The ACC Gets A Sweet Tooth In March

This is the fourth time in five seasons the ACC supplied at least a quarter of the representatives in the Sweet 16. This year five ACC teams are in the regional semifinals, more than any other conference.

Until 2015 the league had gone nearly two decades without having as many as four teams survive two rounds of the NCAA tournament.

ACC entrants start knocking each other off on Friday night when Duke faces Virginia Tech in the 2019 East Regional.

The half-dozen Sweet 16 participants in 2016 were the most by any conference before or since, and marked the first time since 1995 the ACC sent at least 40 percent of its members that far in NCAA competition.

The percentage of participants in the Sweet 16 is a significant measure. The more quality basketball programs a league has, the greater its chance of getting NCAA bids and earning berths in the NCAA regional semifinals. The ACC’s greatest representation by percentage came in 1990 when four of eight teams, 50 percent, reached the Sweet 16.

In the decade between the ACC’s 2005 expansion to 11 schools, through 2014, when the league grew to 15 members, it sent no more than three teams to a Sweet 16 in any season. In both 2014 and 2017 a single ACC member – Virginia and UNC, respectively --got that far.

In the six seasons since the ACC added Notre Dame, Pitt and Syracuse, those newcomers made the Sweet 16 a combined five times, just once in the past three seasons – when the Orange, a First Four entrant, lost to Duke in the ‘18 Sweet 16.

Louisville joined in 2015 and immediately reached the Elite Eight but hasn’t been since. Notre Dame in 2015, when it won the league title, and 2016 advanced to the Elite Eight. Syracuse got to the Final Four in 2016, defeating Virginia before losing to UNC, the eventual champ.

Expansion also put an end, at least temporarily, to a remarkable ACC streak.

For 27 straight years – from 1980 through 2006 – the conference annually sent at least two teams to the Sweet 16. North Carolina was the sole ACC survivor to get that far in ’07. Also in ‘08. Duke was the lone ranger in 2010, advancing all the way to capture the national championship with a veteran-laden lineup.