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Well, it’s up to Duke and Carolina to save the ACC.
UNC’s controversial invitation to the NCAA Tournament gave the ACC four teams when it was expected to get only the top three. And now, the second and third best are gone.
Louisville, an eighth seed, lost to No. 9 Creighton after trailing by 18 until the Cardinals’ Chucky Hepburn hit a long shot just before halftime.
To make it worse, the eventual 89-75 loss in the South Region was in Lexington, Kentucky, a short drive from Louisville. And just like that, the 27-8 season is over for ACC Coach of the Year Pat Kelsey, who was greeted with a flying water battle from the stands at Rupp Arena to end his first year in the passionate Bluegrass state.
If that’s not bad enough for our league, Clemson, the No. 5 seed in the Midwest Region, rallied late after trailing by 20-plus points but lost to 12th seed McNeese State and the next N.C. State coach Will Wade, 69-67. The Tigers’ comeback was gallant but the hole they dug was just too deep.
Wolfpack fans, whose team missed the entire postseason before Kevin Keatts was fired, must be ecstatic about Wade, who has taken three schools to the NCAA Tournament but got fired from his second, LSU, during a prolonged recruiting scandal.
“We made history!” said Wade after the Cowboys earned their first win ever in the Big Dance, and what a way to go out unless they can also upset No. 4 seed Purdue in the second round Saturday in Providence.
So the ballyhooed Blue Bloods are all that’s left from the ACC. Duke, the No. 1 seed in the East and top-ranked team in the country, is an unmitigated favorite over 16 seed Mount St. Mary’s Friday at noon in the Lenovo Center. The only drama to that game is whether Cooper Flagg will play sparingly or at all after spraining his left ankle in the ACC Tournament.
The Blue Devils will move on to the second round Sunday and will likely need both Flagg and Maliq Brown, another injured regular, against either Mississippi State from the SEC or burly Baylor of the Big 12.
And at 4 p.m. Friday, Carolina gets Ole Miss, another of the 14 teams competing from the SEC. The Tar Heels have an advantage that most winners from the First Four – or the entire tournament for that matter – never have. A scheduling quirk allowed them to have two full days of rest after blitzing San Diego State with perhaps their best game of the season.
Confidence going to Milwaukee was sky high for the team that used all the flack as motivation in scoring more points on the Aztecs than any other opponent this season.
Surely, the ACC needs more than one team to advance into the second round, or it would underscore criticism of the fifth-ranked conference for most of the season.
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Featured image via Associated Press/Charles Krupa
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
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