ACC Roundup - No Word On Okogie But Strangers Things Pops Up

The Louisville paper’s Jake Lourim does a standard short form ACC preview and finds Duke at the top. He’s a bit more pessimistic about Wake Forest and Clemson than we are and doesn't seem to have heard about Josh Okogie’s injury. He also makes no mention of Boston College at all.

Did we mention it was short form?

The Roanoke paper picks Duke too.

Speaking of Okogie, Tech still hasn’t released much information about his injury and when he might be back.

Virginia is going to rely on guard Kyle Guy. Will the cocky, man-bunned freshman be ready to embrace the Pack Line as a sophomore? He’s talented but he didn’t quite fit Tony Bennett’s ideal last season.

Our friends over at Streaking The Lawn had some fun comparing ACC teams to the cast of the Netflix hit Stranger Things.

If you haven’t seen it, it’s a bit like the JJ Abrams film Super 8 and if you haven’t seen that either, then both are about kids realizing that aliens are in town and about to cause major problems, only the adults (darned the adults!) don’t understand everything and are basically in the way.

It’s not a new idea but the show has a great feel and spin on things. And we might add that the show runners and creators Matt and Ross Duffer grew up in Durham and are among the most prominent graduates of Jordan High (we were quite surprised to learn during the recent campaign that Carly Fiorina was also a Jordan graduate).

They grew up in the area between Duke and Chapel Hill as we understand it, near Duke Forest, and it seems to have influenced the show.

Let’s just say that anyone who grew up in Durham or Chapel Hill will recognize lots in Stranger Things, particularly in the way the land looks. The houses could come right out of Durham.

One of the minor things we noticed in Season 2 is that they referred to a river as the Eno.

Unfortunately it’s in Indiana but it’s a cool tribute nonetheless.

Anyway, our STL friends drew some pretty keen comparisons: BC got Will Byers, Clemson got Bob and Georgia Tech got one of the coolest characters on the show, Dustin Henderson who, despite outwitting monsters and the US government and being a keen part of monster suppression, still has trouble getting a partner at The Big Dance.

UNC got Dr. Brennan, who does terrible things and gets away with it all while Duke, surprisingly, got a cool character: Eleven.

Why?

Because: “Look, I know. No school says shadow monster more than Duke, but Eleven fits and you know it. Duke is the real power of the ACC, whether we like it or not. They’re unstable with change (as players depart for the draft season to season) and you never really know what you’re going to get, but they always come up with some last minute power and emerge victorious. Definitely use rage to help performance.“

We can live with that. Beats UNC/Brennan. And in a way Elle looks like Duke great Bobby Hurley who wore #11, so it all fits.

If you haven’t seen the show yet it’s really good but not for small children or people who tend to have nightmares.

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