Easy pickings for the most part
In Saturday’s ACC Action, it was a clean sweep but not always by much:
Louisville topped Eastern Kentucky 78-76, Georgia Tech rolled by Alabama A&M 92-49, Syracuse got by Bucknell 75-63 and BC took down Fairleigh Dickinson 78-70.
Louisville shot out to an early lead but Eastern Kentucky ripped off a 12-1 run with 6:17 to go to take the lead.
It went back and forth and the issue wasn’t resolved until Cardinal Noah Waterman hit a shot with 1.2 left to play put the Cards up 77-76. Terrence Edwards picked off the inbounds and. hit one free throw to give Louisville a tight win.
Tight, smight: with the win, Louisville matches last season’s win total of eight. When they win another four, they match Kenny Payne’s two year total of victories.
On the roster for EKU: one Cyril Martinov, who started his career at Georgia Tech in 2022.
Lance Terry had 22 to lead Georgia Tech to an easy win over Alabama A&M while Javian McCollum came off the bench for 18.
Jaeden Mustaf continues to come on with 13 points, seven rebounds and six assists. Big man Baye Ndongo had 10 points, six boards and four assists.
Naithan George shooting wasn’t impressive, hitting just 2-8, but he did have seven rebounds and six assists.
There isn’t much to glean from this as it was just a mismatch.
Syracuse had 21 turnovers, which wasn’t good, but suppressed Bucknell’s offense, limiting them to 34.5 percent from threes and 38.2 percent overall.
The Orange also controlled the boards, 28/15 to 19/8.
Donnie Freeman had five of those turnovers and fellow starters Eddie Lampkin and Elijah Moore had four each.
BC had a strong start against Fairleigh Dickinson but the Knights cut the lead to 70-65 with just 2:07 left.
However, it wasn’t meant to be.
Donald Hand continues his strong resurgence after a knee injury last season: he finished with 29 points and 10 rebounds, which is one of the more impressive outings of this ACC season so far.
With the win, BC moves to 8-5 which ain’t great, but given where the Eagles were when Earl Grant took over, ain’t awful either.
The Miami search to replace Jim Larranaga will be under the radar for a while naturally because most of the candidates are busy coaching their own teams. However, you can tell his impact by the quality of the names that are coming up. Joining the list: Sean Miller, Archie Miller and, yes, Ben McCollum’s names all being floated.
Only two games on tap for Sunday as SMU entertains Longwood, whoever that is, and UNC gets a somewhat risky visit from Campbell. Why is it risky?
Because UNC hasn't played well, UCLA aside, and it’s a holiday buy game from a nearby school. You can ask Louisville about that.
Normally UNC would just roll out a team with a dominant inside player and cruise to a 20+ point win. They’ll probably win, but you can see a scenario where something shocking could happen.
Sunday’s ACC Action
