Maryland has lost two basketball recruits, one transfer and another recruit has yet to academically qualify, leaving coach Gary Williams with possibly nine scholarship players for the 2008-09 season (the NCAA allows 13).

Williams insisted he wasn't finished recruiting the Class of 2008 but as the Baltimore Sun points out, there aren't many warm bodies left in this class.

Tip to all ACC coaches: triple-team Greivis Vasquez.

Last basketball player at Maryland, turn the lights out.

Shane Walker, a reserve forward as a freshman for the Terps, has transferred to Loyola (Md.). Walker joins recruits Gus Gilchrist, a forward, and Tyree Evans, shooting guard, to leave the program this offseason.

Walker, a 6-10 forward, appeared in 24 games and averaged 0.5 points and 1.0 rebounds per game in 2007-08 but the Terps were already losing senior forwards James Gist and Bambale Osby.

Is it possible this is the same program that won the national title six years ago?

Maryland losing basketball recruits like road trips to Miami. Forward Gus Gilchrist was granted a release from his scholarship by the Terps on Wednesday.

The Terps parted ways with juco guard Tyree Evans earlier in the spring.
Both Evans and Gilchrist, a top 60 recruit from the Class of 2007, were expected to play major minutes for Gary Williams.

=> Read more!

Troubled basketball recruit Tyree Evans won't be Gary Williams' salvation after all. Evans, 23, who has been arrested four times and served an abbreviated jail sentence for marijuana trafficking, told the Terps last week he wants to play elsewhere.

Maryland's decision to recruit and sign Evans caused quite a stir on the campus and with both the mainstream media and internets.

Given Maryland's deficiencies at shooting guard, he could have helped right away.

• Wake Forest and N.C. State
• Boston College and Clemson
• Florida State and Maryland
• Va. Tech and UVa
• Miami and Ga. Tech
• UNC and Duke

If you thought the ACC was bad last year, or the year before, or the year before ... brace yourself for 2008. The league could be even worse, if that's possible.

Attrition, either through the NFL Draft, graduation or suspensions, has hit the division champs, Boston College and Virginia Tech, hard.

Traditional powers Miami and Florida State, who went a combined 12-13 in 2007, are no longer reloading but out-and-out rebuilding. FSU is doing so with the handicap of an academic scandal.

The ACC, and Coastal Division in particular, is so bad that Duke could equal its combined win total since 2004 before October ends.

=> Read more!

2007 record: 7-6, 4-4 ACC

Returning starters: Offense 7, Defense 7.

Quarterback?: Yes. Drew Weatherford (9 TDs, 3 INTs)

Avoid in the ACC: Duke, UNC, UVa

Coaching situation: Bobby Bowden enters his 33rd season at FSU as the all-time winningest coach in I-A history (373 wins in 42 total seasons) but with pressure to recapture the program's form from the 1990s. At 78, Bowden won't be fired but he might be asked to resign if the Noles post a third straight 7-6 season.

Second-year offensive coordinator Jimbo Fisher has been designated Bowden's successor, the head-coach-in-waiting.

"I'm on a one-year basis now," Bowden said. "I'm still the head football coach, nothing has changed there. As I've looked at the end of my career, you wonder how you're going to retire. It has been a relief for me."

=> Read more!

When the ACC spring meetings begin Sunday at Amelia Island, Fla., discussions of expanded conference scheduling will not be limited to basketball.

Also under review will be the possibility of going to a nine-game league format in football. Under the current system, ACC teams play eight conference games. Each school in the two six-team divisions — Atlantic and Coastal — play the other five division members plus three from the opposite division.

Should a nine-game format be adopted, each team would play four games against teams from the opposite division.

=> Read more!

While Tyler Hansbrough was busy "celebrating the crap" out of the end of the semester, SI's Luke Winn was busy analyzing Maryland's decision to add Tyree Evans to its basketball team.

In the agate type of the transactions, Evans appears to be another junior-college transfer rounding out a recruiting class but Winn's piece on SI.com proves otherwise.

Evans, a shooting guard who averaged 21.1 points per game for Motlow State Community College last season, arrives at Maryland with two felony charges on his resume and an 11-month suspended prison sentence, of which he served two weeks, according to the SI article.

=> Read more!

Thursday, Aug. 28
Jacksonville State @ Ga. Tech
Charleston Southern @ Miami
N.C. State @ South Carolina
Wake Forest @ Baylor

Saturday, Aug. 30
Boston College vs. Kent State (@ Cleveland)
Alabama vs. Clemson (@ Atlanta)
James Madison @ Duke
Delaware @ Maryland
McNeese State @ UNC
USC @ UVa
Va. Tech vs. East Carolina (@ Charlotte)

=> Read more!

N.C. State football coach Tom O'Brien spoke Wednesday with News & Observer reporter Chip Alexander. For the full transcript of the interview, click here.

Here's what O'Brien had to say about the Pack's loss to Maryland:

N&O: You’ve had time to analyze the 37-0 loss to Maryland to end last season. What happened?

O'Brien: “I think some guys folded their tents and went home, quite frankly. I don’t think you can get beat like that without having some guys thinking the season was over.

"That’s why I give the kids a lot of credit. They could have done it after the Florida State game [a loss that dropped the Pack to 1-5]. I tell the story, standing on the sideline at the end of the game, I’m standing next to Darrell Blackman and John Dunlap and I said, ‘Listen, we’re not that far away from winning. You’ve got to hang in there and you’ve got to stay with us because I think there’s some things we can do to really help us. You have to believe in it and make sure all the seniors stay on board and believe in it.’

=> Read more!

North Carolina will play Michigan State at Detroit's Ford Field and Duke will play at Purdue in next season's ACC/Big Ten Challenge.

As expected, N.C. State will be left out of the made-for-TV event for the first time because it finished last in league play. The Big Ten features 11 teams; the ACC has a dozen.

The schedule:

=> Read more!

Two North Carolina women's basketball players were selected at the end of the first round of today's WNBA Draft, although the order is somewhat surprising. N.C. State's Khadijah Whittington and Duke's Wanisha Smith went in the second round.

LaToya Pringle went 13th to the Phoenix Mercury, while Erlana Larkins was picked by the New York Liberty as the last pick of the first round.

=> Read more!

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) — Jonny Flynn had 23 points to lead four Syracuse starters in double figures as the Orange advanced to the quarterfinals of the NIT with an 88-72 victory over Maryland Thursday night.

Arinze Onuaku added 14 points and 14 rebounds for Syracuse (21-13), which will play the winner of Saturday's second-round matchup between Massachusetts and Akron. Paul Harris added 19 points and Donte Greene tossed in 16.

=> Read more!

AP photo

CHARLOTTE (AP) — Tyrese Rice scored 17 of his 19 points in the second half and Boston College snapped a six-game losing streak with a 71-68 comeback win over sloppy Maryland on Thursday in the first round of the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament.

Rakim Sanders, with 13 points, was one of four other players in double figures for the 11th-seeded Eagles (14-16), who rallied from an 11-point second-half deficit to advance to play third-seeded Clemson on Friday.

James Gist scored 19 points and the Terrapins (18-14) shot 52 percent but committed 21 turnovers to end their NCAA tournament hopes.

=> Read more!

Today's topic: Joe and Tudor preview the ACC tournament.

Staff video: Rob Roberts, Tim Lee, Joe Giglio and Caulton Tudor.

• ACC Now: The Podcast archives