Originally Posted by
JasonEvans
Because this is not an all-or-nothing situation. The 28 game round robin is ideal... getting as close as possible to it is good.
I am sure you would agree that a 27 game schedule would come darn close to being perfect. If Duke, UNC, Louisville, and Virginia each played a 27 game schedule and each missed a road game against one of Syracuse, NC St, Notre Dame, or Miami then I can imagine at least 95% of us would say Duke, UNC, Lou, and Virginia had played pretty much equal schedules and the team with the best record certainly deserved to be crowned some kind of ACC champion.
27 is better than 26 is better than 25 is better than 24... and so on. Therefore 20 is better than 18. I'm not saying 20 is perfect, not even close. I am merely saying it gets us closer to a fair schedule than 18 does.
Another reason for a longer conference schedule, is that it prevents miscreants like Syracuse from depreciating the ACC currency by playing a total joke of a non-conference schedule.
Also,Duke's non-conference schedule has included some competitive games. This year we have two challenging and two other potentially interesting non-conference match-ups in November and December: Kansas, Cal, Georgetown/Texas and Michigan State. Last year's was even more challenging -- Kentucky, Maui (SD State, Auburn, Gonzaga), Indiana and Texas Tech.
Sage Grouse
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'When I got on the bus for my first road game at Duke, I saw that every player was carrying textbooks or laptops. I coached in the SEC for 25 years, and I had never seen that before, not even once.' - David Cutcliffe to Duke alumni in Washington, DC, June 2013