The ACC is perceived to be down this year.
The metrics and math guys seem to hate the ACC, there are real questions about just how many teams from the conference will get into the NCAA tournament, and some national analysts wonder if the ACC has any teams who will make the "second weekend" once the tournament begins.
Heck, the narrative is so loud even players from other leagues, like West Virginia's Erik Stevenson, have openly begun to parrot it and say silly things about it.
"Like Pitt, they're winning the ACC right now. We go into the ACC and win the league by five games. There's no question about it. There's nobody even in that league that could play in our league," Stevenson said Friday leading up to Texas Tech's visit to Morgantown.
"Maybe Miami, maybe Pitt if you want to say that, but I think they're just having a good conference year."
Stevenson's claim that WVU would win the ACC by five games probably wouldn't be viewed as the joke that it is if the Mountaineers didn't just lose at home to the worst team in the Big 12. West Virginia has now lost three in a row by a combined 52 points, and looking ahead, if the Mountaineers aren't careful they might end their season on a seven-game losing streak.
But yeah, we are supposed to believe the ACC is so bad that the Mountaineers would win it by five games. Maybe Stevenson will be able to prove the strength of the Mountaineers when they play Notre Dame in the first round of the CBI.
Pitt coach Jeff Capel has been asked several times over the past week about the perception of the ACC being weak. For the most part, he has stayed away from the narrative and just basically said the league is strong and the perception is wrong.
On Monday he was asked again, and this time he took aim at ACC Network as being a part of the problem of the perception of the league.
"I don't really get it. You look at the success we've had in the NCAA tournament, the ACC/Big Ten challenge, what our guys have done nationally as far as coaching/players/talent/draft picks, it's more than anyone," Capel said. "I was watching the ACC Network, 'Is the perception a reality that the ACC is down?' I never see that on the Big Ten Network. I watch that a lot because one of my best friends coaches in that league, and they always pump the Big Ten.
"I think it's a really good league, but I think ours is, too. I wish the people who represent us would have the respect, pump our league and be positive instead of looking at negative things."
Capel is correct that ACC Network exists to promote the ACC and its members, as do all of these league-owned networks. I didn't see the conversation in question, but I can't imagine that it is a conversation that has been frequent and more importantly wasn't spun in a way to shed the best possible light on the ACC.
And let's be honest, the people watching ACC Network in large part are fans of the ACC and its members, so I hardly think whatever they said is hurting the perception of the conference across college basketball.
All of these discussions are useless and a waste of time. The beauty of sports is simple — once the games begin, the only thing that matters is the actual games. All of the outside noise is just that — noise.
I don't think that NCAA tournament performance is the be-all, end-all measure of a conference's strength or weakness, but I don't think it is meaningless, either.
The ACC teams can prove, at least on some level, that the conference was stronger and deeper than perceived by winning in March. Just go win. Stop talking about it, stop trying to fight against a perception that isn't likely to change, and go win games in March.
If the second weekend of the NCAA tournament begins — meaning it is down to the Sweet 16 — and there are four or five ACC teams still standing, nobody is going to care what the perception of the league was in January. And if the ACC gets a couple of teams to the Final Four like last season, it will render all of these conversations moot.
Conversely, if the second weekend begins and all of the ACC coaching staffs are on the golf course or formulating their recruiting strategy for next season, well, then it suggests the current perception of the league was fair and correct.
Again, the beauty of sports is that you eventually get a chance to prove yourself when it matters. Some ACC teams will have that chance next month, and at that point it will be time to either put up or shut up.
Until then, however, these discussions about the relative strength of the conferences are all background noise and are not terribly meaningful.
