THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, October 30, 1995 TAG: 9510300142
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY FRANK VEHORN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: GREENSBORO LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
Normally the ACC is a basketball league brimming with superstars. Maybe no league has ever twinkled as brightly as the ACC did last season, either. Stars were everywhere.
There were Stack and 'Sheed, Joe and Randolph, Cherokee and Junior. All stars. And all gone.
This season the ACC can only claim to having more question marks than any other league.
Or, as Florida State coach Pat Kennedy said as he gazed around the interview room on Operation Basketball Sunday, ``There is a story everywhere you turn.''
As if the media did not already know, Kennedy began ticking off the dramas that might replace sheer athletic brilliance in ACC-land this winter.
``How will Duke do with Coach K back? Can Carolina recover from losing Stackhouse and Wallace to the NBA? How effective will Tim Duncan be at Wake Forest without Randolph Childress? Will prize recruit Stephon Marbury jump to the pros after only one year at Georgia Tech? Can Maryland and Virginia withstand the pressures of being picked so high?'' Kennedy said.
Good questions, and everyone was talking about them Sunday. The real fun starts in less than a month, when they start trying to answer them on the court.
Drawing the most attention on talk day was Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, who missed most of last season because of a bad back. While he was away, the Blue Devils slipped from being a Final Four contender to finishing last in the ACC.
In other years, these long media days had been a pain in another part of K's body. But he was so happy to be back this time that he said he would have jumped and clicked his heels if he didn't have a sore ankle.
While last winter was full of pain and emotional misery for Krzyzewski, he said the break was something he needed to remain in coaching.
All those trips on the road to the Final Four, and two national championships, had burned him out.
Even success can get old, he said.
``I wasn't coaching any more,'' he said. ``I was responding to the success we'd had in the past and to the success we were anticipating in the future. It wasn't fun anymore.''
Krzyzewski said he needed time off to step back and reflect.
``If that (absence) hadn't happened, I would not be coaching much longer,'' K said. ``Now I see myself coaching for a very long time.''
But, will Coach K's return alone be enough bring the Dukies back to the national spotlight?
``Absolutely not,'' K said. ``Hopefully my presence will help, but I didn't do it alone when we were going to all those Final Fours, either. We had great players.''
Right now, Duke has good players who Krzyzewski hopes to mold into great players.
Good players, not great ones, are the norm in the league this season.
The only returning superstar is Wake Forest's 6-foot-10 junior center Tim Duncan, who might have been the NBA's No. 1 draft choice if he had joined others in bailing out early.
``I knew I wasn't ready mentally or socially for the NBA, so I was never tempted by the money,'' Duncan said.
Duncan doesn't think he can cruise through this season, though, especially with Randolph Childress taking his jump shot to the NBA.
Maryland has so many good players, including four returning starters, that the Terps were picked by the media to finish No. 1 without Joe Smith.
Wake Forest was picked second, its highest pick since 1982.
Following the Deacons were Virginia, North Carolina, Duke, Georgia Tech, Florida State, North Carolina State, and Clemson.
It was the lowest pick for the Tar Heels since 1985 and the lowest for Duke since 1987. ILLUSTRATION: ACC POLL
[For a copy of the poll, see microfilm for this date.]
by CNB