I spent the day watching ACC basketball (well, I did check in on Georgetown-UConn) and saw two blowouts, one great finish and one pretty good game.
Obviously, UNC-State was a rout ... and is covered elsewhere.
But BC's rout of Wake in Boston was huge for the Eagles. Strange that earlier in the week, Wake had a great homecourt win over a pretty good BYU team, while BC lost at home to Robert Morris. But the Eagles got a great first half from John Oates (11 points on three 3-pointers) and a great second half from Tyler Roche (three 3-pointers) and were never theatened.
The Georgia Tech-Miami game was pretty good ... Georgia Tech led by 12 points early, but had a total meltdown at the end of the half. Miami took the lead and Hewitt had to be restrained by his assistants from attacking a ref.
The 'Canes got a great game from James Dews and controlled the second half, although Georgia Tech settled down and stayed within range.
The great game was in Blackburg, where the Terps suffered what had to be a bitter loss. Playing without Eric Hayes, Maryland led almost all the way (I was clicking back and fourth with the Miami and UConn games, so I might have missed it, but I'm pretty sure that VPI never led in the second half until freshman Jeff Allen hit one of two free throws with 12 seconds left to give the Hokes a one-point lead.
Maryland really blew the last possession -- they inbounded to Vasquez (who had played well), who dribbled upcourt slowly -- then pulled up five-feet behind the three-point line and launched a contested 3-pointer. The ball hit the back iron and bounced high in the air and by the time it came down the game was over.
I can't get the FSU-Clemson game tonight, but I'll be trying to follow on gametracker.
PS UConn blew a chance for a big win. They trailed G-town most of the way, but had a nice spurt late in the second half and were up six with two minutes to play. Then they got passive on defense, dropped back in a tight zone and gave up two uncontested 3-pointers to tie the game, then with four seconds left (and the shot clock running down), GU's Roy Hibbert hit a 3-pointer from the top of the key to win. True, it was only his second 3 of the year, but with a chance to win at Georgetown, the Huskies allowed three wide-open 3s in a row to lose.
BTW: It's barely a week into the Big East season, but the announers said that Georgetown is the last of 16 conference teams that's unbeaten in league play.