ACC Countdown Preview

#1. North Carolina

Games against 2009 NCAA Tournament teams: 13

Best non-conference game: Dec. 5 at Kentucky

Projected Starting Five:

F - Ed Davis (Sophomore)

F - Deon Thompson (Senior)

F - Will Graves (Junior)

G - Marcus Ginyard (Senior)

G - Larry Drew (Sophomore)

Common sense says there is no way UNC can win the ACC again this year. Gone from last year's team: Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington, Danny Green -- all drafted into the NBA. I scoffed when I saw media predict they would finish as high as #3 in the country this year. And while I still think that's a bit too optimistic, when you sit down and look at the ACC teams, Carolina once again has the most talent.

What Carolina does have back this year is a terrific talent in Ed Davis. He was somewhat buried on the depth chart last year, but you could tell when he got into a game he was something special. Davis, along with the very solid Deon Thompson, make up the best frontcourt in the ACC. The backcourt is a little more suspect. I'm not sold on Larry Drew as a starting point guard. I don't think he's that good of a scorer. And paired with Marcus Ginyard, who is a great player but also not a big scorer, points might be hard to come by from the outside. I'm also not sold on heralded recruit Tyler Zeller, who looked out of place when he came back from injury last year.

One thing that will help Carolina is their out-of-conference schedule. They have some very tough games that will help the team establish some cohesiveness. Carolina will probably lose a few games early in the season (they've already played two games against relatively weak opponents and won both). But when it comes to the conference season, they should have a year in the 11-5 range that might be enough to finish on top.