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Spartans, Heels will go at it again
Familiar rivals will play tonight; N.C. State will also be in action
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Published: December 1, 2009
Once isn't enough for North Carolina and Michigan State. Twice isn't either.
The two will play each other for the third time in 12 months at 9 p.m. today in an ACC/Big Ten Challenge Series game at the Smith Center in Chapel Hill. The game will feature the teams from last season's NCAA Tournament final, which UNC won 89-72 at Detroit's Ford Field.
"It'll be like old-home week to see Tom (Izzo, the Michigan State coach) coming," Coach Roy Williams of UNC said.
UNC and Michigan State also played at Ford Field last Dec. 3, with UNC winning 98-63 in the ACC/Big Ten series. UNC is 6-1 this season; Michigan State is 5-1.
N.C. State and Duke also will play in the series, as the ACC attempts to win its 11th challenge and stay unbeaten in the overall competition. N.C. State will put its unbeaten record on the line at 7 p.m. today when it plays Northwestern in Raleigh. Duke, one of only two teams that has never lost in the series, will play at Wisconsin at 9:15 Wednesday. Duke is 10-0 in the series.
Michigan State returns four starters from last season, with Kalin Lucas, a junior point guard, and Raymar Morgan, a senior forward, leading the group.
Ed Davis, UNC's 6-10 sophomore center, said he wouldn't want to switch opponents in the series despite the familiarity that the programs are gaining with each other.
Davis is friends with Draymond Green, a sophomore forward at Michigan State, and they have talked frequently about the third game between their programs since they started college.
"I know they really want to beat us," Davis said. "If we lose to a team twice, we really want to beat them. I know they're really going to get after us."
Forward Deon Thompson of UNC is expecting Michigan State to play with playoff intensity to avenge last season's losses.
"I'm pretty sure they're going to be fired up and ready to come in here and take no prisoners," Thompson said. "We're just as excited as they are. We're going to have to have more ‘want-to' than they do."
The game will start the Tar Heels' toughest stretch of the season before ACC play. UNC will play at Kentucky on Saturday and will play Texas in Dallas on Dec. 19.
Williams is setting his playing rotation more firmly in anticipation of those games, and he stuck with his top six -- including reserve Tyler Zeller, a 7-0 sophomore -- in Sunday's 80-73 win over Nevada.
Thompson, Davis, Marcus Ginyard and Larry Drew all played at least 30 minutes.
"You've got to be able to produce," Williams said.
"I'm going to go by the seat of my pants. The guy who plays the best and does the job that I want at that specific moment is going to play.
"It was important to us (against Nevada) and will be important to us, but that doesn't mean that I'm giving up on some of those other kids. They've just got to be able to do it a little more consistently."
N.C. State (5-0) and Northwestern (5-1) have played once in the series, with N.C. State winning 74-47 at home in 2002.
Coach Sidney Lowe's team hasn't scored 70 points in a game this season but has shown an ability to grind out victories. One of N.C. State's last three wins was by two points; another was by seven.
Forwards Tracy Smith and Dennis Horner continue to carry a heavy workload. They are averaging a combined 30.6 points, almost half of the team's average of 66 points.
Duke (6-0) will be playing for the first time since winning last week's NIT Season Tip-Off in New York, and its size could cause Wisconsin problems.
Duke has outrebounded all six opponents and grabbed 25 offensive rebounds in a win over Connecticut in the NIT title game.
"We do run sets where our perimeter guys take shots," Coach Mike Krzyzewski of Duke said. "Our big guys are accustomed to knowing when those guys take their shots.
"We've been working a lot in trying to position ourselves in places where we might get that reshot."
Jon Scheyer is still proving more than capable at point guard after switching positions late last season. He scored 19 against Connecticut and was named the NIT's most valuable player, and he has had at least five assists in five consecutive games.
"He has a great feel for the game," Krzyzewski said.
"And because he's almost an automatic free-throw shooter, he's especially dangerous at the end of the game. He values the ball.
"And although he's not making a lot of great passes, he's not making hardly any turnovers. He's the most important player we have, just because he has to have the ball so much."
Wisconsin (4-1) defeated Maryland in its last game, 78-69 in a Maui Invitational consolation. Wisconsin made 10 of 22 3-point attempts in sending Maryland to a second consecutive loss.
ACC/Big Ten Challenge
Series records
ACC H A N W-L
Boston College 2-0 1-0 0-0 3-0
Clemson 4-0 4-2 0-0 8-2
Duke 3-0 3-0 4-0 10-0
Florida State 4-1 2-3 0-0 6-4
Georgia Tech 3-1 1-4 0-1 4-6
Maryland 5-0 1-1 1-2 7-3
Miami 0-1 0-2 0-0 0-3
North Carolina 1-3 3-2 1-0 5-5
N.C. State 4-0 1-4 0-0 5-4
Virginia 4-1 1-4 0-0 5-5
Virginia Tech 1-1 0-2 0-0 1-3
Wake Forest 5-0 3-1 0-0 8-1
BIG TEN H A N W-L
Illinois 2-2 1-2 0-3 3-7
Indiana 1-2 1-3 1-0 3-5
Iowa 2-0 0-3 0-2 2-5
Michigan 2-2 0-3 1-0 3-5
Michigan State 4-2 1-2 0-0 5-4
Minnesota 3-2 1-4 0-0 4-6
Northwestern 3-2 0-5 0-0 3-7
Ohio State 2-2 1-2 0-1 3-5
Penn State 2-3 2-3 0-0 4-6
Purdue 2-2 0-4 0-0 2-6
Wisconsin 2-1 1-5 1-0 4-6
Note: Home teams are 61-27 in the series, with the ACC 36-7 and the Big Ten 25-20. There have been nine "neutral site" games, with the ACC ahead 6-3.
Schedule
Monday
Penn State 69, Virginia 66
Tuesday
Wake Forest at Purdue, 7 p.m. (ESPN)
Maryland at Indiana, 7:30 (ESPN2)
Northwestern at N.C. State, 7 p.m. (ESPNU)
Michigan State at North Carolina, 9 p.m. (ESPN)
Virginia Tech at Iowa, 9:30 (ESPN2)
Wednesday
Illinois at Clemson, 7:15 (ESPN)
Minnesota at Miami, 7:15 (ESPNU)
Boston College at Michigan, 7:30 (ESPN2)
Duke at Wisconsin, 9:15 (ESPN)
Florida State at Ohio State, 9:30 (ESPN2)
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