My Take on Wake - MTOW’s All-ACC Team

MTOW’s All-ACC Team

In that I cover Wake Forest, I didn’t see a great deal of ACC basketball this season—at least not a great deal I would recognize as such.

But if you will forgive my blissful ignorance, I’d like to lay my All-ACC Teams and conference superlatives on you before they’re announced shortly.

My two rules of thumb in picking these are a) lean heavily on conference-only statistics and b) don’t make your call until all the games are played. I seen players honored after loading up against the lesser lights on the schedule and I’ve seen many a first-team lock in mid-January who I barely consider for honorable mention by early March.

So without further adieu:

First team
Nolan Smith—Duke
Jordan Williams—Maryland
Reggie Jackson—BC
Iman Shumpert—Georgia Tech
John Henson—UNC

Second team
Malcolm Delaney—Virgina Tech
Harrison Barnes—UNC
Kyle Singler—Duke
Jeff Allen—Virginia Tech
Demontez Stitt—Clemson

Third team
Tyler Zeller—UNC
Reggie Johnson—Miami
Joe Trapani—BC
Tracy Smith—N.C. State
Corey Raji—BC

Coach of the Year
Roy Williams—UNC

Player of the Year
Nolan Smith—Duke

Rookie of the Year
Harrison Barnes—UNC

All-Freshmen
Harrison Barnes—UNC
Kendall Marshall—UNC
Travis McKie—Wake Forest
Terrell Stoglin—Maryland
C.J. Lesie—N.C. State.

It bears noting that I put great weight on team success, which at least in some ways explains the picks of Henson for first team, Barnes, Singler and Stitt for second team, Raji for third team and Williams for COY. But I’m not intractable about it, which is why I had Shumpert—who was absolutely fabulous in all areas for an distant also-ran—as first team.

I imagine I’ll catch the most flak for going with Henson over Delaney for first team, and that’s more than OK. What good are these teams for anyway other than to stir up discussion, and I’ll be expecting to hear your teams as well over the next few days. But my reasoning goes as following:

Henson, in conference games only, ranked second in the ACC (behind Williams) with 10.6 rebounds a game and led the conference with 3.4 blocks a game—one per game more than anybody else in the league. He, more than anybody else I saw, changed how the games were played, and was probably the best defensive player in the ACC. And his team is seeded first in the ACC Tournament.

Delaney averaged 18.7 points in league play, third in the conference. So it’s really hard to leave him off. But he didn’t shoot as well against ACC competition (40.7 percent) as he did against non-conference teams (43.8 percent) and he was only 11 of 28 in the two late losses to BC and Clemson. He probably wore down, considering his conference-high 38.8 minutes a game.

As in most seasons, there are more than five players probably deserving of first-team honors. But the rules only allow for five, and I’m going with Henson over Delaney (who I really like as a player) because Henson’s team finished first and Delaney’s team finished sixth.

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By Dan Collins on 03/07/2011 (1:23 pm)

Comments

I have become increasingly distrustful of rankings given that they can often be overally impacted AAU participation where the emphasis (objective) is more on individual stat stuffing, launching threes from everywhere and highlighting individual athleticism (i.e dunking exhibitions) than building the skills necessary to be a winner. The difficult thing is that most of these kids are far more athletically gifted than the kids they are playing against until they get to college and then they find out there is more to it than just being talented….. now the college coaches are having to teach them the very basics of the game…..which for a kid that has been told all their life that they are on their way to the NBA can be diffiuclt to do.

More and more of these highly ranked kids show up with no concept of defense other than trying to block every shot into the next time zone, no real inside go to move other than a thunder dunk, no mid range game, no ability to get open without the ball in their hands, anemic foul shooting…...an let’s not get into the idea of position either as a rebounder or posting up people down low. A lot of this is stuff they used to teach in high school and junior high…..the fastest way to find your butt on the bench was to let anybody go take the baseline on you!

Obviously, it’s not true in every case but these days I think a recruiter has to dig a lot deeper than the number of stars to find/ attract real winners.

Deacon23 on 03/08/2011 (4:35 pm)

The star+# system is not perfect, but I believe all enterprises need measuring sticks. Some 2-stars do great, while some 5-stars(see Walker,etc)are a flop.That’s how things go.

I would feel better if we had gotten commitments from 4-star PG Ogbueze and 4-star PF Harrell(who committed to VaTech)rather than the two commits we got last week.

Jerry on 03/08/2011 (11:41 am)

Sounds like Bz is trying to recruit players that will just be happy to play ACC ball. This goes back to my comment before. It appears he only know one style of coaching. This recruiting class appears to be an attempt to get him back to his comfort zone. Recruiting average players, with the hope of making them better. My concern again with Bz is that great coaches can coach different talent levels (which may come with different personalities and backgrounds). Based on the events of this season, this does not appear to BSA strength of his. This strategy that he appears to be taking may take several years to execute and assuming he is successful should our expectation be a CO like season, which Bz like to take credit for who is at best a NCAA bubble team this year or the Air force team he coached that many years ago that he likes to take credit for ( his one and only NCAA appear) that lost in the first round. I feel bad for the current players on the team that do not fix Bz mode (especially those with potential) for these are the ones that will pay the biggest price in this case.

Frank II on 03/08/2011 (12:25 am)

Dan,
You will probably have a hard time choosing the Rookie of the Year the next two seasons since Bzdelik is really loading up on 2-star players.

I am underwhelmed at the two 2012 commitments made last week to go with the stellar 2011 group. It appears Bzdelik has given up on players that are wanted by schools other than Marshall,Liberty,etc.

Sounds like we will have to go the Europe or Australia route to get a quality big man for 2011 0r 2012.

Bz is recruiting like Odem…except Odem could coach and develop players that were under the radar.

Jerry on 03/07/2011 (7:30 pm)

DC, I actually do put some stock in rankings, but I don’t worship at the altar of Telep and Gibbons like some others do. But in general I wait to until the recruits arrive before making any hard and fast judgments. I’ve been proven wrong so many times before, and I have no trouble admitting it. I do think there remains an alarming need for size and muscle.

Dan on 03/07/2011 (6:00 pm)

Dan,

Do you see any future All-ACCers coming out of the 2012 recruiting class?! It looks like we stole one guy from Colorado, UNCG and UNCW. Powerhouses! And one guy, we stole from… no one.

But seriously, I put zero stock into recruiting rankings, and part of the reason some of these kids weren’t highly ranked was because we signed them so early. But I’d be interested to know what these two new guys might bring to the table. Thanks.

DC on 03/07/2011 (5:09 pm)