The ACC Tournament: How It Changed Game

WASHINGTON — When the ACC tournament first came to Capital Centre in Landover, Md., 11 years ago, it was a radically different event than it is now. In fact, the entire sport of college basketball has improved and changed greatly since then. That’s not an accident. One is linked to the other.

The impact, the ripple effect, of the ACC tournament has been enormous, so great we don’t notice it at times. When we look at the three biggest innovations that have rocked and shaped college basketball in the last decade--the mammoth 64-team NCAA tournament, the 45-second clock and the three-point shot--we don’t immediately think of the ACC tournament. But they’re connected. Without that ol’ ACC hoedown, it’s quite possible that none of these progressive steps would have come into existence.

Back in ‘76, the ACC tournament, even though it began when the league did in 1954, was still an exception in the sport, an event ahead of its time. The idea of playing an entire league season just so everybody could meet again in a tournament seemed daring and risky, perhaps stupid.

In those days, the NCAA tournament had just inched up from 25 to 32. One nightmare haunted every mind: The fate of the 1973-74 Maryland team. Tom McMillen, Len Elmore and John Lucas lost to North Carolina State and David Thompson, 103-100, in the ACC tournament final. Maryland’s season, and its entirely realistic hopes for a national title, came to an end.

Sure, the ACC tournament made huge profits, catering as it did to rich alumni, not students. And, yes, it was a social highlight of the year, full of color, school spirit, excitement and beer. Money and fun--a tough combo to turn down. Gradually, other conferences joined the fun. What the ACC had been doing since 1954 became the rage.

At the moment, only two leagues in America do not have an ACC-style end-of-season tournament--the Big Ten and the Ivy League. The Pac-10 just joined the party this season.

It’s no coincidence the size of the NCAA field grew dramatically--from 25 to 32, then to 40, 48, 53 and finally 64--as this multitude of ACC-like shebangs sprouted like mushrooms. Everybody wanted to have a fund-raising, hell-raising ACC tournament, but no school wanted to suffer Maryland’s fate. The compromise: Expand the NCAA field.

Almost every dinky little league in the nation started getting one automatic NCAA berth and (because it made financial sense) that invitation was usually given to the postseason tournament winner. Maintain suspense and keep everybody’s hopes alive until the last possible game.

It’s mostly an accident that the 64-team NCAA event has become such a mega-success--a three-week extravaganza with building suspense and hoopla that may rival the NFL postseason or the baseball playoffs and World Series as America’s premier annual spectacle.

If we turned the clock back to ‘76, when the ACC tournament finally came north from Tobacco Road (largely because of years of cussin’ and complainin’ by Lefty Driesell), we’d also see a different sport. The ACC set the tone of much of the nation’s style in college play back then. And it wasn’t all good.

Remember the aggravation of watching the four-corner offense year after year? And the exasperation of watching tiny guards throwing themselves backward onto the court to try to draw yet another bogus charging foul? Those were gifts to the sport from the ACC, and nowhere were they more prevalent than in the tournament when stakes were highest.

If one game, more than any, finally convinced the rank and file that a shot clock was essential, it was the 1982 ACC tournament final. North Carolina Coach Dean Smith, with Michael Jordan, James Worthy and Sam Perkins in hand, turned a nationally awaited showdown with Virginia and Ralph Sampson into a joke as he stalled all the drama out of what might have been a fabulous contest. North Carolina won, but the four-corners died.

Just as the four-corners grew to be widely despised, so the charging foul became one of the banes of the game. How could rule-makers unclog the lane and put the drive back in the sport? How could teams be punished for packing back in the lane with zone defenses?

The three-point shot was the answer, one that’s still being debated. The ACC tournament was not the only father of this rule change. But it was certainly one of them.

Changes in a system are often interrelated. That’s how it has been in college basketball. Without the proliferation of ACC-style postseason events, there would never have been a 64-team NCAA tournament. But without the new expanded NCAAs, there would never have been a three-point shot.

Why?

Because the three-point shot inherently breeds upsets. A couple of hot peashooters can undo the work of aircraft carriers. In the bad old days, coaches abhorred the thought of such upsets. It ruined their digestion. That sacred NCAA tournament was so select they’d do anything to get invited. Now, with 64 spots on the dance card, the big boys can relax. They’re going to get in if they’re any good at all. So, what the heck, let’s have some fun. Bring on the three-pointer.

This season college basketball has a fluke rule that’s probably never going to exist in its current form again: The 19-foot 9-inch three-pointer. By next year, betcha it’ll be 21 feet from the front of the rim. Someday we’ll look back and say, “They gave three-points for a jumper from the top of the circle? Why high school junior varsity kids bury that shot. A one-time-only chance to steal. Shooting 40% outside is like shooting 60% inside.”

One aspect of the ACC tournament never seems to change. Whatever the rules, whatever the trends of the day, Dean Smith always wins. Or almost wins. Or leaves the impression that he should have won. Or that it didn’t matter that he didn’t win because he’ll get further in the NCAA tournament than you will.

When the last beer cup has been stomped and the last cheerleader has done a final cartwheel, the smart money says North Carolina will have taken more three-pointers than any team--just as it has been first or second in that ACC category all season.

Sports evolve and rules change, but the same people stay ahead of the game.