ACC Basketball Falls Flat in the Postseason

After touting itself as the comeback kid of power basketball conferences, the ACC has had its reputation sullied again by its disappointing showing in the postseason.

Once the pride of college basketball, the ACC’s image took a hit last year when only four of its teams got into the NCAA tournament and only one made it to the second round.

But this year was different as eight ACC teams got bids to the NCA tournament, two others got into the NIT and an 11th team made it to the College Basketball Crown tournament.

The ACC is back.

Or so it was declared by the 18-team conference.

The postseason has told a different story, and Cal contributed to the damaging picture of the ACC.

It’s true that postseason results are given far too much weight in determining the perceived strength of a conference, and injuries (North Carolina’s Caleb Wilson, Louisville Mikel Brown, SMU’s B.J. Edwards, Duke’s Caleb Foster) played a role in the ACC’s poor showing.

But the bottom line – which is what people pay attention to in the postseason – is that ACC teams have gone 5-7 in the NCAA tournament, by far the worst record among power conferences, and did worse than expected in the NIT, with both its teams losing at home in the second round.

Only one ACC team, Duke, is still alive in the NCAA tournament, and even the top-seeded Blue Devils did not shower themselves in glory in a closer-than-expected first-round game against Siena. Duke has yet to face a team seeded eighth or higher.

By contrast, five Big Ten teams are still alive, four apiece from the Big 12 and SEC remain in contention, and two from the Big East are still around. And all four of those conferences have overall records well over .500 in the NCAA tournament.

NCAA tournament records of the five major basketball conferences:

Big Ten – 13-3

SEC – 12-6

Big 12 – 9-5

Big East – 4-1

ACC – 5-7

Only two of the seven eliminated ACC teams lost to higher seeded teams, and SMU and North Carolina State were ousted by 11 seeds in the preliminary-round First Four.

In the NIT, second-seeded Cal lost at home to a third-place Atlantic 10 team (Saint Joseph’s) that had been 7-7 on the road, and top-seeded Wake Forest was eliminated at home in the second round by a third-place Missouri Valley Conference squad (Illinois State) that had been 5-7 in road games.

Another ACC team, Stanford, will not play its opening game of the College Basketball Crown tournament until April 2, but if the Cardinal does not beat West Virginia in its first game . . . .

As noted earlier, postseason results play a bigger role than they should in creating a conference’s basketball reputation.

However, the ACC has to live with the image the postseason has given it.