It’s only December, but fair or not resumes for the NCAA Tournament are built during the OOC portion of the schedule in November and December.
Don’t think so?
Why do you think the ACC only got 5 bids last year, with Notre Dame barely making the field and the only team higher than an 8 seed? Even ACC teams that improved during January through March were penalized for sluggish performances earlier in the year. When ACC teams played each other last season, they just couldn’t make up ground because they couldn’t point to many OOC-quality wins.
This year was looking like more of the same for the conference save Virginia who had moved into the Top 5 with wins over Baylor and Illinois. There were barely any OOC p5 wins much less ranked wins going into the ACC Big 10 challenge. The Big 10 went into the challenge with 6 ranked teams and with most brackets projections having 10 Big 10 teams already in the field.
The ACC is atrocious at the bottom. Georgia Tech, Syracuse, and Boston College are very mediocre teams, but Florida State and Louisville had a whopping 13 losses between them and just 1 win. The fact was the ACC was getting no help from these 5 teams in the Challenge. That was an automatic 4 or 5 losses.
To win the challenge the ACC needed to go 8-1 or 7-2… Good luck with that.
Monday Virginia Tech knocked off Minnesota as expected, but then Pittsburgh played at a Northwestern team and that lost by 1 point to Auburn. Jeff Capel’s team shot lights out from three and beat NW by 29.
Ok maybe the ACC might have something, but Tuesday would tell the tale.
Clemson beat a solid Penn State in 2 OT at home, but when Wake Forest won at challenging to win at Wisconsin there was something to build on. Virginia again proved they are one the country’s best teams facing a double-digit deficit at Michigan to beat the Wolverines.
Is there anyone in the country with a better resume than the Hoos?
Wednesday night Miami came back against Rutgers. Duke’s young talented team grew up holding off a ranked and rugged Ohio State. Even Florida State played kept it tight with Purdue before going down.
The nightcap needed a UNC win over Indiana, or BC win at Nebraska or a victory by Notre Dame at home Michigan State. The Spartans had some injuries, but the Irish took advantage of routing the Spartans by 18.
ACC teams ended up beating at least 5 Big 10 teams, maybe more that will make the NCAA field.
That is exactly what the conference needed after a disastrous start to the OOC Schedule, and a bottom that is going to bring down the computer numbers of the ACC.
When March comes around, this week probably be at least 2 more bids to the ACC than what the conference would have got previously. I feel the the ACC is headed towards being a 7 or 8 bid league
That’s how important this past week was for the ACC, and the conference needed it.
