excited to see my Cavs visit Purdue. I watched Georgia Tech take apart the Boilermakers with their guard play, so I’m hoping the Cavs can do the same. The other game of interest is Michigan State at Boston College. This is a good chance for the Eagles to get their stuff together.