Virginia in firm control of ACC

The Atlantic Coast Conference’s stretch run looks more like a coronation than a race.

Second-ranked Virginia has all but wrapped up the league’s regular-season championship and could rise to No. 1 in the Top 25 on Monday for the first time since the Ralph Sampson era. The rest of the league is far behind — No. 16 Clemson is the closest at three games back — and playing for postseason positioning amid a jumbled mess in the standings with roughly three weeks left.

Consider: six teams are within two games of the second-place Tigers in the loss column, including No. 9 Duke, No. 21 North Carolina and No. 25 Miami.

“Somebody is going to come out of that pack,” Florida State coach Leonard Hamilton said after Wednesday’s loss to Virginia. “We hope that’s going to be us.”

The intrigue now is focused on who will claim the remaining top four seeds at next month’s ACC Tournament in Brooklyn and the double-round bye that comes with them.

At this point, that’s all anyone can hope for considering how well the Cavaliers are playing.

Virginia (23-1, 12-0 ACC) has won 15 straight games going into Saturday’s home game against Virginia Tech. A win over the Hokies would keep them on course for something that once seemed unthinkable: becoming an unbeaten regular-season champion.

Only eight teams have ever gone unbeaten through the ACC regular season, the last being Duke (16-0) in 1998-99.

“The guys have done a terrific job,” Virginia coach Tony Bennett said after his team rallied to win at Florida State on Wednesday. “Would I have thought we’d be 12-0 at this point? Probably not, but they’re playing the right way and they don’t quit, that’s for sure.”

There’s a bit of intrigue at the bottom of the league standings, too.

Pittsburgh (8-17, 0-12) is flirting with becoming only the seventh team to go winless in ACC regularseason play. Kevin Stallings’ Panthers have suffered 10 of their 12 league losses by double-digit margins and have failed to reach 60 points in nine of those games. AP