Can Duke run the table in ACC Play? Does it matter?

Tar Heels next test

Halfway home. Ten down, 10 to go.

Can Duke go undefeated in ACC play this season? Probably not. But no one else has a chance.

And people do seem to be talking about it.

So, let’s go to the scorecard.

This is the ACC’s 72nd season. Only eight teams have gone undefeated in regular-season ACC play. It is not easy. Obviously, no one has ever had to win 20 games. Even less easy.

Here’s the list.

1957-North Carolina, 14-0, won ACC Tournament, won NCAA title.

1963-Duke, 14-0, won ACC title, lost in Final Four to Loyola

1970-South Carolina, 14-0, lost in ACC Tournament title game to NC State;no NCAA Tournament.

1973-NC State, 12-0, won ACC Tournament, on probation, season ended

1974-NC State, 12-0, won ACC Tournament, won NCAA title

1984-North Carolina, 14-0, lost in ACC Tournament semifinals to Duke, lost in Sweet Sixteen to Indiana

1987-North Carolina, 14-0, lost ACC Tournament title game to NC State, lost in Elite Eight to Syracuse

1999-Duke, 16-0, won ACC Tournament, lost in NCAA title game to Connecticut

So, five of these eight teams subsequently won the ACC Tournament, four made the Final Four, two couldn’t play in the NCAAs and two did not make the final weekend.

Interestingly, the 1984 North Carolina team that included Michael Jordan, Sam Perkins and Brad Daugherty is the only one to not make the ACC Tournament title game.

Lots of star power falling short in Mike Krzyzewski’s first great Duke win.

Speaking of star power, every one of these teams had at least one All-American. Sure, they had great complementary players but great complementary players need even greater players to complement.

Lennie Rosenbluth (1957), Art Heyman (1963), John Roche (1970), David Thompson (1973, ‘74), Michael Jordan (1984) and Elton Brand (1999) were all selected ACC Player of the Year. Rosenbluth, Heyman, Thompson in ‘74, Jordan and Brand were all national players of the year.

Kenny Smith-yes, he had game--was first-team All-American in 1987 but finished second to Clemson’s Horace Grant in ACC POY voting.

Some of those complementary players were pretty good. Perkins joined Jordan as first-team All-America, while Heyman had Jeff Mullins, Thompson had Tommy Burleson and Brand had Trajan Langdon.

Having an elite talent doesn’t guarantee an undefeated season but a sample size of eight suggests elite talent is a necessity.

Cooper Flagg, check that box.

NC State is the only team to go back-to-back. They only had to win 12 games, as that was the period after South Carolina had left the ACC and before Georgia Tech joined. Still, 12-0 meant two wins over Maryland (Tom McMillen, John Lucas, Len Elmore) and North Carolina (Bobby Jones, George Karl in ‘73), two teams that spent most of those two seasons ranked in the top-10.

Eight other ACC teams lost only once in ACC play. That includes the 2018 Virginia team, which went 17-1, losing only to Virginia Tech, 61-60 in overtime, in Charlottesville.

This was the Virginia team that infamously lost to Maryland Baltimore County in the NCAAs.

Still, 17 wins remains the ACC record.

Duke had four of those one-loss teams. The 1954 team only played 10 conference games in the ACC’s first season. The loss was 96-89 to Wake Forest.

The 1964 Duke team almost went back-to-back, falling to Wake Forest 72-71. Duke sandwiched that 1999 team with two 15-1 teams. But the 97-73 loss to North Carolina in 1998 and 98-87 to Maryland in 2000 weren’t especially close.

One final thought before closing the history book. The ACC has won 14 NCAA titles. Only two of those went to teams undefeated in ACC play. Duke’s five champs went 11-3, 12-2, 13-3, 13-3 and 15-3 in ACC play.

Points to be gleaned? Really tough to accomplish, only really good teams have done it, doing it isn’t always an indictator of March success and Duke has bigger fish to fry.

Starting Saturday when the Tar Heels come to town.