2014 NCAA ACC MEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT INFO:
Location: Greensboro, NC
Venue: Greensboro Coliseum
Games: TBD
Dates: March 12 - 17, 2014
ACC Tournament Bracket
Recent ACC Basketball Tournament Championship Winners:
ACC MEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT
The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) Men's Basketball Tournament is one of the most popular collegiate sporting events in America and boasts some of the oldest rivalries in the sport. The winner of the event receives an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. The tournament began in 1954, a year after the conference was created, and the first championship game pitted North Carolina State against Wake Forest. The finale was won by N.C. State 82-80 and kicked off years of domination by schools in North Carolina. For the first 17 years of the conference's existence, the ACC Championship was won by a North Carolina college, with the lone exception coming in 1958 when Maryland upset North Carolina to take its first title.
In its early years, the ACC Men's Basketball Tournament was predominantly controlled by North Carolina colleges, but there was a degree of parity that left the championship game in doubt. In the late 1960s, the University of North Carolina went on an unprecedented run. With players like Michael Jordan, Bob McAdoo, Phil Ford and Sam Perkins, the Tar Heels took the ACC title six times between 1972 and 1982.
In the 1990s and 2000s, the conference expanded with the arrival of Miami, Boston College, Florida State and Virginia Tech, but the event's results followed a similar pattern from the past. The tournament shifted hands from the Tar Heels to their rivals, the Duke Blue Devils. Duke would begin the longest championship streak in the tournament's history, winning each year from 1999-2003. Led by the second-highest scorer in ACC history, J.J. Redick, the Blue Devils were a model of team basketball. Though the team was shocked by the tournament winner Maryland in 2004, they won the title for next two years before North Carolina won back-to-back championships in 2007 and 2008.
With the arrival of basketball juggernauts Syracuse University and the University of Pittsburgh for the 2013 season, the ACC Men's Basketball Tournament has begun a new era of high-profile rivalries that is bound to create a few classics along the way. The tourney has now taken center stage in the conference championship pool as teams vie to win at-large bids and build up a resumé to make it to the NCAA Tournament.
More Links:
ACC Basketball Tournament Preview History