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To the best of our knowledge - Al Featherston probably has a more refined sense of this - Maryland's whining about the conference being unfair dates back to the Lefty Driesell era.
As Maryland heads towards the exits, at least for basketball, the carping continues unabated.
Latest example: CSNBaltimore feeds into the paranoia by discovering that Maryland gets called for more fouls than any other ACC team. The writer, JP Finlay even concludes thusly: "Terps fans will tell you that Maryland has never gotten the best treatment from ACC referees. In their final season in the conference, the numbers seem to support the theory."
As we've said previously and more than once, if you have a conspiracy theory, you have to establish a motive and you have to figure out how it works. Rule #1: the more complicated it is, the less likely it is to work.
If we accept that the motive is to screw Maryland, then you have to consider how a conspiracy would work and who would be involved.
It would involve, at a minimum, the ACC offices, supervisor of officials John Clougherty and the conference officials.
For the ACC, currently embroiled in a multi-million dollar law suit with Maryland, it would be foolish in the extreme. For Clougherty, who built a superb reputation as an official, it's hard to imagine. And the officials all work other conferences as well. They're messing with their reputations, and therefore their income, if they participate.
We're looking at a conspiracy involving somewhere between at least 30-50 people. Just how do you keep everyone silent?
Maybe, just maybe, Maryland is getting called for more fouls than the other conference members because the team isn't very well coached and the players aren't as gifted and as fundamentally sound as some other teams in the conference.