Duke and North Carolina have owned the ACC since the conference started back in 1954, but this year, the Virginia Cavaliers left no doubt as to who the best team in the conference actually is. The AP No. 5 Cavaliers are currently 25-5 (16-1 in the ACC) and have already clinched the regular season title with one game remaining at Maryland. It is their first outright regular season title in 33 seasons and their sixth overall championship. The team is led in scoring by guards Malcolm Brogdon (12.6 p/g), and Joe Harris (11.3 p/g). The Cavaliers are currently on a 13 game winning streak and their most important win might have been this past weekend. Virginia defeated then No. 4 Syracuse at home 75-56 in a game where the Cavaliers scored 48 points in the second half. Most of the experts weren't expecting either team to put up more than 50-55 points, but Virginia exploded for 75 in their best effort of the season. It is just one win, but this one win did a lot for this ball club. First off, it sent them soaring up in the rankings from 12th in the country all the way up to 5th in just one week. Along with that, this was a statement win for a team who really didn't have too many of those over the course of the season. This team was overlooked all year by just about everyone because they were overshadowed by teams like Duke and Syracuse who get all of the publicity due to their talented Freshmen.
Along with all of the success that this season had in store for the Cavaliers, adversity was something they certainly had to overcome. A loss at the hands of Wisconsin in which Virginia only put up 38 points was looked at early on as the low point in the season, but that was not the case. A road loss to Green Bay three days later was another "bad loss". However, easily their worst moment of the season came Dec. 30th at Tennessee where they got routed by the Volunteers 87-52. Losing by 35 points to an unranked opponent is embarrassing for a team as successful as Virginia. This game certainly caused a positive affect on the team, as they have gone 16-1 since that loss with the only other defeat coming on the road at Cameron Indoor Stadium. With a good mix of Senior leadership and talented underclassmen, this team is poised for a deep run in March. Joe Lunardi, ESPN's Braketologist, currently has Virginia as a No. 3 seed for the NCAA Tournament which begins March 20th.
Last season, there was another ACC team who made a great late season run like the Cavaliers are currently doing. That team is the Miami(FL) Hurricanes, who finished atop the ACC last season. That team started four seniors along with current NBA stand out Shane Larkin. Like the Cavs, Miami was overlooked for most of the season, until they got a huge home win against #1 Duke. For them, that was the game where people really started to take notice. Miami ended up losing in the sweet sixteen to Marquette, but it was still a very successful season. With Miami and now Virginia winning the ACC, that means it has been two years since Duke and North Carolina have been atop the conference. This is very rare, in fact, there have only been four years since 2000 that UNC or Duke haven't had at least a share of the ACC crown. In terms of being regular season Champions, the Tar Heels have claimed this title 29 times, while Duke has 19 of their own. The closest school to them is North Carolina State with only 7 titles. Could there be a changing of the guard in the ACC? Perhaps now that Syracuse, Pittsburgh, and next year Louisville are in the conference. The fact is that the conference is deeper than it has ever been and that just means it will be a lot harder for teams like UNC and Duke to have the same dominant success that they once had.
Virginia looks at least at the moment that they are poised for success over the next couple of years as they are only graduating 3 seniors, 2 of which are starters. Joe Harris, one of those seniors, will go down as one of the best players to ever wear the Cavalier uniform. He is a four year starter who averaged at least 10 p/g in all four seasons at Virginia. Another man who deserves a lot of credit for this year's success is the man at the helm, 6th year head coach Tony Bennett. Bennett has a 101-58 overall record as the head coach of Virginia and has made great progress with his teams over these last couple of seasons. He isn't mentioned among the great head coaches like coach K, Boeheim, Pitino, and Calipari, but he is a very successful head coach who is on the rise. In a season with so much parity all across the country in College Basketball, Virginia is a team that can definitely make it to New Orleans.
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