NCAA Basketball: 5 biggest takeaways from 2020-21 initial NET rankings

NEW YORK, NY - MARCH 8: The NCAA Basketball Tournament Selection Committee meets on Wednesday afternoon, March 8, 2017 in New York City. The committee is gathered in New York to begin the five-day process of selecting and seeding the field of 68 teams for the NCAA MenÕs Basketball Tournament. The final bracket will be released on Sunday evening following the completion of conference tournaments. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images) /

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Roy WilliamsNorth Carolina Tar Heels (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images) /

2. ACC has just one team ranked in the top 20

In the preseason, Duke was one of four ACC programs ranked in the top-25, along with Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida State. The conference was supposed to be right along with the Big Ten in terms of top-tier strength but so far has fallen below the Big 12 and even the SEC.

Right now, there’s only one team from the ACC with a top-20 NET ranking, which is the Clemson Tigers at No. 15. They’re there on the strength of some solid non-conference wins, including over Alabama, Purdue, and Mississippi State. The rest of the conference didn’t collect many quality non-conference victories, especially those who were supposed to be at the top.

After Clemson, Syracuse (25), Louisville (33), Virginia Tech (34), and NC State (38) round out the top-40 for the league. Among the other notables are Virginia (45), Florida State (60), North Carolina (64), and the previously mentioned Duke Blue Devils at 115.

The saving grace for the ACC is that while the Big Ten is very likely to get 10-12 bids and the Big 12 is on track for another six, the other conferences don’t look very strong either. And with the Ivy League not playing this season, that means another at-large bid will be up for grabs. Considering how many from the ACC are projected between the 6-11 seed range, they’ll be thankful for that this season.

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