ACC Roundup: Injuries And Exhibitions
After months of waiting, the season is about to start
In ACC news, a minor UNC injury from last week’s exhibition win over St. Augustine’s as Notre Dame transfer Cormac Ryan left the game with an ankle issue. Not to worry, says Hubert Davis; it’s just a tweak.
Syracuse has an issue: Auburn transfer Chance Westry has a “lower-body injury” that will require surgery. He’s out for some time. That could hurt. Westry is pretty athletic and with the move from the ol’ 2-3 to a man defense, Adrian Autry was probably counting on him for a lot.
Unfortunately, Judah Mintz has a lower-body injury of his own, but it’s said to be mild.
We feel pretty strongly that Brad Brownell is the best coach Clemson has ever had. If he were at, say, Indiana instead of Clemson, he’d be in a better position to recruit 5-star players, but he’s done alright at Clemson with what he’s been able to get. Brownell, never forget, is really good at developing players. Take PJ Hall, who came from nowhere to be what Mike Krzyzewski once called “the most improved player on the planet.”
Still, Clemson has struggled to get in to the postseason, and Brownell is not amused about that and how the process works. He points out that while Clemson lost to Louisville late last season, and that loss may have cost the Tigers an NCAA bid, the Louisville we saw later was much, much better than the dreadful team we saw early on. Is that a fair criticism of the NCAA’s tournament formula?
A lot of people think Louisville’s Kenny Payne might be fired if he has a second poor season - and last year’s was epically bad although, as Brownell noted, the Cards did improve more than the record might indicate.
We really don’t think that’s a big issue. First, the Cards have a lot more talent. And second, Payne’s former players at Kentucky and with the New York Knicks say about his development skills. Payne knows what he’s doing and, unlike last year, he has some decent if not great talent. Is it enough?
It’s enough. And it’ll keep getting better. Eventually, people will look back on last season as a hiccup. We don’t know how much Louisville will improve this season, but improve they will and we won’t be surprised if they turn into a big pain in the ass for everyone else.
The Miami Hurricanes had no problem with the College of New Jersey (all together now: who?) in Sunday’s exhibition, winning 111-54.
The stats don’t mean much here but what the coach thinks does and here’s what Jim Larrañaga had to say: “I thought we played well from start to finish. We shared the ball extremely well. We defended well, and our bench played really, really well.”
Flagler College gave Florida State conniption fits before the ‘Noles pulled away late, winning 90-74. Leonard Hamilton said this: “We had some decent moments. We’re fairly athletic, but we don’t quite have some of the quickness we’ve had in the past. That means we need to play extremely aggressively for our defense to be effective. I think we’ve had our moments, but that’s the progress we have to make.”
A conference alumni note: former Louisville coach Rick Pitino is at St. John’s now and his first outing was a major dud, with the Red Storm losing to D-II Pace, 63-59. St. John’s had injury woes, but even so, that’s not ideal.
- RJ Davis, Harrison Ingram pace UNC basketball in exhibition win
- Chance Westry Out Indefinitely After Suffering Injury in Practice
- Why PJ Hall has been Clemson basketball’s ‘best recruit’ under coach Brad Brownell
- Brad Brownell toughens Clemson slate for ‘23-24
- Clemson’s Brad Brownell & PJ Hall Excited About Joe Girard III
- FSU basketball beats Flagler College at home in exhibition game
- Takeaways, notes from FSU men’s exhibition win over Flagler - TheOsceola
- Seminoles Top Falgler In First Of Two Exhibition Games - Florida State University