ACC

ACC Basketball News & Notes: League Still Looking to Find its Way

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In years past, the ACC was an easy league to identify. This season may be different as the conference has already suffered two losses to schools from the America East Conference, and one loss to Navy from the Patriot League. Something that in recent times never would have taken place. The league has only one team, the Duke Blue Devils in the A.P. Top-25 poll with one other, North Carolina, receiving some mention in the polls. This may be a down year for the league in general and conference play will say a lot about how things are looked at. Let’s take a look at what else is going on.

Wake Forest (9-1, 1-0) finds itself at the top of the heap as the week gets started. The Demon Decanos have won three in a row. Senior guard Daivien Williamson is doing his part. He leads the conference and is fourth in the nation in free throw percentage at 94.4%, 34-of-36. He is also getting it done from long range as he is fifth in the ACC in 3-pointers made with 22 for an average of 2.2 a game. Wake comes into the week with the second-best offense in the league averaging 81.5 points a contest. They are second in scoring margin at +15.90 and first in field goal percentage at .495% (292-590).

Miami (8-3, 1-0) comes into the week with a four-game winning streak. Last Sunday in their win over Fordham, which gave them their fourth win in a row, redshirt senior guard Charles Moore went for a game-high 18 points and seven rebounds in the win. Moore is also getting 1.55 steals a game and his assists/turnovers ratio is 1.43 a night, 33 assists to 23 turnovers. The team is the best free-throw shooting group in the league at .766% (164-214).

Florida State (5-4, 0-1) has lost their last three games. After last Sunday’s one-point loss to South Carolina, redshirt sophomore Caleb Millis has an ACC high 21 steals so far this year for an average of 2.33 a game. The transfer from Houston has as many steals in nine games for the Seminoles as he did in 35 games over two seasons for the Cougars (21). His 2.33 a game leads the conference. Florida State is number one in the league in steals with 10.11 a night. The Seminoles are also second in offensive rebounding percentage .339%, 107 offensive boards in nine games.

Virginia Tech (7-4, 0-1) got a big game out of junior guard Hunter Cattoor in Dayton last Sunday. He went for 14 points which tied for the team and game-high honors. Cattoor has been having a little trouble putting the ball in the basket. His output on Sunday was his best since Nov.12 at Navy. Cattoor is knocking down two three-pointers a game. The Hokies are second in scoring defense allowing 57.18 a game, third in scoring margin at +13.09 a contest, and first in 3-point FG percentage defense .254% (58-228)

The ACC Player of the Week is Wake Forest graduate forward Alondes Williams who went for a triple-double last Saturday. The triple-double was the 35th in conference history and the second in Wake Forest history. The other was by Tim Duncan in 1996 vs Maryland. He is also the second player this season to record a triple-double, the other being Wendall Moore of Duke. The 16 points, 14 rebounds, and 10 assists came against USC Upstate.

There are two Rookies of the Week in the ACC. Notre Dame’s Blake Wesley and North Carolina State’s Terquavion Smith. Wesley scored 14 points and pulled down three boards in the huge win over then #10 Kentucky at home. Wesley hit the go-ahead jumper with 12 seconds left in the game to snap a 62-62 tie. Smith made rookie of the week for the second straight week by averaging 17.5 points, 3.5 rebounds, two assists, and 1.5 steals vs Bethune-Cookman and then #1 Purdue. Smith scored a career-high 21 in the overtime loss to the Boilermakers.

That is all for this week. We’ll be back next week with more from the ACC.

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