ACC 2025-26

[triaddukefan]

Zam Jones badly twisted her ankle and had to leave the game with Cal early in the 4th quarter. She will miss time. Meanwhile, it is official now that Lorena Awou has left the NC State team.

And joined Baylor 🙄

 

[FanInNC]

Zam Jones badly twisted her ankle and had to leave the game with Cal early in the 4th quarter. She will miss time. Meanwhile, it is official now that Lorena Awou has left the NC State team.

Nice win today without Tilda playing. Zam injured her ankle in the final minute no less! Heard she was in a wheel chair after the game but maybe that’s standard stuff out of precaution. Wes indicated he suspected it may be a situation where she has to miss a few games. Big blow for the Pack, she had been really playing well.

Opportunity for Quigley and Lunan to show what they can do.

And Awou to Baylor - kinda thought she may drop down to Southern Illinois, she had a sister going there. Figured she’d put up good numbers at a place like that and then move up a level again. She has the talent to succeed but has to get it straight between the ears.

 

[slug25]

Qadence played all 40 minutes. 13 pts, 6 boards and 3 steals.

 

[FanInNC]

Qadence played all 40 minutes. 13 pts, 6 boards and 3 steals.

Her best effort of the year. Was active on defense, crashed the boards, slashed to the basket, drew fouls … just a nice energy piece and disrupter on defense today.

 

[sivad40]

Notre Dame and UNC play Thursday; one of them will have 3 conference losses before the first week of January is over.

They play Sunday. UNC has the week off and ND plays BC on Thursday. The ND-UNC game is basically a regular season title elimination one.

 

[nwhoopfan]

With so many teams and unbalanced schedules, it's probably going to take a while to really make sense of things in the conference standings. 1-3 Virginia Tech is currently pounding 3-1 Syracuse, on the road. Some pretenders have managed to get off to good starts like the Orange and also UVa.

70-44 midway thru Q4.


edit--Syracuse is actually 13-2 for the season, but it's mostly a nothing burger. Wins against Utah and Auburn. Crushed by Michigan. Lost by 20 to Duke. Looking to top that margin today.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Okay, I still can't make heads or tails of this conference. Today Syracuse drilled Virginia on the road 79-60.

edit--whoa, Phelia went off w/ 38 points today, I keep forgetting she's w/ Cuse now; only averaging 12.5 ppg for the season but she was feeling it today.

 

[LETTERL]

Finally completely healthy for the first time in a month, all 10 Wolfpack Women scored in a 91-54 win for NC State over SMU. Zam Jones, who was out in Thursday's loss at Clemson due to an ankle injury, came off the bench to reach double figures (15). Leading scorer tonight was UCONN transfer Qadence Samuels, who scored a career high 16 points.

 

[FanInNC]

Qadence has been all over the place. Her last 3 games have been a roller coaster. I thought the Cal game was her best in a Wolfpack uniform. She followed that up at Clemson with her worst game of the year. And now set a new personal best against SMU.

She was a real spark tonight with energy, defense, rebounding and was highly efficient. 7-10 and 2-4 from 3. 2 of her misses she got her own rebound and scored.

Tilda and Khamil both had double doubles in limited action. Combined 12-16 from the field between them.

SMU is pretty bad. Didn’t really have much of anything that stood out on that team.

 

[FanInNC]

Okay, I still can't make heads or tails of this conference. Today Syracuse drilled Virginia on the road 79-60.

edit--whoa, Phelia went off w/ 38 points today, I keep forgetting she's w/ Cuse now; only averaging 12.5 ppg for the season but she was feeling it today.

I think the conference lacks high end teams so you get alot of weird results. There is a clear basement with SMU, Pitt and BC (GT, FSU and WF not far away) but the there isn’t a huge gulf between teams like Miami, Syracuse, Clemson, Va Tech, UVA, and Cal.

I still am holding onto my belief that Duke, State and UL will finish as the top teams when it’s all said and done.

 

[triaddukefan]

I think the conference lacks high end teams so you get alot of weird results. There is a clear basement with SMU, Pitt and BC (GT, FSU and WF not far away) but the there isn’t a huge gulf between teams like Miami, Syracuse, Clemson, Va Tech, UVA, and Cal.

I still am holding onto my belief that Duke, State and UL will finish as the top teams when it’s all said and done.

But Georgia Tech beat Clemson today...

 

[triaddukefan]

 

[FanInNC]

But Georgia Tech beat Clemson today...

Yep. I think those kinds of wins are what GT, FSU and even WF are capable of and what separates those schools from Pitt and BC.

GT is a weird one so far, they have played a couple of respectable teams : State and ND, a couple of bubble type teams: Clemson and UVa and a couple of bottom tier teams: WF and SMU. They beat ND, only lost to UVA and WF by a combined 3 points, beat Clemson and SMU and got dragged in Raleigh. Within the conference they have been pretty decent, but man outside of the conference they have had some ugly results.

Clemson is just an ordinary team. They have some pretty decent guards and multiple players can shoot it, but they aren't dominant athletically or physically. I think they are pretty well coached though from what I've seen.

 

[DefenseBB]

Basically what the ACC results show is a league of mediocre parity. Arguably the top team is Louisville, but they are an underdog at ND this week.

To me, only Louisville and Duke belong in any top 16 and host team consideration in the NCAAT. The rest of the season will play that out but the fact that some of the "blue bloods" of the ACC get throttled by middling teams just proves they are not elite worthy.

UNC, which is littered with McDonald's All-Americans, continues to underachieve and seems to choke in EVERY big game. NC State is very inconsistent, and ND is simply the "Hannah show" with a rotating cast of support players by game. I would be very sad if this conference garners 7 or 8 bids given how poor the teams have looked but given the state of the rest of the potential field, the ACC may get that many.

 

[triaddukefan]

Basically what the ACC results show is a league of mediocre parity. Arguably the top team is Louisville, but they are an underdog at ND this week.

To me, only Louisville and Duke belong in any top 16 and host team consideration in the NCAAT. The rest of the season will play that out but the fact that some of the "blue bloods" of the ACC get throttled by middling teams just proves they are not elite worthy.

UNC, which is littered with McDonald's All-Americans, continues to underachieve and seems to choke in EVERY big game. NC State is very inconsistent, and ND is simply the "Hannah show" with a rotating cast of support players by game. I would be very sad if this conference garners 7 or 8 bids given how poor the teams have looked but given the state of the rest of the potential field, the ACC may get that many.

Louisville is a underdog at ND? Which sportsbook is that? Asking for a old buddy

 

[DefenseBB]

 

[FanInNC]

Pretty much went as expected last night. UNC survives a scare from Miami, Duke holds serve at home against UVa, UL gets a big win on the road against ND.

Massive game this weekend in Raleigh with UL and State. If UL wins in Raleigh they would have wins on the road against UNC, ND and State. I think most people would assume Duke, UL, State, UNC and ND are the top 5 teams in the conference in some order. Going 3-0 against your main competition on the road would be an impressive statement for the Cards.

Stanford is probably another team you could throw into that same mix.

 

[LETTERL]

Pretty much went as expected last night. UNC survives a scare from Miami, Duke holds serve at home against UVa, UL gets a big win on the road against ND.

Massive game this weekend in Raleigh with UL and State. If UL wins in Raleigh they would have wins on the road against UNC, ND and State. I think most people would assume Duke, UL, State, UNC and ND are the top 5 teams in the conference in some order. Going 3-0 against your main competition on the road would be an impressive statement for the Cards.

Stanford is probably another team you could throw into that same mix.

It's hard to believe, but NC State has won 6 in a row against Louisville, heading into Sunday's big showdown.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE give us Ryan Ruocco and Rebecca Lobo for that one!

 

[FanInNC]

It's hard to believe, but NC State has won 6 in a row against Louisville, heading into Sunday's big showdown.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE give us Ryan Ruocco and Rebecca Lobo for that one!

Yeah I read that too, didn't realize it. HUGE game for the Pack moreso than UL. I think for UL if they win, it really puts them in fantastic position for the regular season title hopes - but it's not necessary. For State, after stubbing your toe against Clemson, you kinda have to win this one if you want to keep that dream alive.

State hasn't had to play the upper echelon of the conference really to this point, only Stanford really. I kind of think the ACC winner goes 16-2...maybe 15-3? State still has games @ND and @Duke as well as UNC and UL at home (plus they've proven to be vulnerable if not healthy against mid tier teams like UVa, Syracuse, VT etc). Getting UL at home needs to be a win. Tall task for the Pack, but a good chance to make a statement and put themselves back on the map in the national media and fans eyes.

 

[triaddukefan]

Pretty much went as expected last night. UNC survives a scare from Miami, Duke holds serve at home against UVa, UL gets a big win on the road against ND.

Massive game this weekend in Raleigh with UL and State. If UL wins in Raleigh they would have wins on the road against UNC, ND and State. I think most people would assume Duke, UL, State, UNC and ND are the top 5 teams in the conference in some order. Going 3-0 against your main competition on the road would be an impressive statement for the Cards.

Stanford is probably another team you could throw into that same mix.

As a Duke fan, is much rather play ND again then Stanford. Stanford is dangerous..

 

[TheFarmFan]

Stanford is probably another team you could throw into that same mix.

Next weekend will tell us a lot about where we're at after home games against UL and ND. If Tara was still our coach, I'd be feeling pretty good about ND, because she was about the best in the biz at taking away a team's plan A player and making them beat us with plan B. But I haven't seen us have quite as much success doing that under KP's watch. That said, our losses to Duke and Tennessee were both close until the final minute or two, so other than the NC State blowout and the bizarre FGCU facesplat, we've generally been competitive in every game we've played.

(and I owe you a response to your PM, coming this weekend when my insane schedule finally calms down!)

 

[cancontent]

Genius marketing idea. As a Canadian, I find this style of overall amusing and love how popular they are for the various NCAA programs. They're the equivalent of the Canadian tuxedo outfit. Acceptable anywhere 😉 😍

 

[WBBTakeover]

Duke fell behind by six points against Virginia at the beginning of the 4th quarter, but at no point did I actually think they'd lose to UVA because of Mox (and, by extension, Kymora Johnson--see below).

While I'm no fan of the way that Duke's guards have (or haven't) developed over the years, I can't help but to think that the UVA coaching staff is mismanaging Kymora in a way that borders on the criminal. I've said time and time again that I don't think that Kymora is a PG (she's more of a short SG who was pigeonholed into the position for reasons I won't get into here) because she doesn't have a feel for the position. When you look at someone like Raven Johnson, Olivia Miles, Tonie Morgan, Rori Harmon run the point, you can see that they have full command of their team more often than not. Kymora's been starting at PG for three years and I don't think she's any better as a PG now than she was as a freshman. She still doesn't fully know when to pass versus when to shoot. She hunts for assists rather than make the pass that may not lead to the assist (but is the right play). She still throws those wild, one-handed crosscourt passes that are almost always picked off. Very spotty defensive effort. Questionable shot selection, especially in what are deemed to be "big games". She's essentially a generational stat-padder for a team that's, at best, middle of the pack in a down ACC.

When I look at UVA's coaching staff, it all makes sense:

1. Not one coach with WNBA experience (playing or coaching).

2. All but one of the main coaches followed Mox from a previous stop (Missouri State or Michigan State).

3. ONE coach with any ACC experience outside of UVA--and he just got there this year. ZERO coaches with prior UVA ties.

Never forget that Mr. Reddit, a UVA alum himself, is paying $3 million over four years for this mess. Let's see how forgiving he is if the Golden Child decides to transfer out.

Fun fact: Mox's college coach (Coach Jack of Syracuse) holds a 3-1 record over her in ACC games since both entered the league in 2022.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Clemson beat Notre Dame. Didn't Muffet retire the last time that happened? Should we be expecting anything from Niele?

 

[triaddukefan]

Clemson beat Notre Dame. Didn't Muffet retire the last time that happened? Should we be expecting anything from Niele?

Clemson went 6-17 from the Free Throw line.... they tried to keep ND in the game. ND might be WNIT bound... but they would probably decline and end their season like the crybaby football team did.