Bleacher Report - Articles by Zach Smith

ACC Football: Bowl Woes Don't Make a Woeful Conference

Zach Smith — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 11:01:00 -0500

Criticism of the Atlantic Coast Conference has been rampant in the last few days, after Virginia Tech’s Orange Bowl loss to Kansas marked the seventh straight bowl defeat for ACC representatives.

But is this criticism deserved?

Overall records for ACC teams have been almost identical to records of the other major conferences in recent seasons. This year, for example, the ACC had two teams win 10 or more games, and three more that won nine. Only the Big 12 and SEC had more than two teams with 10 wins, and every BCS conference had exactly five teams with nine or more wins, except for the Big East with four.

On the other end of the spectrum, every BCS conference has one team with three or fewer wins, except for the Big 12 with two and the Pac-10 with none.

Those numbers indicate that the ACC isn’t significantly better or worse than any other BCS conference. Since the expansion to 12 teams in 2005, the ACC has ranked second, fourth, and this season fifth (pre-bowls) in the Sagarin conference rankings.

The best teams in the conference may not often finish in the national top five like the best teams in other conferences, but to place that highly in the Sagarin the ACC has to have strong teams finishing in the middle of the pack.

The ACC has obviously been in decline, but to say, "You’d be hard pressed to prove that [any BCS conference] comes close" to being worse than the ACC seems like a stretch.

If the primary reason for knocking the ACC is bowl records the last few seasons, then I have a question: Why do people put so much stock in bowl results?

I understand the temptation to ascribe bowls great importance. They're games played against a good opponents from other conferences—something most teams haven’t had since September.

If bowl games are really so important, then Oklahoma is one of the worst football programs in the nation, as the Sooners lost four straight BCS bowl games (two Fiestas, one Sugar, and one Orange).

But no one says Oklahoma is a bad football program...so why would anyone say the ACC is a bad football conference?

Notre Dame, meanwhile hasn’t won a bowl game since the 1993 Cotton Bowl, but until this awful season no one would call ND a bad program.

The truth is that bowl games aren't good measures of teams or conferences. Really, they’re just glorified exhibition games.

No other major sport, either amateur or professional, requires teams to take a month off before playing their most important games of the season. After such a long break, the rust is obvious—consider the numerous penalties, mistakes, and “what the heck was that?” type of plays seen in these games.

The only way to fix the problem is to play the games closer to the end of the season. The obvious solution is a playoff, but that dead horse needs no more beating at the moment.

If the eight Big East teams had been matched up against the top eight ACC teams on December 9th, the ACC would have won at least five of the games. West Virginia would have beaten Virginia Tech, UConn-Boston College would have been a good game, and maybe the Big East would have stolen one or two others.

How can anyone say the Big East would have fared any better than that?

Against other conferences, the ACC probably loses more than they win, or maybe splits—but that still doesn’t make it the worst conference in the nation.

West Virginia was certainly a great football team this season, but they beat Big East co-champion UConn 66-21 at the end of the season. How is that an indication of a strong conference?

It would be foolish for me to argue that the ACC is the best there is. Clearly the conference has struggled recently, especially with the demise of Miami and Florida State—but that doesn't mean the ACC champ doesn't deserve to go to a BCS bowl.

Last season, Wake led Louisville 13-10 with 13 minutes left in the game. The year before that, it took Penn State three overtimes to beat Florida State by three. This season, Virginia Tech only lost by three as well—so it isn't like the ACC is consistently being blown out in January.

Even for all of its bowl losses the ACC isn't a bad conference, and its regular season numbers prove it. I'm confident that no team in the nation goes into any bowl against an ACC team expecting to waltz out with an easy victory.

It's too strong of a conference for that.

This article can also be found on Smith's blog, the Old Gold & Blog

Wake Forest vs. Presbyterian: Final Thoughts, 70-58

Zach Smith — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 15:27:24 -0500

A win is a win.

That's really the only way to look at last night's game against the Presbyterian Blue Hose.

Although the Deacs came out strong for the first ten minutes of the game and jumped out to a 16 point lead, all the fire suddenly disappeared—and

for the next twenty minutes of basketball the Deacs looked as bad or worse than they have all season long.

Some energy seemed to return to the team for the final ten minutes—perhaps when the team realized they were actually in danger of losing a game to a team they had no business losing to.

But still, a win is a win.

Watching a basketball game on ACC Select is not the easiest thing to do. It's great because you are getting a live representation of the game, but its awful because you really don't get to watch a basketball game the way I like to watch a basketball game. It's impossible to see what's happening on the floor and really analyze the play, so you're really stuck with watching the score and the emotions of the players on the floor.

Other than L.D. Williams, I don't think you could say there was any emotion from the Wake Forest. That's not entirely surprising, considering the opponent and what seemed to be one of the worst crowds I've ever seen at the Joel (also not surprising).

The Deacs just weren't up for this game, and it showed in their performance. I saw plenty of lazy defensive plays and sloppy offensive decisions. The Deacs were asleep at the wheel.

Thankfully, something changed with about ten minutes left and the Deacs went on a little bit of a run. The defensive intensity picked up a little bit and guys seemed to make sure to take good shots on the offensive end.

In the end, a 12-point victory in this game isn't going to make any difference. It was a game we were supposed to win, and when the NCAA selection committee looks at this game at the end of the season, they won't pause over a 12-point win over Presbyterian. I guess you could say "No harm, no foul."

No one had overly impressive stat lines last night, although James Johnson scored 18 points, and Ishmael Smith had an interesting line, with 7 rebounds, 11 assists, 0 points and 0 turnovers. Other than that, I think I've said all I need to about this game. We won, it's over, and we can start focusing on BYU.

Funny how a game like this one brings out all these basketball clichés. Oh well.

Wake Forest: Meineke Car Care Bowl Champions!

Zach Smith — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 21:52:46 -0500

After a slow first half start, the Demon Deacons found a way to turn everything around in the second half, scoring 24 unanswered points to beat the Connecticut Huskies 24-10.

Wake Forest scored on a long Josh Adams touchdown run of 38 yards, a 21 yard touchdown pass from Riley Skinner to John Tereshinski, a Sam Swank 42 yard field goal, and finally put the game out of reach with a nine yard touchdown run by senior Micah Andrews.

Except for one unfortunate fumble inside the five yard line, the second half was a thing of beauty for the Deacs. The defense, which only allowed a field goal in the first half (UConn's only TD was a punt return), played well all day long, and the offense began completing drives in the second half (which was the only thing that seemed to be missing in the first).

Although I was frustrated with the score at the half, I felt that Wake was definitely the better team on the field. Unlike UConn, Wake seemed capable of making big offensive plays, and I enjoyed seeing the Deacs stretch the field vertically today more than they have all season.

Nothing made me more happy than Micah Andrews getting to score a touchdown on the last play of his career. It's been a tough couple of years for Micah, and to see him go out on such a high note was really nice. Congrats to Micah on a great career at Wake—I wish him the best in whatever he does next (sounds like it will be something theatrical).

ACC Rookie of the Year Josh Adams struggled at times today, although the real issues seemed to be more a lack of holes than a lack of running prowess. He did finish with 81 yards on the ground, including one beautiful 38 yard touchdown run, and I know he will be a huge part of Wake's offense for at least two and hopefully three years to come.

Riley Skinner had a pretty solid day himself, completing 29 of 38 passes for 267 yards, the most he's had all season. His touchdown throw to Tereshinki was beautiful, and he should have had another to Kevin Marion.

One thing I love about our offense is that it allows for days like today where Riley finds 10 different receivers. Spreading the ball around like that really keeps a defense on its toes. Although the interception was not a particularly good throw, Skinner had a typically effective day, and once again proved that he's the man for the job here at Wake Forest. Hopefully the coaches will be more willing to continue throwing the ball down field next year after Riley and the offense's performance today.

Alphonso Smith moonlighted on the offensive side of the ball today and had three catches, one of which went for twelve yards. I don't know if this is something we'll see regularly next season, or if it was one of those Bowl Game Special type of moves, but I enjoyed seeing the coaching staff trying to find more ways to get him involved. Although he didn't add to his interception or TD totals today, he played a strong game, and I'm more than happy that we can expect to see him in Old Gold and Black one more time next year.

Kenny Moore also deserves recognition for his 11 catches today, which gives him the ACC record for most receptions in a season with 98. Congrats, Kenny, on a great record and an incredible senior season.

The defense played solidly as a whole, sacking Tyler Lorenzen twice and hurrying him on several other occasions. UConn picked up 115 rush yards, but considering that the rush is the strongest part of UConn's offense, I'd say that's a pretty good day. Stanley Arnoux played a great game, grabbing an interception on a tipped ball at a crucial point.

With the win, Wake improves to 9-4 for their 2007 campaign, and has now won twenty football games in the last two years. I know long time Wake Forest fans never thought they'd hear something like that, and it truly is a thing of beauty.

Coach Grobe looked characteristically stoic on the sidelines all day, and barely even cracked a smile until well after the game was over. He did a great job guiding the Deacs all season long, and it calms me greatly to be confident that he'll be back on the sidelines in 2008.

The published attendance of today's game was 53,126. I was hopeful that this number would end up being a little bit higher, but seeing the endzone parts of the upper deck made it clear that the game was nowhere near sold out.

Wake fans were definitely out in force, and several times the "Wake" "Forest" chant could be heard on TV. I will say that I think the MCCB makes a big mistake by not selling the midfield seats to the participating schools. Corporate sponsors who had those seats did not turn out in great numbers, and it was very strange to see the middle of the lower deck looking as spotty as did.

If Wake ends up playing in Charlotte in the future, I hope they fix this issue. Although there did seem to be a reasonably good UConn turnout, I can proudly say that the stadium definitely seemed dominated by Deacon fans.

That's all I've got for now. It was a great afternoon to be a Deacon fan—and this should leave a very nice taste in our mouths until next August rolls around. Who knows, if the cards fall the right way, we could end up in the top 25 when the final rankings are announced, which would certainly be a solid accomplishment.

I'm sure there will be some decent follow up over the next few days, but for now we should all jus enjoy a beautiful win.

Congratulations guys—you make Wake Forest fans everywhere proud to be Deacons!

Update: I somehow failed to mention Kenny Moore's record, so I fixed that. My apologies, Kenny.