NOTRE DAME atop ACC WBB standings --WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 IRISH LEAD ACC WBB...CARDS TIED FOR FOURTH 

With all 18 ACC schools that participate in WBB  now having at least 10 conference games played, it seems as good a time as any to look at the conference standings...

Atop the league, and 10-0 in  conference play is Notre Dame. The Irish get five of their final eight conference games at home...and their next two are in South Bend when they bring in the west coast contingent...Stanford and Cal . Overall, UND is 19-2, their only two defeats coming in the Cayman Island after Thanksgiving...to Hailey Van Lith and TCU and Utah.

RIght behind them is NC State at 10-1 in conference.  Wes Moore's squad hs just fallen to California, in Berkley on 1/9/25 and doesn't play Notre Dame until 2/23...and gets them in Raleigh. NCST has faced Louisville, and we won't go into that one again...it wasn't pretty for the Cards. 

Tied for third in the conference are FSU and Duke.at 8-2 . The Cards haven't played either yet..and have to go on the road to face both...on Feb.13th and 20th. 

Louisville and UNC are tied for fourth with 8-3 conference records.  The Cards conference losses have come to NCST, Virginia Tech and Notre Dame.

Right behind the Cards and TarHeels is California, who is Louisville's next opponent on Thursday, Feb. 6th,

Georgia Tech is 6-4 and Virginia Tech is 6-5.to round out the teams with over .500 conference records. 

A three-way tie occurs between Boston College, Virginia and Clemson at 4-7 in conference play, right behind them is Stanford at 3-7. Also with three wins, at 3-8 is Miami. 

Syracuse is 2-8 and SMU is 2-9...With one win is Pitt at 1-9 and Wake Forest at 1-10. 

Looking ahead to the ACC WBB Tournament, despite the addition of three schools to the conference, only 15 schools will participate. And, the top four teams will still get a double bye. The tournament moves from Greensboro to Charlotte this year...One would have thought a 16 or 18 team format for the tournament would have been considered. But the conference officials still wanted to award the top four finishers in regular season play with an additional bye. Right now, the top four would be Notre Dame, NC State, FSU and Duke...and SMU, Pitt and Wake Forest would be staying home.

The order and standings in conference are probably going to change, with most teams having eight conference games left to play. Notre Dame still has NC State, Duke ,FSU and another game with the Cards left on their schedule and that NC State game in Raleigh looks to be the most likely one to put a "L" on the Irish's record. if anyone can at all. Jared seems to thnk UND will be out next National Champion. Based o what i saw when the Irish came to town and played and beat the  Cars, he may not be wrong. They are deep an talented and Hildago and Miles may be the best 1-2 scoring punch in the DI realm. . 

The Cards still have three of the top four on their schedule (Notre Dame, FSU and Duke) and could create a few ripples in the standings should they pull off wins. it's way too early for speculation, but, that never stopped me before, i am going to predict Louisville is one of the top for teams in the league at the end of regular season ACC WBB play and gets a double bye for the CC #BB tournament. 

We'll have more on the standings as we get closer to tournament time...

paulie

 

ACC WBB Tourney Begins Today !! -- WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 

CARDS WBB HAS SOME QUESTIONS TO ANSWER THIS WEEK

Ah, yes..it's  ACCTournament time. if you have neverr been, you have to put it on your "must do" list, especially before it leaves Greensboro for Charlotte. 

This year, it does appear to be a wide open tourney with no clear favorite. A quick look at our contest shows we have four diferent predictions for the champ...from your entries...at 9 p.m. when i was writing this Tuesday.

MAKE SURE AND GET THOSE ENTRIES IN BY NOON TODAY! Leave them in the comments section or e-mail them to cardinalcouple@twc.com or to eupherjared @gmail,com .  Remember the prizes go to first and second place and we have a $25 gift cards to Cracker Barrel or Applebee...you choose...and a gracious "thank you!" to those restaurants for giving us the cards. 

It is a wide open tournament, by most accounts, And, Louisville does have a chance to take this thing, don't you dare think they don't, but it is going to be a tought task, and, they might have to face Boston College, who almost beat them in Beantown, 

Louisville needs to play like they did against FSU and not like they did against Notre Dame in this tournament. We hope that Syd Taylor is knocking down threes, "O" and the forwrads are killing it on the boards and we can avoid these quarter-long collapses. 

I wish i could be there live, but still not quite up,... physically... tor the five days of basketball and the trip up and back. I am aiming on next year.being in attendance 

Can the Cards WBB pu together a win streak that gets then through Thurs, Fri, Sat  and Sun? 

Can someone step up and take over this tournament on offense for UofL?

These are the things we'll be lookng for.

So, get those picks in. Jared will provide updaes each day and i will verify those results.

Action starts today, 1 p.m..on ACCN with Clemson and Boston College going at it. . 

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more sports...

The UoffL softtball game was canceled yesterday because of the rain that never came, They are rescheduled to face Arizona at 5:30 today at Ulmer, pending on rain. of course. 

Also. LAX plays Cincinnati in Cincinnati AT NOON TODAY., We'll have the results, plus ACC Tourney results in tomorrow's column. Y'all make sure and come back. 

paulie