With one weekend left in the ACC’s regular season, the standings are chaotic.
This is what we know: Miami, Louisville and Florida State are in; Pittsburgh, Boston College and Duke are out.
The other eight teams? This is how they shape up. Click on the table for a larger image.
Because three teams are eliminated and 10 of the 14 make the tournament, the league is basically shaping up as a six-way race for the last five spots.
With more than half the conference still in contention, the possible outcomes are too numerous to list.
The easiest way for the Hokies to make the tournament — at least in terms of requiring the least amount of outside help — is by sweeping Pittsburgh.
Using the nifty chart, it’s also pretty simple to see that if the Hokies have at least as successful of a weekend as Virginia or Wake Forest in terms of number of wins, they will be in.
The Hokies have the tiebreaker over Virginia, but Wake, GT, UNC and Clemson hold the tiebreaker advantage over Tech.
The Hokies/Wolfpack tiebreaker is yet to be determined. It will depend on whether Virginia or Wake Forest finish higher in the standings (it’s all complicated).
Because Tech’s series final versus UNC was rained out, it has one fewer game played than Virginia, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, and Notre Dame.
Depending on the finish, that’s either an advantage or a disadvantage.
I will be at Tech’s practice this week and will have a story after that. Tech needs to keep its head down, play baseball, win games and on Saturday night look up and hope you did enough.
Matchups (Thursday – Saturday)
Virginia Tech (12-14) at Pittsburgh (7-20)
Virginia (12-15) at North Carolina (13-13)
Georgia Tech (13-14) at Miami (19-8)
Notre Dame (15-12) at Boston College (9-17)
Wake Forest (11-15) at Duke (8-18)
Clemson (13-13) at Florida State (17-10)
Louisville (23-4) at NC State (13-12)
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Wasn’t UVA highly ranked at the beginning of the season? I hate it for them. Well, not really.
Why is the word “still” in the title? Take it out and it gives a more positive tone.
Also, shouldn’t it read: “…the league is basically shaping up as an eight-way race for the last seven spots.”? (Feel free to delete this comment after updating.)