It has arrived. ACC basketball is back, and I for one couldn't be happier. Let's do it.
The game tips off at 6:00, but the programming starts off at 5:30 with ESPNU's ACC preview. I'm not really that interested in hearing Hubert Davis and Andy Katz telling us things we already know, but if it's your cup of tea the thread will be open for that.
As a quick sidenote, the ACC opening weekend has been pretty crazy: Miami was a botched open lay-up away from beating #23 Virginia on the road; Georgia Tech was a few missed free throws away from beating #3 Duke in Atlanta; and expected ACC bottom-dwellers Clemson and Wake Forest won their opening games over Florida State and Florida State.
In short, the ACC is a mess. The good news, so long as you aren't Duke or UVA, is that it looks like there's only one elite team in the conference, and there's a hodge-podge of everyone else in some rough order. Bad news is, I feel like Maryland is more likely to succumb to the craziness than they are to benefit from it, at least this year.
Guess we'll get a good idea today.
Random, Baseless Prediction: Nick Faust has more made threes than airballs.
Prediction: Sticking with my earlier call. Maryland gets a run late in the first half, but it's never really in doubt. State by double-digits.
For today's guessing game, let's return to Alex Len in his first ACC game ever. As per usual, points + boards with minutes played as a tiebreaker. I'll say 21 (11 and 10) in 29 minutes.