Thursday, April 10, 2008

Elite talent missing from ACC in '07-08

Though the NBA draft isn’t the ultimate indicator of the strength of a particular college team or conference, it does reflect the amount of elite talent a league has.

If current draft projections hold true, the draft will show that elite talent was largely absent from the ACC in 2007-08. The ACC appears likely to have its worst draft showing since 2000, when Jason Collier of Georgia Tech was its only first-round pick and Duke’s Chris Carrawell was the lone pick of the second round.

As of Thursday afternoon, NBAdraft.net projected N.C. State freshman J.J. Hickson as the ACC’s highest pick with the second selection in the second round. No ACC player was projected in the first round.

The ACC has had at least one first-round selection in every draft since 1988. The conference still could have one or more, particularly if North Carolina’s Tyler Hansbrough, Wayne Ellington and/or Ty Lawson enter the draft. But even if they all enter, the ACC probably will be far short of the six first-round picks it had in 2007.

– Ken Tysiac

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

The ACC will reload next year and be very deep. UNC, Duke, Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, Miami, Clemson, Maryland, and Georgia Tech should all have a very good chance of being top 30 if not better. NC State also has talent if they can get everything together. FSU, UVA, and BC probably will be rebuilding.

The ACC will also be bringing in a lot of talent this year. Of the 24 McDonald's All Americans 8 will be in the ACC next year. There are also other very good recruits coming in that didn't make the McDonald's AA team.....Ty Walker and Tony Woods of Wake, Julius Mays and CJ Williams of NC State, Andre Young and Catalin Baciu of Clemson, Reggie Jackson of BC, Victor Davila of VT, etc. Maryland will be bringing in 3 studs also that didn't make any AA list....Gus Gilchrist, Sean Mosely, and Bobby Maze. The ACC will be loaded next year.