Day Three of the ACC Men's Basketball Tournament

A Day of Major and Near Upsets

The ACC has always been very proud of its' long and accomplished basketball tradition. To fans of schools within the conference it is the best basketball conference in the nation.

Of the remaining charter schools in the conference (North Carolina, Duke, N.C. State, Wake Forest, Maryland and Clemson) all consistently produce winning records against outside opponents and post most of their losses from in-conference play.

Many fans of the conference were reluctant to expand the conference believing that the addition of schools outside of the conference's long dominant winning tradition would water down the league and its' long standing image as a power conference.

After the first two rounds of the conference tournament it appears those concerns can be put to rest as the most recent entrees to the conference beat three of the league's charter members. Shocked fans watched as two Florida teams best known as football powers, quickly sent home perennial powers Wake Forest and North Carolina State and low seeded Boston College eliminated a very talented Maryland team.

Standing by in the wings, the forth-new member, Virginia Tech, as a result of winning a high seed awaited the outcome of Miami - N.C. State game to learn who their second round opponent would be.

It appears that those fans concerned about the competitiveness of the new entrees into the conference can rest easy as after the first round of play four of the league's newest members will play in the second round while four senior members of the conference have been sent home.

In the second round of play both North Carolina and Duke played very competitive games against opponents, which did not seem to realize they were not suppose to win. UNC struggled until late in the first half to gain a lead over a very good and determined Florida State team and Duke had a similar problem with an aggressive and scrappy Georgia Tech team. Both UNC and Duke benefited from rest and from very deep benches as their opponents seemed to whither in the second half, perhaps the result of having played tough games the previous day.