JMO, I wouldn’t count out Louisville yet. The other three, yes.
The rest of their conference schedule isn’t daunting, they’ve had close losses, and they have a tiebreaker win over SMU.
This is also the first season with 9 conference games (although BC, UNC, Clemson, GT, & FSU only have 8) so multiple two loss teams being in the running for 2nd has to be taken into consideration.
If you count UVA’s loss to Nc State last year as a conference game, 6 acc teams had two in conference losses. I’d expect something similar to go down where this picture won’t be clear until post-Halloween.
Two teams with only eight conference games that intrigue me are GT & UNC. Through ten games, Duke was 5-5 (4-2). Through six games, Duke was 4-3 (3-1). Through four games, they were 2-2 (1-0) Maybe GT is this year’s Duke? Maybe that’s UNC?
So my teams of interest are GT, UNC, VT, and Louisville.
Like everybody else said, Wake and SMU are the favorites to get there. I’m more doubtful of SMU much more than Wake.
Wake is the easy answer. Yet, Jake ****ert has never won more than 8 regular season games in his previous four full seasons as a HC. He has never finished above .500 in-conference. And his team is one of most penalized in the country. He’s already won two really close games, still, I think his luck runs out as 4 of the remaining 6 conference games are road games; and Duke + UVA at home shouldn’t be cakewalks on papers. I see 2+ more losses somewhere down the road.
I think NC State and UVA have the most favorable schedules left. UVA’s tiebreaker being FSU bodes well for them. I just see a scenario where UVA only loses one more game. Will drop at least one of the road games and another at home. This is a 3 or 4 win conference team imo.
NC State’s schedule lines up nicely if they beat Wake Forest Saturday. No Miami, No SMU, and already beat Louisville who beat SMU. Dave Doreen has coached at NC State since 2013, and has never been to an ACC championship. I don’t expect that change now either.
