ACC Basketball Power Rankings

ACC teams are putting a wrap on the non-conference portion of their basketball schedules. As such, it is a perfect time to check-in and see how the ACC is looking before conference games begin. We’ll start at the bottom and count our way up.

18. Boston College

17. Pittsburgh

16. Georgia Tech

15. Florida State

There are multiple losses to UMass from this bunch. Three of them could have new coaches by next season and Luke Loucks is taking some early lumps in year one at Florida State.

14. Virginia Tech

13. Stanford

12. Syracuse

11. Notre Dame

Virginia Tech and Stanford may prove to be good. They’ve played relatively soft schedules and haven’t come up with marquee wins, so I could be offbase here, but I have them fairly low in the rankings and believe that’ll prove out to be right as we enter conference play.

I was extremely high on Syracuse entering the year because I love their guards — JJ Starling and Naithan George. They beat Tennessee and I thought I was a genius, but then they lost to Hofstra. Notre Dame was doing fine until they lost to Purdue Fort Wayne. I think that is like losing to UNC… Asheville.

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10. California

9. Wake Forest

8. SMU

Cal has only played two teams of note — Kansas State and UCLA. They lost close to the Wildcats but beat UCLA. They’re 12-1 with a bunch of cupcake wins so there’s some unknown here, but former Laker Mark Madsen may have himself a team — or just a nice win over UCLA.

Wake Forest almost beat Michigan and Texas Tech, both 1-point losses, but they haven’t really scored any great wins unless you count West Virginia. SMU beat Texas A&M and Butler and may be pretty solid.

7. NC State

6. Clemson

5. Miami

NC State finally grabbed a P5 win by blowing out Ole Miss. Coach Will Wade crushed his team in a presser days before the game saying they weren’t focused or tough. They responded with this big win. They have loads of potential.

Clemson looks like the best team in the country for 15-20 minute spurts, but they can’t put together a complete game. They blew 26 points of their 27-point lead but hung on for dear life and ended up beating Cincinnati thanks to some clutch Dillon Hunter free throws. They already blew a 22-point lead to BYU previously. They also did the reverse and stormed back from a huge deficit against Alabama to take a late lead but ended up losing a close one in Tuscaloosa. More consistency will go a long way. The neutral site win over Georgia will age well. That’s their best win to date. Losing Zac Foster to a knee injury hurts, but if Butta Johnson can return next week it can be overcome.

Miami is hard to get a pulse on this early, but they beat Georgetown and Ole Miss. Clemson lost to Georgetown, so Miami is slotted just barely above Clemson.

4. Virginia

3. Louisville

2. North Carolina

1. Duke

Virginia looks like a completely different team playing with a little tempo and great shooting. The defense is still solid, but this is a modern offense-first basketball team now — a totally different look from the Tony Bennett era.

Louisville shoots more 3-pointers as a proportion of their shots than anyone in the country. So far so good though. They have final four upside.

North Carolina has impressed me. They fixed their front court with some size and Seth Treble is back from injury at the wing. I think they can compete with anyone in the conference including Duke. They have wins over Kansas, Kentucky, and Ohio State. Center Henri Veesaar stands out to me, but freshman Caleb Wilson at small forward gets all the attention and deservingly so. This is an elite front court duo.

Duke is Duke. They have a ton of talent and are strong on both sides of the ball. Carlos Boozer’s son, Cameron Boozer, is their 6-foot-9 freshman star. They blew a 17-point lead to Texas Tech for their first loss of the year, but that’s their only loss. They are the favorite entering ACC play.