ACC Basketball News & Notes: Virginia is Now on Top

Read Time:5 Minute, 55 Second

With six games left in the ACC regular season, a change at the top has taken place. The Virginia Cavaliers and the Pittsburgh Panthers are tied for the league lead. What is interesting about this is one team. Virginia. is ranked #7 in the Associated Press Top-25 Poll. The Panthers are not ranked by anyone, despite having a five-game winning streak in their back pocket. How one is ranked and the other is anyone’s guess, but make no mistake about it, both are very good teams and should be playing well into March. Here is some more news on the league.

Some milestones were reached over the weekend that deserved some attention. First, Cavaliers graduate guard Kihel Clark is now the ACC’s All-Time leader in minutes played at 5,012. He passed Duke’s Kyle Singler who had 4,887 minutes in 148 career games. Clark needed 148 games to break the record and is 18th in the career assists mark with 675. Wake Forest’s Tyree Appleby smashed two long-standing free throw records last Tuesday night. In their game versus North Carolina, Appleby was 23-of-28 from the free-throw line. The 23 makes breaks a record that was set in both 1957 and 1959 of 21. The 28 attempts broke a record that was set twice back in 1955. North Carolina big man Armando Bacot recorded the 65th double-double of his career, which is the sixth most in league history. He is one shy of Tom Burleson of NC State (1972-74). Bacot is sixth All-Time in rebounding with 1,276. On Monday night, Bacot was held in check by the #15 ranked Miami Hurricanes fouling out with 12 points and four boards. Miami won the game 80-72 in Chapel Hill.

Boston College (12-14, 6-9) headed to Pittsburgh (18-7, 11-3) on Tuesday night to have their hand at trying to snap the Panthers’ five-game winning streak. They did so with post-production being key. Since senior forward Quinton Post has returned to the Eagles lineup, the team has played much better. In his last seven games, Post has scored 20 points in five of them including last Saturday vs NC State. In the seven games, Post is averaging 16.8 points, 6.2 rebounds, and 1.5 assists. Pittsburgh meanwhile leads the league in three-point makes per game at 9.4. For the season they have made 235 three-point shots, which is fourth most in program history. Blake Hinson is 7th in the league in 3-point made FG with 62 in 25 games for an average of 2.48. The game ended with the Panthers extending their winning streak to six games with a 77-58 win over BC.

Wake Forest (17-9, 9-6) has been a really difficult team to beat at Lawrence Joel Coliseum since the 2021-22 season. Their record of 30-4 is proof of that. The 30 wins make them one of only five schools across the country to have 30 wins at home since the start of the 2021-22 season. They are fourth in scoring offense at 77 points a game, fourth in field goal percentage at 46%, third in 3-point FG percentage at 36%, fifth in defensive rebounding per game at 26 a night, and third in 3-point makes with 235 in 26 games for an average of nine a contest. The Demon Deacons take a 3-game winning streak into their game against Miami on Saturday, Feb. 18.

Virginia Tech’s (15-10, 5-9) graduate forward Grant Basile has been on a scoring binge the last two games. He has back-to-back 33-point games in his last two. He is the first Hokies player since Bryant Matthews in December of 2003 to have back-to-back 30-point nights. He is the first Tech player to have three 30-point games since Erick Green in 2012-13. Basile is seventh in league scoring with 16 points a game., seventh in field goal percentage at 52% and fifth in blocked shots with 35 in 25 games for an average of 1.4 a game.

North Carolina State’s (20-6, 10-5) senior guard Casey Morsell is putting the ball in the basket with some regularity lately. He is averaging 17 points a game in his last three on 17-of-29 shooting for 58.6%. He is 13-of-24 54.2% from 3-point range in those three games. Morsell is third in the conference in three-point shooting at 45% and is fifth in the league in 3-point makes per game at 2.58 per contest. He is #1 in 3-point FG percentage at 45% (67-of-149).

The ACC Player of the Week is Wake’s, Tyree Appleby. He averaged 25.5 points, 5.5 rebounds, 8.5 assists, and 1.5 steals in wins over North Carolina and Georgia Tech. In the win over UNC, he scored a season-high 35 points and passed out 11 assists, and seven rebounds. He followed that up with a 16-point, six-assist effort vs the Yellow Jackets. Appleby leads the ACC in scoring at 18 points a game, in assists with 162 in 26 games for an average of 6.23, is third in steals with 42 in 26 games for an average of 1.62, sixth in assists/turnover ratio at 2.08 (162 assists, 78 turnovers) and leads in minutes played with 943 for an average of 36.25 a game. Appleby is fifth in most improved scoring at+7.7 from a year ago (10.9 to 18.6). In career active leaders Tyree is all of this, second in active points with 2,036, first in steals with 208, and second in assists with 666.

There are two ACC Co-Rookie of the Week. First, there is Boston College’s Chas Kelley III. He averaged 12 points, 2.5 assists, and 1.5 steals in games against Virginia Tech and North Carolina State. In the win over the Hokies, Kelley had a career-high 17 points and tied a season-high with four assists while committing zero turnovers. In the loss to the Wolfpack, Kelley off the bench in 21 minutes had seven points and three steals.

Syracuse’s Judah Mintz was the other ACC Rookie of the Week. Mintz had 16 points, with 14 of them coming in the second half of the Orange’s win at Florida State. Trailing 54-49 in the second half, Syracuse went on a 15-2 run with Mintz scoring 10 of those points. Mintz leads all freshmen in the league in scoring with 15.4 per game. He is eighth in assists with 112 in 25 games for an average of 4.48 a contest and is first in steals with 51 in 25 games for an average of 2.04 a night.

That’s a look at the conference for this week. We will be back next week with more from the ACC.