Following from my fellow rake’s ACC/Big 10 postmortem, and further betraying my wholesale lack of objectivity, Big 10 centrism, and capacity for denial, I offer the following broadsides:
1. The ACC has more overall athleticism on its rosters than the Big 10. I haven’t crunched the numbers, but I suspect this would be supported by a cursory look at McDonald’s All-American numbers, and a quick survey of recruiting rankings. Reasons for this greater appeal to the modern blue-chipper fall under several themes or watchwords: media/PR (ESPN worships at its altar, Coach K infomercials, ehem, commercials), freedom (athletes allowed to be athletes, less interference from meddling coaches who think they know more), more NBA-style offenses (less structure, more isolations, higher scoring), less stringent academics (the brain gap between the average Duke undergrad and a member of the hoops squad is epic and Duke is the best the ACC has to offer).
2. Other than Roy Williams, Coach K, and Gary Williams whose numbers I am forced to acknowlege, the Big 10 has better coaching brainpower top to bottom than the ACC: Ryan, Weber, Izzo, Carmody, DeChellis, Matta, Sampson, Painter, Alford beat the likes of Haith, Purnell, Leitao, Lowe, Prosser, Hamilton, Greenberg, Hewitt, Skinner. Admittedly, the Big 10 has a curve lowering coach in Amaker and a caught cheater in Sampson. Still, as a package deal, I take the B10.
3. The ACC/B10 Challenge takes place early in the season before good coaching has rendered its full impact and when athleticism (rather than coaching) has more of a net effect. As the estimable, barrel chested pivot from Altoona, Iowa, Shon Morris, pointed out during last Sunday’s telecast from Lansing, teams are playing a lot more preconference games than ever before and the loss of practice time is detrimental to the quality of the basketball. My own viewing the last few weeks bears this out. A lot of disorganized sets, inefficiency, miscommunication on defense, poor shot selection. The kind of sloppiness that good teaching and practice will render moot by January. By January well coached teams will be executing well enough to beat teams with superior athletes. (NU over Miami would be a happy early example of this. Except NU didn’t execute particularly well. They just got a monster shooting performance out of previously moribund Craig Moore).
4. Let’s move the ACC/B10 Challenge to February! And then we’ll see what’s what! Or, again, as Mr. Morris suggests, let’s move first practices up to October 1. Either solution means Big 10 revenge. Right? Who’s with me?
5. In lieu of that, let’s see what happens in March.
[…] a few good wins against the media’s favorite conference. To date the Big 10/ACC Challenge, while far from an accurate measure of conference value, has done little to rebut the aforementioned prejudice towards Tobacco Road basketball. But with a […]
Left by Hoopraker » Blog Archive » Loose Balls: November 28 on November 30th, 2007