ACC/B1G Challenge preview

ACC/B1G challenge this Tuesday and Wednesday.  Here's what you need to know going into it.

Tuesday:

Indiana at Syracuse - IU lost on a neutral to UConn and has a neutral down the road with Notre Dame.  Other than that, not many chances for quality wins outside of this one.  Syracuse won in Maui; they can start thinking about a top 2 or 3 seed.  This is the game you have to win to be up for one of those.

Illinois at Georgia Tech - Illinois is a light 7-0 without wins of real consequence (thanks to UNLV's slide).  This would have value for them.  Georgia Tech doesn't have a bad loss among their 3, but it's highly likely they need this to harbor serious bubble thoughts.

Penn St at Pittsburgh - PSU is likely going nowhere; they'd have to win here to change that.  This game is of little help to Pitt, who's cruising along at 7-0.  They just need to kill time until N-Cincinnati comes along.

Michigan at Duke - Well, here's one way for Michigan to erase one of their losses.  Michigan also has Arizona at home soon as well - mindset has to be to get one of the two to be in play for a 1 seed.  As for Duke, after losing to Kansas and Arizona, they need a signature win for their own pursuit of a 1 seed.  Key game towards the top of the bracket.

Iowa at Notre Dame - Both teams expect to be in the tournament, both can easily survive a loss for now, but a win would be nice.  Nothing new to add here.

Florida St at Minnesota - Good road test to find out exactly where FSU is at.  They can afford a loss, but a win really adds an extra degree of heft to the resume (pure road win).  This is Minnesota's last real chance to do significant things in the non-con; this is likely mandatory.

Wednesday:

Maryland at Ohio St - Free shot for Maryland at a signature win.  OSU will be looking to just hold serve.

Wisconsin at Virginia - Wisky has shot out to 8-0 with a couple good wins.  Adding a pure road win would really change the outlook from "protected seed" to "top seed" in a hurry.  Also big for Virginia.  In the end if they split home games with VCU and Wisky, that'll look mighty fine on the resume.

Northwestern at North Carolina St - Whatever.

North Carolina at Michigan St - Well, this would be one way to erase those bad losses for UNC.  As for MSU, it's all about fortifying your position on the top line from here on in.

Boston College at Purdue - BC is terrible.  Nothing of note here.

Miami at Nebraska - Neither team is going anywhere in this matchup either.  That's 3 of them in the Wednesday session.

Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, and Clemson have the event off.  Nobody will miss them.