From what I can tell from the UVa twittersphere, I was in the minority of UVa fans last night hoping that the Hokies would beat the Miami Hurricanes. Well, the Canes did take care of business, as all four of the conference's top seeds moved on to the next round of games. Now the Hoos avoid all those scary VT fans and play a team with more talent and more rest - a team, like the Hokies, with which the Hoos split the regular season series.
Game 1: #1 UNC vs. #4 Notre Dame (7pm, ESPN/ACC Network)
Who would UVa rather play tomorrow night if they get passed tonight's game? UVa won both regular season contests against these teams this season and in convincing fashion. Both teams present plenty of matchup issues, but against UVa, I'd say Notre Dame's star players played much worse than UNC's. That said, the Irish are playing fairly well recently and the game against the Hoos was well early into the year. While neither Marcus Paige nor Brice Johnson had good games against UVa either, I'd give the overall talent mark to the Heels for sure. In terms of coaching, you've got to go with Mike Brey in my opinion, but Tony Bennett's had his number over the recent years regardless. On paper, to me, this is a push. Either team could beat UVa - while the Hoos could also easily handle either one as well. With nothing objective to rely upon, I'm going to go with the subjective reasons: no one likes Carolina. Verdict: Cheer for Notre Dame.
Game 2: #2 UVa vs #3 Miami (9pm, ESPN/ACC Network)
Let's go Hoos.
Disagree about the Heels/Irish? See a noticeable advantage for one over the other? Use this thread for pre game discussions and chatter during the games!