Eagles finally fly

[Olympic Fan]

It might have been overlooked by many of this board, but our Durham neighbors scored a landmark victory last night.

North Carolina Central won its first-ever Division 1 game -- edging Tennessee Tech (which finished third in the OVC last season), 73-70. The Eagles are now 1-5 with losses at Duke, at Rutgers, at Florida, at Wake Forest and at North Dakota State.

That's six straight road games. Their next three games are also on the road -- at Davidson, at Towson State and at Drake. Then they get a break -- the game at Drake is the opener of a four-team tournament, so they'll actually get to play on a neutral court game in their 10th game of the season after nine road games.

On positive impact for Duke -- because of the win (and the tough schedule), NCCU is currently 161 in the RPI. That's not going to last, but the higher the Eagles finish the more it helps Duke. There was a good chance preseason they were going to finish (and they still might) above 300 in the RPI.

Again, it's still wa-a-a-y too early for the RPI to mean much, but after beating Marquette, Duke is up to 14 in the RPI. And, as a conference, the ACC has a big lead on the Big East for the top spot in the conference rankings (the much vaunted Pac 10 is fourth in the conference rankings).

[tbyers11]

Very glad to see that NCCU got their first DI win. Not to make it any less impressive but The Herald Sun says that it was a home game
One of only 7 home games they have all season (against 21 road/neutral games). Such is the life of an independent in Division I.