Pre-Season Media Poll vs the ACC Tournament Seeding

ACC Team

Preseason Media Poll Pick

ACC Tournament Seeding

Evaluation

Duke

1

5

When Duke is healthy, the have the highest upside of any team in the ACC.  If Jayson Tatum continues his rock launch improvement, he make take the Devils to the Final Four.

North Carolina

2

1

These #FireRoyWilliams types are just dumb people (Thanks for allowing me to vent)..  Justin Jackson is one of the ACC’s most exciting players.  The Tar Heels are also a Final Four contender (and probably the best national title contender from the ACC).

Virginia

3

6

Virginia had ACC losses to Pittsburgh, Virginia Tech, Duke, Miami, Syracuse, Florida State, and North Carolina. Losing to Pittsburgh was not good – and they let one get away vs. Miami.  Other than that, Virginia did as well I expected.  I some some weird #FireTony (referring to head coach, Tony Bennett) tweets in the last couple of weeks.  That junk is off the rails.

Louisville

4

4

Louisville looked really good vs. Notre Dame today – and their defense is enough to take the Cardinals to the Elite Eight.  Petino did a heck of a job coaching through all the injuries this season.

Syracuse

5

8

Fair to say that we were disappointed in Syracuse and their losses to UConn, Boston College, St. John’s, and Georgetown (which looks awful right now as the Hoyas took an L to Arkansas State), but they had a decent set of wins vs. Monmouth, Miami, Wake Forest, Florida State, and Duke (as well as a few other top 100 wins).  This is your classic bubble team who drastically underperformed – they are in but should have done much better this year.

NC State

6

13

The most disappointing team in the ACC – and it was never close.

Notre Dame

7

3

People count out Notre Dame – and then they are consistently wrong because Mike Brey is one of the best coaches in the ACC.  We would not be surprised to see him get a few ACC coach of the yer votes.

Florida State

8

2

Leonard Hamilton 100% deserves consideration for ACC coach of the Year (and I would be not surprised if he got that award).  This ought to shut up some of those #FireHam types for a while.

Miami

9

9

This might be one of the best coaching jobs Jim Larranaga has done in his career – five new starters – and the Hurricanes are going to be in the NCAA tournament.

Virginia Tech

10

7

Buzz Williams is taking the Hokies to the NCAA tournament for the first time in a decade – and you don’t want to face Virginia Tech in the 1st two rounds.

Clemson

11

12

Clemson has underperformed in ACC basketball – and needs a new coach to breath life into the program. Someone who can recruit better players – and get their fans invested again – there’s a lot of apathy about Clemson men’s basketball right now.  Virginia Tech was in the same position a couple of years ago before a home rrun hire was made.

Pittsburgh

12

14

We had our questions about Kevin Stallings – we thought he was downgrade.  And Panthers fans, it’s going to get worse.  Much worse.

Wake Forest

13

10

With a 9-9 ACC record, Danny Manning should have the Demon Deacons in the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2010.

Georgia Tech

14

11

Josh Pastner got my vote for ACC Coach of the Year.  The Yellow Jackets will likely be in the National Invitational Tournament.  Pastner got every ounce from this roster.

Boston College

15

15

Does Boston College need to make a change?  Jim Christian might be over his head.