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Midseason report
By Mike Ogle, Special to CNNSI.com Halfway through the conference season, the ACC's teams have accomplished at least one thing: beating up on each other. Now that all nine teams have reached the midpoint of league play at eight games, none is undefeated and the middle of the pack is crowded. No. 4 Duke (19-1, 7-1 in the ACC) leads the way, as expected, after handling North Carolina on Jan. 25 in overtime. The Blue Devils lone loss on the year came at No. 15 Clemson (15-4, 6-2) on Dec. 9. After the top two spots, the word parity takes on new meaning as four teams are tied for third-place at 4-4 in the conference. Surprisingly, Maryland (13-6, 4-4) and Florida State (12-6, 4-4) currently get the slight advantage over Virginia (13-8, 4-4) and UNC (10-8, 4-4) by merits of their overall records. Charlene Curtis' Wake Forest squad has managed to get itself out of the ACC cellar by picking up three conference wins. The Demon Deacons (11-8, 3-5) have not won more than six games in the ACC since 1988. With losses Jan. 25, N.C. State (11-8, 2-6) and Georgia Tech (10-8, 2-6) fell to the bottom of the pack. The No. 22 Wolfpack have been ranked as high as 12th in the country this season, but has lost six of its last eight games. Clemson looks to tame Blue Devils againThis week's marquee matchup will surely come Sunday afternoon when the Tigers travel to Cameron Indoor Stadium for a rematch.If Clemson wants to have a shot at winning the league's regular-season crown, repeating its early-season 93-75 thumping of Duke would be a good start to the second half of the season. Sophomore Chrissy Floyd torched the Blue Devils for 23 points and grabbed six rebounds in that win. Freshman Alana Beard led Duke in the loss with 18 points, 10 rebounds and four assists. Luckily for Clemson, Beard will be out of commission for Round Two. She went down with a dislocated thumb Jan. 18 and is expected to miss another 2-3 weeks. Since Beard went out, the Blue Devils have squeaked by Virginia and North Carolina. They'll have to step it up a notch if they want to get by the Tigers, winners of four in a row and 14 of its last 16. Floyd, Wimbush take weekly titlesClemson's Chrissy Floyd earned the first ACC player of the week honor of her young career last week by averaging 18.3 points and 5.3 rebounds in league victories against Virginia, Georgia Tech and Florida State.She hit 23 of 50 shots from the floor in the contests and notched her first career double-double against the Cavaliers with 20 points and 11 rebounds. The guard is second in the conference in scoring at 17.8 points a clip, sixth in field-goal percentage (.476), seventh in steals (2.1) and ninth in assists (3.2). Maryland's Kiki Wimbush won an award that Floyd took home two times last season -- rookie of the week. Wimbush scored a career-high 17 points and had seven assists in a win against Wake Forest. Against Georgia Tech, Wimbush's jumper with 3:19 remaining gave the Terrapins their first lead of the game and helped them to the win.
Mike Ogle is a reporter for The Daily Tar Heel, the student paper that serves the University of North Carolina.
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