Dave Sez

Dukie Dreaming

Now, I normally like the Duke Basketball Report. I like it a lot actually, even though I'm not a Duke fan. They cover the ACC and all of college basketball extremely well and despite their obvious bias, they usually are pretty objective.

Usually.

This collection of what-ifs is a pretty egregious anomaly. According to the DBR guys, if everything had always gone Duke's way, they would have won more games! Now, there's a pretty shocking revelation.

I guess they are forgetting that they've been the beneficiaries of more than their share of good fortune. The most famous and productive of course is their hiring of a little-known and barely-proven young coach named Mike Krzyzewski. Surely there was much debate about whether he was the guy, but they pulled the lever and hit the jackpot.

I don't want to hear any talk about how much luckier they could have been.

Low Spark Of Tar Heeled Boys

It seems that Tar Heel fans aren't really being sparked by the disinterested play of their football team. They are staying home and those empty seats cost Carolina some serious dollars. The projection is that they'll lose out on about $600K in ticket revenue, plus whatever concessions that would have produced. One million bucks seems like a reasonable guess. Ouch. Even for a wealthy athletic program like UNC, that loss has to hurt. They rely on football and basketball to pay for all the other sports.

On top of those ticket losses, I think it's pretty safe to say that the Tar Heels won't be traveling to any bowl games this year. That's even more potential revenue down the toilet.

On the other side of the ledger, it seems that UNC is still the national leader in merchandising revenue. That's pretty incredible when think that their football program has been mediocre to bad for six or seven years now and they haven't won a hoops title in over a decade. It just goes to show the power of a few stars, namely Michael Jordan and Mia Hamm. Certainly Vince Carter and Marion Jones don't hurt too much either.

When you put those two stories together, you see what Carolina expects (#1 in merchandise, which equals reputation) and what they are currently getting. Again, it doesn't look to good for Coach Bunting.

Defense Rules

The Washington Post is right, the ACC is loaded with good defenses this year. Five teams in the top 15 in the country is pretty impressive, and it's not like there isn't some offensive talent in the league. It's just that those players, like Charlie Whitehurst, Darian Durant and Chris Rix, have been overpowered by the defenses they've seen.

It's just one of those cycles. Don't be surprised if it turns around the other way next year.

ACC Review - Week 4

Miami at Houston - Miami's biggest opponent for the rest of the year will be themselves. Unless something surprising happens, there isn't a game left where they won't be fairly significant favorites. It's a bit odd for a team to have their biggest, toughest and most significant game so early in the year. I wonder if it will be too hard for the Canes to maintain focus without that one key game to motivate them?

One slight concern at this point is the play of Brock Berlin. He has not looked particularly sharp yet. He may just not be that good, but it shouldn't matter. As long as he doesn't kill them with turnovers, Miami has enough talent on both sides of the ball to more than make up for mediocre quarterback play.

Maryland at Duke - Wow. Either Duke's worse than I thought or Maryland's better. I've been overrating Duke all year, but I really think a lot of the credit for this blowout goes to Ralph Friedgen and his Terrapins. Yeah, Duke's not that great to begin with and they are banged up, but Maryland rolled up 685 yards of offense. 685! And that's with a QB, Joel Stathon, that has been shaky all season. Well, shaky until Saturday, when he passed for 324 yards and four touchdowns. Stathon did throw three picks and this is Duke, but still, it was a great game for a young QB.

Maryland's defense did a pretty good job too, allowing only one touchdown. Duke's other two scores were a kickoff return for a touchdown (pretty rare for Duke) and an interception return. Duke totaled only 190 yards on offense.

With this effort and given another week to reflect on it, maybe I was too hard on the Terps for their showing in Morgantown last week. Considering they were on the road against a ranked team, a close loss isn't too bad, even if it wasn't pretty.

NC State at Virginia Tech - I'll be the first to admit that I read this NC State team wrong. Like many people, I overreacted to the Ohio State game. One game does not make a season and things like turnovers and costly penalties are often easy to fix. What I didn't give them near enough credit for is their defense. Sure, they shut out 1-AA Richmond and they held Ohio State to only 137, but I wasn't convinced. Richmond is, well Richmond, and Ohio State is very conservative on offense. But it's obvious now - this team has a nasty defense.

Check what they did to the Hokies in Lane Stadium - 16 points with their only touchdown coming on a short drive after a turnover, 192 total yards of offense and ten (10!!!) sacks given up by mobile QB Bryan Randall. To get ten sacks in any game is mighty impressive, but to do it to Bryan Randall is amazing. State was fast and relentless.

All that said, NC State was lucky to win. Randall moved the Hokies into field goal range on their final drive, but they missed a game-winning 43 yarder. As much credit as I'm giving the Wolfpack defense, the Hokie D did nearly as well. They allowed State only 223 yards of offense, and State's two TDs were the result of short fields after turnovers.

The bottom line is that both schools showed that they have good, dangerous teams. Both have better defenses than offenses, but they are each capable of beating any team in the league.

Boston College at Wake Forest - I said this one would be close, didn't I? For the second year in a row, Wake scored a late touchdown to beat the Golden Eagles despite being outgained on the day. What a great end of that game. Wake really showed great composure despite having their offense largely shut down for most of the game.

I can't say enough about how good of a coach Jim Grobe is. I'll be shocked if he's still in Winston-Salem next year.

Louisville at North Carolina - I believe my lovely, scatological quote from last week's Preview was that UNC might be "due to take a dump at midfield" in this game. I should have said "enormous dump."

Man.

34-0. That's bad. I also said in my preview that given the prowess of the two offenses, that the game would be a shootout. Shootout? More like an execution. That was the kind of game that you wonder if a team can recover from. I'm guessing no.

One big reason why I (and others) gave Carolina too much credit in this game was how they took apart Georgia Tech just one week earlier. Well, the problem with judging teams early in a football season is that almost every team has one or two games in a season that are anomalies, either for the good or bad. Well, now that Carolina's played four games, it's pretty easy to see that the Georgia Tech game was their anomaly. That was an aberration. They aren't that good and the Yellow Jackets aren't that bad.

Clemson at Florida State - I turned this game on for the first time in the first quarter and saw that the Tigers were up 7-3. I checked back in just before the half and saw that they were down only 17-14. Man, I thought, I guess their offense is nowhere near as bad as you would think, considering they scored only 6 points last week against Texas A&M. I mean, Florida State's defense looked awesome against Miami. It was only later, when I was watching highlights, that I realized that one of those touchdowns was a kickoff return. Of course, the one they scored in the second half was a return also. Add those to their safety, and you see that the defense and special teams scored 15 of Clemson's 22 points. So, their offense is that bad and FSU's defense is that good. Clemson managed only 183 yards and star quarterback Charlie Whitehurst threw for only 90 yards to go with three interceptions. Maybe "star" isn't the proper adjective anymore.

The most interesting side-story for this not-as-close-as-it-appeared game is the FSU quarterback situation. Maybe you've heard something about it? Erstwhile star quarterback (and can I make an aside here? Wasn't this supposed to be the year of the QB in the ACC? All those returning QBs - Whitehurst, Rix, Berlin, Durant, Randall - and not one is playing to all-conference levels. Wake's Cory Randolph is your leader in the clubhouse for 1st team All ACC.) Chris Rix sprained his ankle, letting sophomore Wyatt Sexton get in the game. Sexton wasn't spectacular, but a blind man could see that he was better than Rix. He has more poise and confidence. Unsurprisingly, Sexton has been named the starter for a few weeks while Chris Rix heals up his ankle. (I wonder if Rix will get a handicapped sticker for his car in the meantime?) Don't be surprised if Rix returns to find his job gone. The Seminoles loss to Miami in week one removed all margin for error this season and Rix is just too inconsistent.

Syracuse at Virginia - Virginia cruised again, although this time the margin wasn't quite as wide. As I mentioned last week though, don't buy into the hype. The national media types keep seeing those lopsided UVA scores and have overrated this team. I've heard more than one pretty boy say that he is looking forward to a matchup between undefeateds when UVA plays Miami on November 13. Nope. Not gonna happen. Virginia is good, but I doubt they'll win in Tallahassee and don't ignore games at home against Clemson and Maryland. The Terps in particular are no gimme. The Cavaliers will lose at least one of those games (and Miami still has Louisville at home and NC State on the road before then).

On the flip side, this team really is playing well in every phase. Their running game has been solid, and now Marques Hagans' passing is becoming a weapon. Although his two rushing touchdowns got most of the attention, he also completed 11 of 12 passes against the Orangemen. That's not the kind of efficiency you usually get from a mobile quarterback like Hagans. It'll be very interesting to see how this team does against stronger opponents. We may or may not be able to tell in their next game against Clemson in two weeks.

Open Season

Well, it appears that last weekend's stinker against Louisville officially marked the opening of John Bunting Season. And the hunters are banging away on their typewriters. I promise I won't keep linking to these articles. After all, how many different ways can they say the same thing? That said, this one is a doozy.

I hope this guy doesn't go to too many Bunting press conferences. If he does, I hope Bunting doesn't recognize him. Ouch.

It's Never Too Early

The Georgia Tech Sports Blog has uncovered quite a list - the top fourth-grade hoops prospects in the country, according to The HoopScoop Online. See the list here.

Pretty amazing. Word has it, Pete Townsend of The Who is one of the talent scouts.

Broken Hoop Dreams

This is a good article on some prep basketball stars who never made it to the NBA. This isn't a new story, but it's important for everyone to remember that things don't always work out. The rankings aren't perfect (mea culpa - I've been ragging on Pete Gillen for taking unranked players) and the future isn't guaranteed to even the brightest of prep stars.

A article or two like this plus a showing of Hoop Dreams should be required reading and viewing for all high school basketball players. Unfortunately, many of the top players don't understand math enough for those percentages (.03 percent of high school seniors make it to the NBA) to hold much weight.

It's sad to see guys throw away such a golden opportunity to better themselves.

UNC Lands Recruit

North Carolina picked up another recruit, 6' 5" swing guard Danny Green. Recruiting experts differ in their rankings of Green who had a big summer to shoot up the charts. Most services have in the top 100 and many in the top 50.

See Pete Gillen, that's what you should be looking for.

Gillen Does It Again

I hate to keep doing this, because I've never seen these guys play and I could be wrong, but it looks like Pete Gillen has landed another middling prospect. Unranked prospect Brian Moten commmitted to the Virginia Cavaliers this weekend.

Moten had good numbers in his senior year in Michigan, averaging 28 points, five boards and four assists and finished fifth in Mr. Basketball voting.

The catch is that he originally committed to play this season for Western Michigan. Moten wasn't able to fulfill NCAA academic requirements though, and will go to prep school this year.

To repeat, Gillen signed a guy who was going to go to Western Michigan and who has academic problems.

I hope Gillen knows what he's doing and this works out. It doesn't look good though.

Pull The Plug

The News & Observer's Caulton Tudor says that North Carolina's football program is on life support. He's right. They are hurting.

The thing is, they are not completely bereft of talent. They just aren't playing well. It may not be all John Bunting's fault, but this program needs a change. Given their reputation and resourcse, there's no real reason why the Tar Heels shouldn't be in or near the Top 25 every year.

Euro-Style Soccer In The US

I've been saying and writing for a while now that the US is catching up to Europe in soccer. Well, we just took another step, our first incident of crowd violence and fighting police! I'm so proud.

In fairness, from what I read, the SJPD way overreacted here. Fans standing up and cheering during a game? Unacceptable!

ACC Preview - Week 4

Miami at Houston - This is kind of an odd matchup. Miami doesn't really have much to gain here other than maybe some recruiting help in Texas. Otherwise, you wouldn't expect a team like Miami to go on the road against a mid-level (I'm being kind) program like Houston. As for the matchup - it shouldn't be too close. I'm guessing Miami wins something like 38-13. ;-)

Maryland at Duke - Both schools are having quarterback problems, but for Maryland, the rest of the team is good enough to compensate. They almost beat West Virginia on the road last week despite five turnovers. Duke, on the other hand, has rotated three different QBs and got blown out last week by Virginia Tech.

I'm thinking Duke will get an upset this year against one of the teams in the top half of the conference, but not this week. They just aren't ready.

NC State at Virginia Tech - Now, this is a good matchup, easily the most interesting of the week. Before the season, I would have said that State was a much stronger team, but I don't feel that way now. I think State has better skill position players. In fact, their talent at RB and WR matches up favorably with just about any team in the country. The problem is that they just didn't look good against Ohio State. Actually, their defense looked solid, but the offense was inept and the whole team made way too many mistakes.

The Hokies, on the other hand, have all the markings of a team that's prepared to have an unexpectedly good season. They looked good in their loss to #1 USC and followed that up with two blowout victories.

This should be a tight game. Pundits are saying it will be a defensive struggle, but I'm not so sure. State has given up only about 150 yards per game, but they've only played two games and both were against weak offensive teams. I wouldn't be surprised at all to see this one turn into a shootout. I think the Hokies will win, as State isn't disciplined enough yet to win in a place as hostile as Lane Stadium.

Boston College at Wake Forest - This is one of several interesting non-conference matchups this week. One point of interest, of course, is that BC will be joining the ACC next year, so this is a bit of a preview. Another tidbit that sparks this one a bit is that Wake staged a big comeback on the road to upset the Eagles last season and ruin their homecoming.

This BC team looks pretty solid, beating Penn State and UConn, although they had a fairly tight game against Ball State. BC's strength is their defense, giving up less than 10 points a game (eighth best scoring D in the country). For Wake, it's the opposite, with their offense producing 34 points per game and rushing for more than 275 yard per game. Something has to give.

I'm not really sure who I like in this, so I'll go with the home team. Wake Forest has some offensive schemes that are very confusing to prepare for. I say they beat BC in a close one.

Louisville at North Carolina - The easy prediction here is that North Carolina will get smoked. I mean, everyone knows they are bad and have been for several seasons now, and Louisville is ranked #22 in the country. Well, as some not-so-wise man once said, not so fast. Carolina is one of those classic good-bad teams. They have plenty of talent and can score on everyone. Their problem is that they are poorly coached. They're inconsistent, so you never really know from game-to-game, hell from series-to-series, which Carolina you're going to see. They're like Jerry Seinfeld's two-faced girlfriend.

Last week, we saw good Carolina, as they trounced Georgia Tech. Some may say that signals that the Tar Heels are on the rise, but I think it's just as likely that it means they are due to take a dump at midfield this week.

One thing's for fairly certain - there will be some points in this one. I don't know what the line is, but bet the over. I pick Louisville in another shootout.

Clemson at Florida State - The Bowden Bowl again. Anyone else tired of that? Every year, I have to read about how Bobby Bowden's wife hates the game - either her husband or son loses. I get it. Enough.

Last year, Clemson came in to the this game in a shambles and it looked like Tommy's job was in serious peril. This year, things are diff ... uh, well actually, things are exactly the same.

This time though, the game's in Tallahassee and pop isn't going to lose this one to save his boy. Clemson is dangerously close to going into a death spiral so they should be fired, but FSU needs this one too, given their early loss to Miami. I think the 'Noles will win by at least two touchdowns as they start to figure out how to run an offense. Don't be surprised if Clemson melts down in the second half and gets blown out.

Syracuse at Virginia - This sounds like a really good game, doesn't it? Syracuse and UVA are pretty similar programs in terms of football strength. Also, there was the whole ACC courtship that turned sour for Syracuse, in large part because Virginia insisted that Virginia Tech be included.

Unfortunately, the game itself likely won't be as interesting. Virginia is on the climb (although they aren't as good as the national media seems to think - the Cavs are becoming media darlings), and the 'Cuse, well, they aren't climbing. Did you see that pounding they took from Purdue? Man. Expect Syracuse to put forth a better effort than that, but still lose by two or three touchdowns (or more).

Syracuse's best team ranking in any offensive or defensive category is 58th in turnover margin (where they are even). UVA's worst ranking is 50th in passing offense.

Virginia tailback Wali Lundy's nine rushing touchdowns are better than 105 Division 1-A teams.

State Adds Another Good Recruit

Herb Sendek continues to perform his magic. Even Lazarus would say, "man, that guy's made quite a comeback." A few years ago, it was a certainty that the Wolfpack faithful would send Herb packing, but several good seasons later, he is finally on solid ground. Not only is he winning on the court, he's starting to win in the offseason.

State just received an oral commitment from 6' 8" Brandon Costner, rated by TheInsiders.com as the 26th best national recruit. Costner is State's third top-fifty (by some recruiting rankings) recruit.

You Can't Spell Hypocrisy Without N-C-A-A

Well, actually you can, but you shouldn't be able to.

One of the big arguments against going to a post-season playoff for football is that it would create too many extra games and thus hurt the academics of those poor student-athletes. Hooey.

Most people suggest an 8 team playoff, which would take 3 rounds. That means that two teams would have 3 games, two would have two and four would play only one. Since if there were no playoff they'd all be in bowl games anyway, only two teams would play two extra games and two more teams would have one extra game.

Not a huge impact, right?

Well, get this. The NCAA is now pushing forward a plan to allow ALL football teams to play an extra regular season game! Incredible! I guess that academic argument is just, well, academic.

Curry Scores

Former UNC quarterback and point guard Ronald Curry, who I wrote about previously, had quite a game for the Oakland Raiders last weekend. He led the team with 5 catches for 89 yards, including a 43 yard touchdown in a 13-10 win over the Buffalo Bills. Curry even returned a kickoff for 10 yards. It looks like this wide reciever thing might just work out OK for him. Check the boxscore.

A Fifth of "No"

The NABC is dropping their proposal for a fifth year of eligibility for college basketball players. Too bad. As I wrote here, here, here , here and here, I like the idea.

As far as I know, there is still talk about a fifth year for football.

Maybe the NCAA will come back to it as an all-sports proposal.

DBR Preview - Florida State

I mentioned that the guys at the DBR like Skip Prosser. Well, they like Leonard Hamilton almost as much. There's no doubt that he's put together a deeper, more athletic team than FSU has had lately, but I'm not sure how good they'll be. Last year's team was essentially a bubble team and it relied on Tim Pickett for a bit of everything. He was the main scorer, defender, leader and energy source. How will they do without him? Will they be a rudderless amalgam of talent? Or will they be a Ewing Theory example? It's tough to say, except that when you consider how strong the ACC will be next year, option 1 may be most likely.

Here is what the DBR guys think.

DBR Preview - Wake Forest

Like a lot of other people, the guys at DBR like Wake Forest. They like Skip Prosser even more. In fact, they say that he might be the second best coach in the conference now. Remember, this is the Duke Basketball Report, so the two Williamses might not be getting their due. Still, their preview of Wake Forest is good.

DBR Preview - NC State

Every year, the Duke Basketball Report does some nice previews of each ACC team. Somehow, I missed that they started doing these last week. Here is their preview of NC State.

Does Wake Need Danelius?

Ken Pomeroy has an interesting bit up comparing Wake Forest to UNC for this coming season. His point is that everyone seems to have Wake penciled in at #1 even though UNC also returns everyone, had a very similar 2003-2004 campaign and has a better recruiting class. The one factor in Wake's favor is the healthy return of Vytas Danelius. Ken says that his impact on Wake is overrated.

He makes a good point, but he misses the fact that Danelius was never fully healthy last year. The year before, Danelius was probably Wake's best player and he was a preseason first team All-ACC last year. While adding yet another player doesn't always make a team better, when he's an all-conference level performer, that has to count for something. If nothing else, it's more protection for foul-prone Eric Williams.

39-Year-Old College Football Player?

Now, this is a cool story. 39-year-old Tim Frisby recently retired from the US Army and enrolled at South Carolina. He was a Ranger, so he's in good shape and he wants to play football. Lou Holtz wants him and they are just waiting for the NCAA to approve.

Very cool.

I thought I remembered that the NCAA had a max age, but hopefully they'll waive that. This sort of thing is exactly what college sports should be about. Regular students are of all ages, so there's no reason the athletes can't be as well.

Freddy Gets Drunk

When I was in high school, going to a college party was one of the greatest things you could do. It was usually tough to pull off and often ended with getting kicked out. Freddy Adu doesn't appear to have that problem. It seems he's been bopping around some University of Maryland parties. The problem of course is that he's 15 and everyone knows it.

Hey Freddy man, I know you're having fun, but one of the prices you have to pay to earn that $1M a year is discretion. You can't be pulling a Larry Eustachy. Sorry man.

Thanks to the MatchNight guys for finding this one.

ACC Review - Week 3

Akron at Virginia - So far, Virginia hasn't played anyone, but has looked good doing it. Akron is no powerhouse, but UVA completely dominated them, something good teams do in games they should win. In recent years, Virginia has struggled to put away weaker teams, but not this year. If the score isn't a clear enough indicater of how lopsided this game was, check the total yards - 522 to 86. That's right, 86 yards for the Zips. UVA outrushed them 326 to 6. And while Akron is a weak sister of the MAC, they do have a four year starter at QB in Charlie Frye, the third leading career yards leader among active NCAA players.

UVA stud TE Heath Miller caught only one pass total in the first two games of the season. Against Akron, he had six catches and two touchdowns.

Running back Wali Lundy rushed for three touchdowns for the third straight game this year. He currently leads the nation in scoring.

Duke at Virginia Tech - Before the season began, I thought this game had upset potential. I thought the Hokies might overlook Duke, a traditional ACC patsy and maybe miss that Duke is improved under new coach Ted Roof. Well, then the games started. Virginia Tech looked good in losing to USC and blasting Western Michigan while Duke was miserable against Navy and improved a bit against UConn. Once Saturday rolled around, I figured Duke was likely in trouble and I was right. It's no longer clear that they are any better than they were last year. That's no indictment of coach Roof, as it takes a while to rebuild a program, but people were hoping for miracles.

As for the Hokies, it looks like they may have been underrated to start the season. They appear to be a solid team that can hang with anyone.

Maryland at West Virginia - This one hurts. Maryland has owned West Virginia in recent years, beating them by a combined score of something like 382-14 in the last three games. This year, the Mountaineers are overrated, everybody's favorite sleeper for a Cinderalla national title contender. It seemed like a great game for Maryland to show that they have stepped up to the national elite. But, they blew it. Despite giving up five turnovers, the game was Maryland's to win at the end. Driving for the winning score, Coach Friedgen got a bit too conservative, leaving stud kicker Nick Novak with a 50 yarder to win. Novak missed, sending the game to overtime.

In overtime, Maryland found themselves with a fourth and inches from the 16 yard line. They made the right call in kicking the field goal, despite what I'm sure many Terrapin fans are saying. The cost-benefit ratio of going for it just isn't worth it in that situation. If they make the first down, it's still no guarantee that they'll get a touchdown. If they don't make it, the game is essentially over. No, Maryland made the right choice in taking the easy field goal and relying on their defense that had kept the Mountaineers out of the end zone for three and a half quarters. The defense didn't hold though, giving up the touchdown and the game.

Louisiana Tech at Miami - Do you know how many people you need to have in a room to have a greater than 50% chance that two people will have the same birthday? Only twenty. Bet you didn't know that!

Ohio State at NC State - Just like Maryland with West Virginia, NC State had a golden opportunity to beat a top ten opponent and failed. Ohio State is one of those teams that never puts anyone away. They just don't score a lot of points, so almost any team can beat them if they just make a few plays. The key is that Ohio State rarely lets teams make those plays. On Saturday, NC State made several big plays, but all the wrong kind. Mostly, they were fumbles and interceptions. Ohio State managed to beat the Wolfpack by a touchdown despite gaining a measly 137 yards of offense. 137! That's amazing.

The reason this game hurts the Wolfpack faithful so much is that this was to be their statement game. They really wanted last year's game in Columbus to be that game, but the Pack came up just short. In taking the Buckeyes to triple overtime though, NC State felt it had earned respect and showed that they belong with the big boys. Chuck Amato has energized Pack fans like few coaches around the country. You can feel the optimism and excitement in the air and see it in the sea of red in Carter-Finley. At some point though, it's going to wear off. It doesn't look like State is any closer to being a national player than they were last year. In fact, if one common opponent is a good measure, they look a bit further.

Georgia Tech at North Carolina - Last week, I mentioned how evenly matched that Clemson, Georgia Tech and Wake Forest appeared. While the transitive property doesn't really work in sports, looking at head-to-head matchups and common opponents is the best way to compare teams. Well, Wake visited Clemson and lost in double overtime and the next weekend, the Yellow Jackets visited Death Valley and won a nailbiter. Two close games in successive weekends involving three teams - it's reasonable to assume that means they are all pretty comparable. The question was just how good those three were relative to other teams. Not too great, it turns out.

The Yellow Jackets dropped the first stinker when they went into Chapel Hill and were blown out by three touchdowns. Remember, this Tar Heel team had struggled to beat a 1-AA team in their first week and then got whacked by four touchdowns by Virginia last week. If UNC is bad, what does that say about Georgia Tech? And in turn, what does it say about Wake and Clemson? More on that a bit further down in this article...

UAB at Florida State - I didn't watch this scrimmage, but the box score doesn't look too impressive for Chris Rix. Less than 200 yards, no TDs and one INT. When he first went out on the field, many of the 81,825 fans booed him. I'm not a big fan at all of booing college players, but I was amused by Rix's quote about it, "any human being is going to hear it." OK, if you say so.

NC A&T at Wake Forest - Yawn. Wake cleared the bench for the second half in this one, probably trying to avoid embarassing a local school that may have more local alumni than Wake does.

Clemson at Texas A&M - If Georgia Tech wasn't the big loser of the day, Clemson gets the big L on their forehead. This is not a very good Texas A&M team that took them apart. In the Aggies first game this year, they were humiliated by Utah. Admitedly, Utah is good this year, but still - they beat A&M by three touchdowns, and it was only that close because the Utes gave up some charity scores late.

If Clemson is really stepping up with coach Tommy Bowden, they need to be winning games like this. At the very least, they should be close, but the Tigers were never really in this game. A 1-2 start doesn't mean the season is over. They dug out of a bigger hole last year, but how often can Bowden pull off Houdini seasons? At some point, enough will be enough. If Clemson doesn't turn it around, and the schedule's only getting harder, this may be Tommy's last chance.

20 for 36, 192 yards, 1 TD and 3 interceptions. I think it's safe to say that Charlie Whitehurst's shot at the Heisman is not just outside, it's off the continent.

Easy Ed In The Baltics

Have you wondered what ever happened to Ed Cota? Do you ever think to yourself, has he taken a charge yet in whatever European league he's in?

Well, I can't answer that second question, but I can tell you that he has been playing in Lithuania. And here's a snazzy highlight video to prove it! Check out Arvidas Sabonis on his team. If you look closely, you can see the bolts on Sabonis' neck. They must have given him a few jolts before these games, or maybe it's just the slick production, but he looks like he's actually running.

Tudor: NC State, ACC Unimpressive

Caulton Tudor hit the nail on the head with this one. NC State fell on its face this weekend. Losing to Ohio State isn't so bad, but the way State lost was troubling. Ohio State was very beatable, but State was sloppy and blew their opportunity. If last season's game against the Buckeyes wasn't the great chance for Amato to show that the Pack had arrived, this year's game was it. I guess they haven't.

Likewise, the ACC as a whole had a bad weekend, despite what the Pony says. Maryland blew their game against overrated West Virginia and Clemson absolutely crapped the bed against a mediocre Texas A&M.

It's looking like the ACC has its two giants, two maybes in Virginia and Virginia Tech, three not-as-good-as-advertiseds in Maryland, NC State and Clemson and two could-bes in Wake Forest and Georgia Tech. Not a great start, although there is still a lot of football to be played.

UVA Signs Center

On Tuesday, Virginia landed a commitment from 6' 10" center Sam Warren. Warren's dad, Rudy Woods, was a McDonald's All-American and played in the NBA, but Sam averaged just 7 points and 5 rebounds a game last year. Seven and five? Uh, Pete .... this is the ACC, not the SWAC.

The Future: More Cupcakes

The Washington Post has an interesting article on scheduling non-conference games in the new ACC. With the larger, tougher conference, coaches are wanting easier non-conference games. For Florida State and Virginia, their biggest and toughest non-conference game is now a conference game, so that's a factor as well.

So, we may start seeing less Ohio State and more Arkansas State.

Quote Of The Week

I meant to put this in my ACC Review for week 2, but forgot. It's too good to skip though.

Virgina tailback-turned-safety Marquis Weeks had a 100 yard kickoff return against UNC last weekend. About the return, Weeks said, "that was just instinct. Kind of like running from the cops."

I wonder if UVA will use that on their media guide next year?

Live Ryder Cup Scoring

I haven't made any mention of it here, but the big sports event, the Ryder Cup, started this weekend. In a surprising pairing, captain Hal Sutton paired Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson for the first matches. You can follow live scoring here.

18-Year-Old Yank Starts For Man U

This is pretty nuts. I admit to having never heard of him before, but Jonathan Spector, an 18-year-old American, recently started several games for Manchester United. That's incredible. To start on any pro team at that age is amazing, but start on arguably the most storied team in all of pro sports - not just soccer, any sport - is impressive.

I'll say it again - the future of American soccer is very bright. In fact, the present is pretty bright.

ACC Review - Week 2

Wow, my review sure is late this week, isn't it? It's just been one of those weeks. Let's go ahead though, shall we?

Florida State at Miami - This was an interesting game. At first, I was shocked by the speed of both defenses. They were amazing. I was thinking that there was no way any other ACC team could compete with them. Then, I watched more. While the defenses remained impressive, the offenses, the quarterbacks in particular, looked bad. They sucked, in fact. Chris Rix may be the worst four-year starter at a major program ever. He threw passes to the wrong guys; he threw passes at the wrong time; he threw passes off the wrong foot; he threw inaccurate passes; he failed to recognize blitzes - you name it, he screwed it up. And Brock Berlin wasn't much better.

In the end, I think these are still the two best teams in the conference, and if they play well, they should each win the rest of their conference games. But, they are both beatable, particularly by a team with a big line who can use size and strength to neutralize the speed of their defenses. The no-brainer (pun intended) is that you want to mix up your defensive looks and bring a lot of pressure on Rix. He'll make mistakes.

BTW, did anyone else notice that Brent Musburger has gone senile? The guy was out of it. Even on replays, he didn't seem to realize that the whistle blew long before the kick on that weird field goal situation at the end of the first half. There were some other obvious miscalls, but damn if I haven't forgotten them now. Maybe his dementia is spreading.

Duke at Connecticut - I guess I underestimated Duke this week. For the record, I overrated them in week 1 and underrated them in week 2. The next bowl of porridge should be just right.

Being in the game all the way to the end, when Trajan Langdon missed a three-pointer for the win (at least he got a shot off this time), is good news for the Blue Devils. But then, in recent years, they've usually managed to play fairly well, keep it close, and then still lose. As bad as they've been, they haven't been blown out a lot. Hopefully for them and Ted Roof, they'll break that pattern and start winning some close games.

W. Michigan at Virginia Tech - The Hokies might be a bit better than expected. Sure, blowing out a mid-major isn't the greatest measuring stick, but that's what good teams do and 63-0 is impressive against anyone. In addition, they got touchdowns from their defense and blocked a punt. Beamer ball may be back.

North Carolina at Virginia - This one was ugly for the Tar Heels. The final score of 56-24 is not indicative of how one-sided this game was. UVA scored touchdowns on their first seven possessions. The Cavaliers rolled up 549 yards, and that was misleading, as they ran one kickoff back for 100 yards and had another one go 93 yards before Alvin Pearman was tackled on the 1. In all, UVA had 238 return yards! Believe me, this one could have been worse.

So, what does it mean? Well, it doesn't tell us much about UNC that we didn't already know. Their defense is among the worst in the country, but their offense is still pretty decent. They'll compete with Duke for the cellar.

For UVA, it's still early, but they are looking like they are legit. They've easily handled two teams that they should beat. They have two more easy games (Akron and Syracuse) before the schedule gets tough. One sign of a good team is one that gets scores from its defense and special teams. UVA has now returned a kick for a TD in each game and missed a third by just one yard. That's a good sign of depth and overall team speed.

Temple at Maryland - Like UVA and Virginia Tech, Maryland easily dispatched of an inferior opponent. The game was basically over by halftime, giving Maryland a chance to work on their depth and start preparing for this weekend's game against West Virginia. So far, the Terps look to be for real, but the Mountaineers will be a real test.

Wake Forest at East Carolina - I predicted that Wake would run all over ECU, and they did, to a point. Really though, they beat them through the air. Quarterback Cory Randolph did his best Woody Dantzler impression, passing for over 300 yards and running for over 100.

The disconcerting things for fans of Demon Deacons is that while Wake rolled up over 580 yards on offense, they gave up 469 yards to a pretty mediocre team. That game against UNC later this year should be quite a shootout!

Georgia Tech at Clemson - I said I wouldn't be surprised if Georgia Tech pulled off the upset here, but no one could have predicted the manner in which it happened. Clemson had the game wrapped up - they had the ball, second and short, with less than a minute to play. After two short runs failed to earn a first down, they went to punt. The snap was bad, leaving the ball for GT on the 11 yard line. Two plays later - touchdown Georgia Tech and game. The Tigers had led by 10 points with under three minutes to go in the game.

It really was an incredible game, and surely a crushing loss for Clemson. The saving grace is that it's still very early in the season and it's not yet clear what impact this game will have. Given the two close games in Death Valley this year, I'm inclined to say that there's very little difference between the middle teams in the league. That middle includes at least Clemson, Georgia Tech and Wake Forest. I'm not sure yet about UVA, NC State, Maryland and Virginia Tech, but I would guess that they are all right there, or maybe a half notch above those other three (did I just contradict myself?).

Gary Goes To Rome

The Diamondback Online, Maryland's student newspaper, has an interview with Gary Williams about Maryland's recently completed summer trip to Italy. My favorite part is when the interviewer asked him whether he learned any Italian. Said Coach Williams, "Not really. I picked up a few words while I was there, like 'thank you' and things like that."

Things like that, huh? Who wants to bet that the "things like that" were the same words that 14-year-olds try to learn first when introduced to new languages. I mean, when in Rome, do as the Romans do, right? And you know Gary had a few things to say during his games. Maybe he can scream his new Italian words at refs next season and avoid a T or two.

Welcome To The NFL

Did you see the hit that Eli Manning took in his first NFL game? Good lord! It was right at the end of the game - garbage time. Manning rolls out, looking upfield when WHAM!, he's crushed by Philadelphia Eagle Jerome McDougle. You can watch it (over and over and over) here. Giant head coach Tom Coughlin had this to say about it: "welcome to the NFL, son." While McDougle was given official credit, I'd like to mark that hit down to Karma.

Oh, and if that wasn't enough, what about Giants punter Jeff Feagles? He was hit even harder than Eli by Eagle Jeremiah Trotter. Clicky, clicky. When I first saw this hit, I thought it was a cheap shot, particularly since it was the punter. Upon further review (OK, after watching that loop a kajillion times), Feagles was actually getting in position to make a tackle. He was only 10-12 yards in front of the returner, so he was fair game. Keep your head up, son! As Feagles said after the game, "I'm Batman!"

Trifecta

Ahhh, football weekends. I've missed them so.

I love basketball. In fact, I'd say it's my favorite sport. But, there's something about football weekends. I love the schedule - college games on Saturday and pro on Sunday. In my opinion, that scheduling alone is at least half responsible for the continuing success of football.

I especially love how football season comes in just about the time when I can't take yet another set of baseball highlights on ESPN (homerun, strikeout, homerun). Or worse, yet another story about the Boston Red Sox and/or New York Yankees. You know what? Most of us really don't care!!

One thing that makes for a really great football weekend for me is when my teams all win, as they did this past weekend. Virginia pounded North Carolina on Saturday, showing that just maybe the hype is for real. Then, on Sunday, the Steelers beat the Raiders, although they didn't really look too good doing it. The Steelers have a very 8-8 look to them. The final piece of the trifecta is my fantasy football team. The Crazy Irish Priests rolled to a 99-51 victory. Ahman Green's big night last night just served to run up the score, as I'd wrapped it up on Sunday.

The only thing missing was that crisp fall air that just smells like football.

Life is good.

Love Returns To Duke

I saw this the other day and thought about making a joke about it, but decided to bag it. The guys at the DBR though make a pretty good case that the curious return of Reggie Love could be a huge improvement to this year's team. I actually think they're right. He's a strong, athletic guy who can play several positions and has no desire to be a star. Every team could use a guy like that.

Picking The ACC - Week 2

Florida State at Miami - This is the big game of the week (the season, really). I think that given the two teams' relative strengths last year and factoring in how many players Miami lost to the NFL, you have to believe that FSU is the slightly better team. However, this game is being played in Miami and when these two teams are closely matched, Miami always seems to win. I'm guessing that trend will continue. Miami in a close one (it's too cute to say that it'll end on a missed field goal).

Duke at Connecticut - Look for Coach K to do a better job of protecting his big men down the stretch and for Duke to pull out a close one to avenge their Final Four loss. Oh, this is football? Well, then, that's different. Connecticut was one of the quieter (and most surprising) good teams last year. in their first game this year, they continued that trend, walloping Murray State (yet another basketball school) 52-14. Duke, on the other hand, crapped the bed against Navy. I have to go with the Huskies here, and it could get ugly.

W. Michigan at Virginia Tech - Should be a bit easier than the Trojans, huh? Look for the Hokies to take out some frustration on the Broncos.

North Carolina at Virginia - Bet the over in this one. Carolina has a good offense and a horrible, horrible defense. Virginia is pretty good at both. On top of that, UNC hasn't won in Charlottesville since 1981, before most of these players were born. While the Heels have the guns to pull off an upset, I don't think it's going to happen. The Cavs will break out the power running game to keep Durant off the field and they'll cruise, although it might be close for a half.

Temple at Maryland - Temple is having themselves a nice tour of the ACC. Kind of funny, since they were recently booted out of the virtuous Big East. Do I really need to tell you who I think will win this one?

Wake Forest at East Carolina - East Carolina fans are an interesting group. They are very loyal to their team and very sensitive to slights, real or otherwise. Their relationship with NC State is very similar to State's with UNC. ECU thinks State fans are snobby and look down on the Pirates (which they do). Of course, ECU really hates UNC, but they don't focus their energies as much on them, as I guess they relate a bit more to NC State. Given all that, you have to think that'll it'll really piss them off when a little, preppy private school like Wake Forest beats them to a pulp. Look for Wake to rush for over 300 yards in this one and win handily.

Georgia Tech at Clemson - Clemson's second straight important ACC game to start the season. This one is a tough one to call, as Clemson showed some warts against Wake last week. I'll go with the home team here, but I wouldn't be surprised at all if the Yellow Jackets pulled off the upset.

Indian Ballers

Tim Stevens of the News & Observer has a few sentences on two prep school brothers who are getting some attention for their basketball abilities (you'll need to scroll down; it's at the end). The brothers are both 6'11" and - here's the kicker - they are of Indian descent.

I don't think I've ever seen or heard of an Indian (or Indian-American) Division 1 basketball player. Not a football player either, for that matter. In fact, despite being a country of over a billion people, and despite millions of Indian-Americans, I can think of only a very few world-class Indian athletes (outside of cricket, of course). You have Vijay Singh and a couple tennis players, including the guy who was in that James Bond movie, and that's it.

It's odd. I've known several Indian-Americans who were excellent athletes. It's not like they are genetically disposed to being terribly short or unathletic. You'd think there'd be more. Or some anyway. It's interesting. Anyone have any theories on why this is? It would have to be cultural, but that doesn't really explain the scarcity of Indian-American athletes.

Discipline Florida Style

Florida coach Ron Zook rightfully punished star linebacker Channing Crowder after Crowder was arrested this summer. Crowder (and another player who was involved) was suspended for the first game of the year, a game against Middle Tennessee. Well, that game was rescheduled for later in season because of Hurricane Frances. Now, the first game is this weekend against Eastern Michigan. Crowder is playing. Huh? Wasn't he suspended for the first game? Well, not according to coach Zook. The coach conveniently moved the suspension along with the game, so that Crowder will still miss the Middle Tennesse game on October 16.

Why, you may ask? It's simple. Florida plays Tennessee next week and Zook wants Crowder to have one warm up game before then.

Nice. That'll learn those players! Don't act out on my team or I'll make you miss meaningless games against weak opponents unless that might have some deleterious affect on an important game.

ACC Football Notes

Some random interesting bits from the weekly ACC football release (and elsewhere):

• Maryland's kicker Nick Novak became the ACC's all-time leading scorer last weekend. He now has 335 career points. I guess that means the best ACC player ever, right?
• Nine true freshmen played in UNC's comeback win over William & Mary. That says two things - Carolina had a good recruiting class and they have a bad team.
• Carolina had two 100 yard rushers in one game for the first time in ten years.
• The ACC has never finished a season with a losing record against the Big East. It seems really unlikely to happen now.
• Duke managed to lose to Navy by two touchdowns despite having a +3 turnover margin.
• Wake Forest's next opponent, East Carolina, was outrushed 478-59 by their first opponent, West Virginia. Too bad for the Pirates that Terry Holland doesn't play nose tackle.
• Virgina tight end, All-American Heath Miller, caught his 22nd career touchdown pass last weekend, increasing his ACC record for a tight end. Miller is only a junior. He's going Wayne Gretzky on ACC tight end records.
• Wake Forest's Chris "Who?" Barclay has rushed for at least 120 yards in six of his last eight games.
• John Swofford sucks.

Introducting The Multi-Flex

The SportsProf has a very interesting article up on his idea for a new football offense. His main point isn't necessarily for his offense, a modern derivation of the single wing, but that football could use more innovation. Most teams run roughly the same sets and offenses, but it would be great to see a team come with something completely different. I love the concept of just getting the ball to your best athletes and letting them do their thing. The other great aspect of his idea is the protection from the impact of an injury to your star QB or RB. In his system, four or five guys perform multiple tasks, sort of like a dual-point offense in basketball.

ESPN To Launch College Sports Channel

ESPN has announced a new network, ESPNU, which will focus on college sports. This sounds like a great deal, because the big network has started showing so many pro sports (NHL, MLB, NBA and NFL) that its college games have become more and more rare. Although the new network will obviously show a lot of football and men's basketball, I'm hoping to be able to catch a few other sports. Actually, I'm really just thinking of lacrosse here - I hope they show a bunch of college lax. It's a damn fun game to watch and there's precious little on TV.

Tar Heel Hell

If you asked a neutral observer to compare the Virginia and North Carolina football programs over the past 20 or so years, they'd probably say they are about even. Some years one is better, some years one sucks. Usually though, both are pretty good, somewhere near the rankings. Well, would you believe that Carolina hasn't won a game in Charlottesville since 1981? That's a pretty incredible streak, particularly when you remember how bad Virginia was in the early 80s and how good UNC was for a few of those Mack Brown years.

Unfortunately for the Tar Heel faithful, that streak seems unlikely to end this year, and that's their next game. After a bad first game against William & Mary, Carolina could use a good outing, but C'ville looks like a tough place to get that for any Heels team, this one in particular.

I think this quote from Coach John Bunting pretty much sums up Carolina's attitude - "We're going to need to have our best game we've played in the last two years and beyond to be in the game." Not exactly inspiring, huh? Play your best game in two years and you'll just be in the game? Thanks coach.

State Gets Top-50 Recruit

Herb Sendek continued his solid recruiting yesterday when he landed 6'9" forward Ben McCauley. McCauley is rated by Bob Gibbons as the 48th best prospect in the country, while Dave Telep rates his as number 82.

ACC Week 1 Review

A few quick notes and comments about the weekend's games:

Virginia at Temple - Well, I was wrong. Virginia did blow the Owls out. Maybe the Wahoos are legit and all that talent that Al Groh has collected is starting to pay off.

My favorite play of the weekend also qualifies as one of the strangest. UVA used their star middle linebacker Ahmad Brooks as their kick returner for the opening kickoff! Brooks is 6'4" and 260 pounds. He is a freak of nature though, with the wheels of a DB. He took the kickoff back 40 yards. If that one return were enough to qualify him, he'd lead the ACC (and his return was the second longest of anyone in the league). He also leads the ACC in sacks with 1.5. I bet that combo's never happened before.

Samford at Georgia Tech - Like UVA and NC State, Georgia Tech took care of business against a lesser opponent. They didn't score a ton of points, but they dominated the game, which is what you want to see in these games. Things get a bit tougher next weekend when the Jackets pay a visit to Death Valley.

William & Mary at North Carolina - One thing coaches at all levels really look for is consistency. They want their teams to execute the same way every time. Well for UNC, they seemed to have mastered the consistently bad defensive performance. Last year, they gave up about 500 yards and 38 points per game. This year, first game (against a 1AA opponent, no less) and they gave up 442 yards and 38 points. Gonna be a long year in Chapel Hill.

Wake Forest at Clemson - Has a school ever hired the opposing team's coach just after a game? I bet some Clemson supporters had this in mind as Wake nearly beat Clemson for the second year in a row. It took a late TD and 2-point conversion and then two overtimes for the Tigers to avoid the upset. Talk about Tommy Bowden nearly undoing all of last season's goodwill.

Clemson is historically a running team and Wake is historically a passing team. Wake had 254 rushing yards to Clemson's 83. Think IPTAY would rather have Jim Grobe than Bowden?

Duke at Navy - Whoops. I got this one wrong. I didn't give Navy enough credit for their 8 win season last year. I guess I also got caught up in the Ted Roof hoopla. It just goes to show that sometimes it's easy to shake things up in the short-term, but that initial success can quickly fade.

Duke is in real trouble already. They were bad against Navy. The score could have been much worse. And it was Navy! The Blue Devils could only win one or two games this year. The only easy ones left are The Citadel and UNC.

Northern Illinois at Maryland - Memo to Ralph Friedgen - drop Northern Illinois from the schedule. The Terps squeaked out another close one against the Huskies. Last year, they lost this game, but it turned out to be a pretty decent loss. It's too early to say what this close game means.

Richmond at NC State - State took care of bidness, shutting the Spiders out. Yeah, it was only Richmond, but good teams win these games in blowouts, and that's what the Wolfpack did. Things get a bit tougher in their next game in two weeks - Ohio State.

Florida State at Miami - They'll play eventually, right?

Holland Cruises To East Carolina

East Carolina has hired former Virginia basketball coach and AD Terry Holland as their new Athletic Director. That is a huge hire for ECU. They are a school with very little recognition outside of the region, so hiring a man with such a large and good national reputation is outstanding. Holland was UVA's most successful coach and seemed to do a good job as Davidson's AD after he left Charlottesville. Holland is an alumnus of Davidson, having played basketball there for Lefty Driesell.

Holland not only has national recognition, he's widely held in high regard as someone with good people skills and high integrity. He should be a great asset for the Pirates.

ACC Draft Prospects

Don't get me wrong, I think it's a bit silly to do this sort of projecting of how the 2005 NFL draft will go, but it is interesting how highly regarded some ACC players are. According to nfldraftblitz.com, the top three players and five of the top six players drafted will be from the ACC. They have ten ACC players overall going in the first round. Seven of the eight players are underclassmen, meaning there is a LOT of young talent in the conference right now.

Picking The ACC - Week 1

Virginia at Temple - Give a hoot, don't pollute your schedule with crappy games. Virginia wins this easily, although probably not in a blowout. Virginia's style isn't conducive to big margins.

Samford at Georgia Tech - Samford could bring his son and it wouldn't help here. GT wins the scrimmage.

William & Mary at North Carolina - I understand that Coach Bunting tried to schedule just Mary, but they insisted on bringing William as well. I say Carolina holds on and wins anyway.

Wake Forest at Clemson - Finally a real game! This one has some flavor, because Wake waxed the Tigers last year 45-17, putting Tommy Bowden within an inch of his coaching life. Something tells me Clemson doesn't overlook this game and wins, although it won't be easy.

Duke at Navy - Somehow ABC didn't pick this one for a national broadcast. I'm going to go with momentum here and say that Duke continues their improved play under Coach Roof and gets a win over the tricky Midshipmen.

Northern Illinois at Maryland - Revenge time for the Terps. Last year, the Huskies (yes, I had to look that up. Why is a team in Illinois named the Huskies?) shocked a Maryland team that was ranked 15 and expecting big things. It turned out that Northern Illinois was pretty good (they beat Alabama later in the year and narrowly lost to Ohio State), but still. No upset this year as the Terps get off to a better start.

Richmond at NC State - Fortunately for the Wolfpack, this isn't an NCAA tournament game. They'll win and win big against the Spiders.

Florida State at Miami - I gotta go with the Hurricanes here. No, not the team, the weather pattern. This game was postponed to Friday due to big storm Frances. I'll predict (read: guess) it next week, assuming the Orange Bowl still exists.

Pressurized Bunting

The News & Observer has a pretty article about stress on head coaches, focusing on the pressure on North Carolina coach John Bunting. Bunting is coaching for his job this year. He does a pretty good job of hiding the stress, but it's clearly there. This article talks a bit about how and why coaches internalize their stress. I'm not buying the claims by some coaches that they don't feel any additional stress when their job situation gets precarious. Sure, all games are stressful, but you can't convince me that it doesn't get worse when you feel that if you lose you're fired.

McLendon Out Again

It looks like "Trainer Anytime" McLendon is hurt again and will miss NC State's opener tomorrow against Richmond. State will instead start true freshman Darrell Blackman. Another true freshman, Bobby Washington will also get carries.

While both freshman are very talented, it has to hurt State to have McLendon out yet again. Seriously, has any impact player been as frequently injured as TA McLendon? He makes Fred Taylor look like Brett Favre.

Too Much Adu

This is a really good (and long) article about Freddy Adu and his first year in the MLS. The expectations and time demands on him are incredible. He hasn't had the kind of season on the field that he would have liked, but this article gives a good look into a big reason why. A pro athlete, even a fourteen-year-old one, needs to be available to work on his game nearly 24 hours a day. Between games, practices and travel, he needs time to think about his game, to watch film and to mingle with teammates. That's what the other guys are doing, so if you aren't, you are at a disadvantage. For Adu, who obviously has more to learn than anyone else, this is particularly true.

At the same time, I can understand his and MLS' desire to get out and be seen as much as possible. Unfair as it may be, Freddy Adu is the face of US soccer's future. He seems to be handling that very well and he knows that you need to strike while the iron is hot. Hopefully next season, the buzz will have died down enough that he'll be able to more fully devote himself. Maybe he should consult with other top stars like Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods to see how they balance(d) their incredible desire to work hard to be successful with their off-field endeavors and endorsements.

Ranking The ACC Football Coaches

Every year, hundreds of newspapers, magazines and blogs (OK, this one is a recent trend) put out their preseason rankings of football teams. What's the point? While I admit to finding them occasionally interesting, the idea that you can guess what the final standings are going to be is laughable. You could replay the entire 2003 season with all the same teams and schedules and not end up with the same standings. That's just the way sports are, particularly football with its short schedules. One win or loss is often the difference between three or four spots in the standings.

So, I'm not going to guess the final rankings.

Instead, I'm going to rank the coaches. Over time, it's the coaches that make the difference. Teams with better coaches win more games. For my purposes, I'm including lots of factors here in coaching, including on-field success, recruiting, program reputation and everything else that goes into a successful program.

One thing that's really interesting about the ACC right now is the unbelievable quality of the coaching. The ACC is loaded! Ten of the eleven teams can legitimately say that they have an excellent coach. ACC basketball can't even say that.

So, without further ado, here goes, starting at the top.

1. Bobby Bowden, Florida State - There's not really much to argue about here. Two national championships, 342 wins (most all-time), 22 straight bowls and once had 14 consecutive top-five seasons. Bowden is to football what Dean Smith and Mike Krzyzewski are to basketball.

In recent years, FSU has finally shown some weakness. It's not a coincidence that this happened shortly after two of Bowden's top assistants, Mark Richt (a distant cousin of mine) and Chuck Amato left for Georgia and NC State respectively. In football, more than any other sport, good assistants are critical, and when programs lose a good coordinator, they often falter. You'll see this theme come up againlater in this list.

Despite the relative lean years, Saint Bobby seems to have the Seminoles loaded again and ready for yet another shot at a national title. Unlike other aging coaches like Joe Paterno, Bowden shows no signs of slowing down. Until he finally does retire, or maybe just dies on the sidelines, he'll occupy the top slot among ACC coaches.

2. Frank Beamer, Virginia Tech - Beamer was a close call for me over Larry Coker of Miami. Coker, after all has won a national championship. Coach Beamer on the other hand has built a national power out of somewhat unknown school in the Virginia mountains. Tech played for a national championship just a few years ago (losing to Bowden's Noles), a concept unthinkable before Beamer arrived at Tech. He doesn't get the talent that most top schools get, but he wins by playing what's known as Beamer-Ball - suffocating defense and aggressive special teams.

Before Beamer, Tech was a pretty mediocre program with little history. He slowly turned that around, in large part by dominating in-state recruiting, beating rival Virginia and their coaching icon George Welsh for the state's rich supply of talent. Since Al Groh showed up in Charlottesville, the recruiting tide has turned a bit, so it will be interesting to see if Beamer can keep Tech on the mountaintop. They have been on of ESPN's analysts' darlings for years now, but eventually that sort of attention passes. Even if Tech does slide back to being just a "good" program, Beamer will have made his mark and cemented his legacy. Look for some buildings or something to be named after him when he retires.

3. Larry Coker, Miami - Three years of coaching, three losses and one national championship. Not too shabby, huh? You can't start out much better than that. On the flip side, he's at Miami and they were already damn good when he got there. It's not too hard to drive 120 MPH in a Ferrari.

In fairness, three years are a bit few to rank this high, except that he really couldn't have done any better in his brief tenure. On top of what he's already won on the field, he's hauling in top recruits at levels that are good even by Miami's lofty standards. There's no reason to believe that barring some sort of NCAA trouble (which frankly isn't that unlikely considering that it's Miami), Coker will continue to enjoy incredible success in the Orange Bowl.

4. Ralph Friedgen, Maryland - What the Fridge has done in his three years at Maryland is nearly as impressive as what Coker has achieved at Miami. Three years, three ten-win seasons. Granted, those weren't typical ten-win seasons; due to quirks in the calendar and NCAA guidelines, Maryland played 39 games over that time. Still, the 31 wins in three years was equal to the Maryland win total in their previous six years.

When Friedgen came to his alma mater, Maryland was non-factor in football. They had had very little success since Bobby Ross was in College Park. Fridge changed that immediately, going 10-2 in his first year and ending Florida State's stranglehold on the ACC Championship. A long-time offensive coordinator under Georgia Tech coach George O'Leary and Bobby Ross before that, Friedgen had earned his rep before he ever coached a game. The only question was whether he could translate his success as a coordinator to the big job. Those questions were answered pretty quickly (and not surprisingly, O'Leary's Georgia Tech squad had a disappointing year after Fridge left).

Now Friedgen needs to prove that he can maintain his success at Maryland against increasingly stiff competition and take the Terps to next level - a national power.

5. Chuck Amato, NC State - If I were ranking coaches based on the excitement level they've brought their fans, Amato might be number one. It really is amazing what he's done in that regard at State. When he arrived, they were coming off a decade or more of mediocrity in all sports, including basketball. Amato, one of Bobby Bowden's top assistants for many years instantly hit if off with the fans with his promises of gridiron success. Fortunately for Amato, outgoing coach Mike O'Cain had landed a somewhat unheralded recruit out of Alabama named Philip Rivers. As you know, Rivers went on to start every game in his Wolfpack career, helping Amato not only win games but build an identity in Raleigh. At the same time, Amato managed to bring many of his Florida recruiting connections with him from Talahassee, helping State land several highly-rated classes.

On the field however, State has really only marginally improved from the O'Cain years. State wasn't really that bad under O'Cain and they haven't been that great under Amato. Two key things have changed though, NC State is now beating UNC regularly, and they're also beating Florida State. O'Cain's biggest problem was his inability to beat Carolina, even after Mack Brown left. Fortunately for Amato, the Tar Heels have been in a freefall ever since and he's owned the rivalry. The wins over Florida State are much more surprising and have helped lift Amato to near God status among the Wolfpack faithful. To take the next step though, his talented and athletic teams need to start finishing somewhere above fourth in the conference, something that hasn't happened yet in his tenure.

6. Al Groh, Virginia - Much like Ralph Friedgen at Maryland and Chuck Amato at NC State, Al Groh came to Virginia four years ago and immediately lifted the hopes of the fans. George Welsh's last few teams had failed to live up to the standards he had set in his stellar career in Charlottesville and the in-state recruiting battles were being won repeatedly by rival Virginia Tech. Al Groh put an immediate stop to that.

Al Groh left his job as the head coach of the New York Jets to take the Virginia job, a shocking change of career. I can't think of another example of an active professional head coach willingly leaving to take a college job, particularly to a mid-level program like UVA. While Groh wasn't winning hearts in NYC, his first Jets team had done pretty well, going 9-7. It's not like he was about to be fired.

Ironically, one reason he was so unpopular in New York was his bland personality. He seemed like exactly the opposite kind of coach who would do well in college. He came to Charlottesville though and set a tone that the program would be run like an NFL team. They play a pro-style offense and defense and he and his staff clearly stress their pro experience and connections when on the recruiting trail. The results were immediate, with Virginia landed several consecutive top-twenty recruiting classes.

Like Amato at State, Groh has now been at Virginia long enough and has landed enough good classes that it's time for the Cavaliers to take the step up to being a consistent top twenty-five program.

7. Tommy Bowden, Clemson - In Tommy Bowden's first year at Clemson, his Tigers shocked the conference. Clemson had a long history of playing power football. Passes were for pansies. Tommy changed that. They used funky alignments, trick plays, inside sweeps, everything. I remember watching a few of their games where it was clear that the defense, to say nothing of the cameramen, had no idea where the ball was or where it was going.

After a few seasons, those tricks stopped working. That's the way it is in a conference. The new coach can often get away with a lot of tricks, but once the other guys get more film on you, that stuff is less effective. Just as significantly, Bowden's creative offensive coordinator, Rich Rodriguez, left to become head coach at West Virginia.

Another problem for Bowden was the hiring of Lou Holtz at South Carolina. The state of South Carolina has good high school football, but there's only so much talent to go around. It's certainly easier for Clemson when the Gamecocks are down (which historically they've been).

After getting spanked by Wake Forest 45-17 last year, it seemed a certainty that Coach Bowden would be fired, maybe before the end of the season. Miraculously though, things turned around the very next week when Clemson beat Florida State for the first time. Suddenly IPTAY turned down the heat a bit under Tommy's chair. Clemson went on to run the table for the season, including a memorable 63-17 win over the hated Gamecocks.

Now, Tommy Bowden's job is somewhat safe. The Tigers are expected to do pretty well this season. If they don't though, well, let's just say that the folks in IPTAY still remember where that temperature control knob is.

8. Jim Grobe, Wake Forest - Jim Grobe has done the miraculous in his three years at Wake Forest; he's made them significant again. Wake actually gives teams some concern. It used to be, under the inexplicably long rein of Jim Caldwell, a veritable certainty that a game against the Demon Deacons was a win. No longer. Using a run-based attack that features constant misdirection, Wake is becoming if not a force, a respected opponent. In Grobe's three years, Wake has home wins against Clemson (including the blowout I mentioned above) and NC State, and road victories against Virginia, Boston College, Purdue and UNC. Wake even went to and won a bowl game in 2002.

Wake's biggest challenge in the coming years will be keeping Grobe. In building a winning team in Winston-Salem, particularly one that uses a running attack when most smaller programs try to win with gimmicky passing attacks, Grobe has attracted admirers. There is no doubt that bigger programs, ones with a better chance to win consistently, will come calling for Coach Grobe. If the Deacons can keep him, that truly would be a miracle.

9. Chan Gailey, Georgia Tech - Chan Gailey, along with Al Groh, is the second ACC coach who used to be a head coach in the NFL. Gailey coached the Dallas Cowboys for two years before being fired. Before that, Gailey was offensive coordinator for the Pittsburgh Steelers when they were employing their creative offense built partly around the multi-talented Kordell Stewart (the Slash Kordell, not the Horrible Quarterback Kordell).

At Georgia Tech, Gailey has had some hiccups, but shown promise. He took over after George O'Leary infamously left to briefly become the head coach of Notre Dame (I believe O'Leary is now employed as a Professor of Linguistics at Oxford). The problem for Gailey is that O'Leary left the problem in shaky state. O'Leary's last year there was the year after Ralph Friedgen left and it was pretty mediocre. Gailey stepped in and guided the Yellow Jackets to back-to-back 7-6 seasons. His team last year was young and showed some promise, beating Auburn, Maryland and NC State.

It may be that Gailey deserves to be ranked a bit higher in this list, but his two years haven't yet given him enough time to prove it.

10. Ted Roof, Duke - Roof has a very brief, but impressive resume as a head coach. Last year, fed up with a 30 game ACC losing streak, the longest in conference history, Duke fired head coach Carl Franks. It was out of character for a school like Duke to fire a coach mid-season, but clearly the program was headed nowhere. Ted Roof stepped in for the final five games and achieved a stunning turnaround.

Roof's first game as coach was against an uneven, but potent NC State Wolfpack. Duke played them tough before losing by a single touchdown. The next week was a road game at Tennessee, not exactly a great place to kick-start a program. Duke surprised the Vols by playing them tight into the fourth quarter. One week later, Duke ended the losing streak in outrageous fashion, waxing Georgia Tech 41-17. Duke went on to win again, beating rival UNC in the season finale.

In five games, Roof won twice, both against ACC competition. His predecessor, Carl Franks, won two conference games in five years - both in his first year. It looks to me like Ted Roof is a coach with a very promising future.

11. John Bunting, UNC - And now we come to the one ACC coach who everyone would agree is struggling. Bunting's first team at Carolina went 8-5 with a big win over Florida State and a bowl victory over Auburn. Tar Heel fans thought that they finally had the man to make them forget the Carl Torbush disaster. Well, it hasn't worked out that way. Bunting's next two teams went 3-9 and 2-10, including a stretch of ten consecutive home losses. Carolina even lost to Duke last year, snapping a 13 year win streak against their hapless gridiron rivals. Making things worse for Carolina fans is that at the same time as their program has fallen apart, cross-Triangle rival NC State is flourishing and starting to capture the minds and hearts of young football fans (and players) around the state.

That just doesn't sit well with the Carolina Blue crowd. John Bunting is one of their own and a guy who looks like a football coach. He's big and tough and he played linebacker for the Heels. His teams though are anything but tough, with last year's squad giving up nearly 500 yards a game, the 116th best defense in the country. If Carolina can't improve significantly on that, and their surprisingly good recruiting classes should help, then I doubt John Bunting will be coaching in Chapel Hill next season.

My Last US Olympic Basketball Post

OK, this time I meant it. I'm not going to write any more about the state of the US national team. Don't get me wrong, I have plenty to say, but enough is enough. I might dust of my ideas at some point in the future, but not now.

That said, the Duke Basketball Report has put together a nice compilation of post-mortems. In particular are good articles by Fran Frashilla and Rick Majerus. There are plenty of good ideas in here.

One thing I fee pretty certain about (well, somewhat certain) is that we learned our lesson. Our team will be much, much better in 2008. The catch is, the other teams will be better too.

Edit: It looks the DBR found more.

Knight!

From the Too-Weird-To-Be-Fiction department comes breaking news that CBS is exploring the idea of a sitcom based on the life of Bobby Knight. They say they have no writers yet for the show. I'm assuming that John Feinstein is not one of their candidates.

I did happen to come across one of the sample scenes they are trying. This is just an audio clip. Enjoy. Oh, and you're gonna want to use headphones, as The General's vocabulary is bit salty.

(Thanks to The Hood for the audio link).

Tony K On Prime Time

Tony Kornheiser has a great take on the return of Deion Sanders. Deion really is a trip. He's an ubelievable egomaniac and I doubt he can really make much of an impact, but I'll give him credit for being interesting.

One great quote from this whole Deion-is-returning story is the quote from his personal trainer that Deion has been running 4.38 40s... on grass!

That's great! Justin Gatlin couldn't run a 4.38 on grass. Ricky Williams maybe could, but a 37-year-old Deion Sanders most certainly can't.

Or maybe they meant a 40 as in a 40 ouncer? 4.38 seconds is pretty impressive for one of those as well.