ACC Basketball News & Notes: League Play is Underway

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This week, the Atlantic Coast Conference has begun the league portion of their season. As has been the case with the fall sports schedule, problems are starting to crop up. Two league games that were to tip-off on Wednesday night December 16 have already been postponed. Those matchups are #17 Virginia vs Wake Forest and North Carolina State at #23 Louisville. An extra non-conference game has been agreed to as Syracuse will play host to Northeastern. The Louisville at Wisconsin game, part of the ACC-Big 10 Challenge, has been rescheduled for this Saturday at noon. This is how life in college sports is going to be at least for this year. Here is some other news from around the league.

Six teams are ranked in the latest AP Top 25 poll. Along with Virginia and Louisville, Florida State comes in at #15, North Carolina is at #21, Duke checks in at #22, and Clemson at #24. However, a streak came to an end when this week’s rankings came out. For the past 461 straight polls, the Atlantic Coast Conference has had at least one team in the Top-10. The longest such mark of any conference by far. This streak dates all the way back to the 1996 season. The previous record for the longest streak was 190 and that too was established by the ACC from 1978-89.

The ACC Player of The Week is Pittsburgh’s sophomore forward Justin Champagnie. Last week, in a pair of games vs Northwestern and Gardner-Webb, Justin recorded 20 points, 20 rebound games. In the two wins, he averaged 22 points, 20 rebounds, and two and a half assists. He becomes the first NCAA division one player to do this since Purdue’s Caleb Swanigan (2016-17) and is the third overall in the past 25 years joining Oklahoma’s Blake Griffin who did it in 2008-09. Justin is the only player in the league to average a double-double of 19 points and 13 rebounds. The board total is fourth-best in the NCAA. The Rookie of The Week is Florida State guard Scottie Barnes. In the Seminoles’ two wins last week over Indiana and Florida, Barnes averaged 13 points, five assists, and three rebounds. He knocked down the game-winning shot in overtime as FSU defeated the Hoosiers 69-67 in the ACC-Big 10 Challenge.

The Boston College Eagles have gotten off to a tough start at 1-5, 0-1. The four-game losing streak included their home opener last Saturday which was also their conference opener vs Syracuse 4-1, 1-0. The 101-68 beat down was the worst home loss in the 32-year history of Conte Forum. The 38-point loss at the hands of the Orange was the worst since a 37-point loss to Connecticut back on March 8, 2003. For the game, Syracuse shot a red hot 58.7% from the field making 37 field goals, 16 from beyond the arc. They were nearly perfect from the free-throw line hitting on 11-of-12 and their defense forced BC into making 17 turnovers. Not the way to get your season underway if you are the Eagles. On the positive side for BC is the play of Senior Steffon Mitchell. Mitchell ranks in the top-5 active career leaders in rebounds (802, #1), blocked shot (4th with 103), and steals (2nd with 147).

On Thursday night, when N.C. State (3-0) travelers to Saint Louis, it will be a homecoming for one of their players. Junior forward Jericole Hellems is a St. Louis native who played his high school ball at Chaminade High School which is considered a Missouri powerhouse. During his time at the school, Hellems finished third in career points behind two guys that would go on to have NBA careers. They would be Bradley Beal and Jayson Tatum.

Tar Heels sophomore forward Amando Bacot led North Carolina with a season-high 19 points and 11 boards last Saturday. It was his second double-double of the season and the 13th of his career. It was the third straight game he grabbed 10 or more rebounds in a game.

That’s a look at the Atlantic Coast Conference for this week. We will return next week with more from the ACC.