Surprise Team, Coach Of The Year, Newcomer Of The Year In The ACC

[ice-9]

Look at Georgia Tech's roster

Look at UNC's roster

Look at Maryland's roster

Look at the standings

Then, tell me Maryland is doing about as well as expected.

Maryland looks good only because UNC, Clemson, Georgia Tech and Florida State all did so much worse than expected.

I'm not suggesting we give Hewitt or Roy the COY. I'm simply suggesting that Gary did a good but not great job with this year's team, and that comparing his performance to Hewitt's or Roy's is a fallacy, a straw man if you will.

[jimsumner]

Vasquez might be a second-round NBA draft pick. Might be. Williams should develop into an NBA player if he works hard, tones his body and listens to the coaches. But that two/three years off. That's about it.

Maryland barely has one consensus top-50 recruit, Mosley, and nary a single prep-All American. If anyone thought back in November that Maryland would be Duke's last remaining obstacle to a regular-season title, then they sure kept that opinion to themselves.

I fail to see how the fact that Roy Williams and Paul Hewitt and Dino Gaudio have taken more talented teams and done less with them supports the view that Gary Williams isn't deserving of the COY award.

[ice-9]

Exceeding expectations is a valid reason.
We are talking about ACC COY, not national COY.
MD was picked pre-season 5 in the ACC. They currently sit 2 in the ACC with a chance for 1.
I repeat, exceeding expectations is a valid reason for ACC COY.

OK, last try at explaining this.

Let's say in the preseason we have teams ranked thusly in conference:
1. Team Awesome
2. Team Lousy
3. Team Bad
4. Team Inconsistent
5. Team OK

Through season play the teams ranked 2 to 4 lose to teams they shouldn't both outside and inside the conference; this results in the team ranked 5, Team OK, to finish second.

So...did the coach of Team OK do a good job?

You answer that by looking outside the conference. He did a decent job, because Team OK is ranked just about where it was ranked in the preseason nationally.

Team OK outperformed conference expectations not because Team OK's coach did a good job; it's more because the coaches of Team Lousy, Bad and Inconsistent did not so good jobs. Team OK looks great in comparison to those under-performing teams; but not particularly outstanding compared to other teams outside the conference.

Now Team Awesome was picked first in conference. It finishes first in conference. Did the coach of Team Awesome do a good job? Hard to say if you only look at conference standings, so let's look outside the conference again. Why yes, Team Awesome did better than expected, so Team Awesome is not just awesome because it beat a lot of teams it was supposed to, it's awesome because it really is a better team than expected as illustrated by their national standing.

I guess the short version of what I'm trying to say is that you can't just look at ACC standings to determine how a coach did with his team.

[94duke]

OK, last try at explaining this.

Let's say in the preseason we have teams ranked thusly in conference:
1. Team Awesome
2. Team Lousy
3. Team Bad
4. Team Inconsistent
5. Team OK

Through season play the teams ranked 2 to 4 lose to teams they shouldn't both outside and inside the conference; this results in the team ranked 5, Team OK, to finish second.

So...did the coach of Team OK do a good job?

You answer that by looking outside the conference. He did a decent job, because Team OK is ranked just about where it was ranked in the preseason nationally.

Team OK outperformed conference expectations not because Team OK's coach did a good job; it's more because the coaches of Team Lousy, Bad and Inconsistent did not so good jobs. Team OK looks great in comparison to those under-performing teams; but not particularly outstanding compared to other teams outside the conference.

Now Team Awesome was picked first in conference. It finishes first in conference. Did the coach of Team Awesome do a good job? Hard to say if you only look at conference standings, so let's look outside the conference again. Why yes, Team Awesome did better than expected, so Team Awesome is not just awesome because it beat a lot of teams it was supposed to, it's awesome because it really is a better team than expected as illustrated by their national standing.

I guess the short version of what I'm trying to say is that you can't just look at ACC standings to determine how a coach did with his team.

The only problem with your thinking is that, traditionally, the writers ONLY take the conference games into consideration for these awards. This is how JWil can win NPOY while Juan Dixon can win ACC POY (2002).

[ice-9]

The only problem with your thinking is that, traditionally, the writers ONLY take the conference games into consideration for these awards. This is how JWil can win NPOY while Juan Dixon can win ACC POY (2002).

You're probably right but it's a lousy system. It pretty much means that the coach of the preseason top ranked team can't win the award.

Imagine if you're the coach of the top ranked team inside your conference but the conference as a whole just isn't well regarded. Still, you kick butt and by season's end you're ranked top ten nationally. Yet you don't win conference COY because silly voters will only look within the conference.

They'd rather give the award to a team that went from fifth to second in conference but did what was expected nationally vs. a team that stayed at first but did better than what was expected nationally.

[94duke]

You're probably right but it's a lousy system. It pretty much means that the coach of the preseason top ranked team can't win the award.

Imagine if you're the coach of the top ranked team inside your conference but the conference as a whole just isn't well regarded. Still, you kick butt and by season's end you're ranked top ten nationally. Yet you don't win conference COY because silly voters will only look within the conference.

They'd rather give the award to a team that went from fifth to second in conference but did what was expected nationally vs. a team that stayed at first but did better than what was expected nationally.

I don't disagree with you here!
I think Coach K should be COY!