ACC Basketball during the Swofford era - StateFans Nation StateFans Nation

After seeing Wake Forest lose to Wofford, Florida State lose to Princeton and BC lose to Rhode Island, I started wondering what the ACC looked like when Swofford became the commissioner and how that compared to the mess we are seeing today. Swofford became the commissioner in 1997.
Here are where the ACC teams in the 1997 NCAA basketball tournament.
Maryland 5th seed
Duke 2nd seed
UNC 1st seed
UVA 9th seed
Wake Forest 3rd seed
Clemson 4th seed
All but UVA ended the regular season in the top 25.
There are currently 2 ACC teams in the top 25.

At the end of the 1997-1998 season the ACC had three schools in the top ten of the RPI and an average RPI rating of 43.5
Right now the original nine ACC teams have one team in the top ten and an average RPI rating of 86.3. If you add the three new members the average drops to 96.1.

Since the RPI is not “fully connected” in 2011-2012, at the end of the 2010-2011 season the ACC finished with two teams in the top ten in the RPI and an average RPI rating of 91.8. Here are the ACC teams who made the 2011 NCAA tournament (including all 12 teams).
CU 12th seed
UNC 2nd seed
Duke 1st seed
FSU 10th seed

28 Responses to ACC Basketball during the Swofford era

runwiththepack 01/04/2012 at 4:03 PM #

Gene, you make good points. I am just talking hypotheticals when I say if NCSU were as bad this year (if this were Sendek’s 16th season at NCSU) as Arizona St. is now, then we would be 2-11, or whatever.
That ignores that Sendek would probably have been fired already. (Or would he, since Harden (?) took AZ to the sweet 16, i think.) But just to illustrate how bad of a season AZ St. is having, I use the hypothetical that we would be 2-11 now if Sendek were here.
My question remains unanswered. I’m not asking Gene, but anybody who can say – was Sid Lowe on the original list of coaching targets?
Or was he a sort of afterthought when Fowler bombed out on all the coaches on his list? That’s how I remember it, but may be wrong.
TruthBKnown Returns 01/04/2012 at 4:17 PM #

^I think Sid was on the search committee, and ended up “saving the day” when Fowler bungled the whole thing. But I’m going by memory. Hopefully I didn’t just pull that out of a hat.

I still appreciate Sid taking the job and trying. It’s not his fault that he was in over his head.
runwiththepack 01/04/2012 at 5:58 PM #

Truth, I, too, try not to forget that detail. Now, Lowe may not be able to get a job at a small college, which is where nearly all rookie coaches get started. Hopefully Lowe is happy in the pros, and his career in the NBA will blossom. Promoting assistants to head coach is considered a foible by many – hiring someone who doesn’t even have experience as an assistant is a prescription for you-know-what.

I remember when it was announced that Lowe was hired. I thought to myself “he doesn’t have ANY college coaching experience”. Crossing the fingers didn’t work.