LOS ANGELES — Armando Bacot and his North Carolina teammates were listening when the quality of Atlantic Coast Conference men's basketball was bashed this season, and they've added it as a chip on their broad shoulders.
Ever since Zion Williamson left Duke for the NBA in 2019 after one season, "I feel like the respect for the ACC just in general kind of went down," Bacot said.
Well, the league is having the last laugh in the NCAA tournament so far.
Besides Bacot's top-seeded Tar Heels and sixth-seeded Clemson (23-11) in the West Region, No. 4 seed Duke (26-8) and No. 11 seed North Carolina State (24-14) remain in the South, which will play its regional semifinals Friday night, along with the Midwest.
This is the 13th time the ACC has had at least four teams in the Sweet 16.
"Most ACC programs are playing a high-level nonconference schedule, too, so I think that really plays a factor," Bacot said. "I feel like other conferences might not be as strong or they're kind of manipulating it in a way. Hopefully everyone sees after this year how competitive ACC basketball is and how good the teams are."
The Tar Heels (29-7), who missed the tournament last year after finishing as runners-up in 2022, will try to prove it against fourth-seeded Alabama (23-11) on Thursday. CBS will televise the matchup, which is slated to tip off at 9:39 p.m. Eastern.
ACC teams went 8-1 during the first week of the NCAA tourney, the most of any league, with the victories coming by an average of 18.4 points per game. The league received five bids, with only Virginia exiting so far — although quickly, with a loss to Colorado State in the First Four.
Alabama and Tennessee — the No. 2 seed in the Midwest, which will play its regional semifinals Friday in Detroit — are trying to help the Southeastern Conference be able to boast of quality in the later stages of the tourney, if not quantity. The SEC matched the Big Ten in having eight teams in the NCAA's 68-team field, more than any other conference, but only the Crimson Tide and the Volunteers are still around after the SEC lost five teams in the first round and Texas A&M fell in overtime in the second round to Houston, the South Region's top seed.
For the Tide, the challenge against the Tar Heels might include playing without senior guard Latrell Wrightsell Jr., who is still being evaluated for game readiness after sustaining a head injury in Sunday's second-round win against Grand Canyon. Alabama coach Nate Oats said after practice Wednesday that he wasn't sure if Wrightsell, who has started 11 of the past 12 games, would be available Thursday.
"I think we'll still have a great game plan, if he plays or not," Tide forward Nick Pringle said. "We have a lot of great players and a lot of great coaches that can make adjustments and be able to make it happen."
The ACC has continued to outperform other leagues in recent NCAA tournaments. Miami reached the Final Four last year, Duke and North Carolina were there in 2022, Virginia won the title in 2019 and the Tar Heels were champions in 2017.
"I just think that there's great parity in our league," Clemson coach Brad Brownell said. "I think because we have a lot of different styles of play in our league that, when we get to the NCAA tournament, we've kind of seen everything. Our teams adjust and we seem to play very well this time of year."
Thursday's first game pits second-seeded Arizona (27-8) against Brownsell's sixth-seeded Tigers. Clemson played Sunday night in Memphis and got back to campus in South Carolina at 3:30 a.m. Monday; the Tigers started their journey to the West Coast about 12 hours later.
"Yesterday was a little challenging. We practiced, but it wasn't easy," Brownell said Wednesday. "Just trying to get our legs back, just get used to the time change and all of that. It's been a quick turnaround, that's for sure."
The Wildcats, wrapping up their time in the Pac-12 before joining the Big 12 next season, played their first two games of this NCAA tourney in Salt Lake City, then made the short trip from Tucson to Los Angeles.
"But just because you had an extra day or a few extra hours doesn't mean you have a significant advantage this time of year, because the other team's really good," Wildcats coach Tommy Lloyd said. "They're playing for something as well."
AP photo by Ashley Landis / North Carolina forward Armando Bacot stretches during practice Wednesday as the Tar Heels prepare for Thursday's Sweet 16 game against Alabama in Los Angeles.Rematch in East
BOSTON — University of Connecticut coach Dan Hurley won't shy away from the notion that his team has consistently been the best this season. The Huskies' 33-3 record and the dominant manner in which they have won along the way have proven that.
He also knows that means next to nothing as they return to the Sweet 16 still four victories away from becoming the first team since Florida in 2007 to repeat as the NCAA tournament champion.
"We're not going to be able to trade that in for anything tomorrow night versus the team we faced last year in the finals," Hurley said Wednesday as his team prepares for its East Region semifinal against fifth-seeded San Diego State (26-10), the same program it beat 76-59 last April to improve to 5-0 in NCAA title games.
"But we bring the confidence," Hurley continued. "We believe. We think we're supposed to win these games."
The Huskies have reason to feel that way, having won each of their first two games of this year's tourney by an average of 28 points.
At last year's final in Houston, they jumped out to a 16-point lead and never let San Diego State get closer than five points in the second half. Thursday's rematch is at TD Garden, the home of the NBA's Boston Celtics and just 85 miles from UConn's campus in Storrs.
"We've got to do what they did to us," Aztecs coach Brian Dutcher said. "We're in their backyard now, and hopefully we'll have an opportunity to beat them close to their home."
In the other East semifinal, second-seeded Iowa State (29-7), which has the best defensive rating of the remaining teams, faces No. 3 seed Illinois (28-8), which boasts the top offensive rating, according to Ken Pomeroy's efficiency ratings.
Both are also among six remaining Sweet 16 teams with Final Four appearances but no titles, and Iowa State's only national semifinal trip was 80 years ago.
Illinois, which is past the second round of the NCAA tourney for the first time since a national runner-up finish in 2005, has been relying on its unorthodox "booty ball" offensive actions, aimed at getting different postups and matchups.
It also revolves around the comradery of a group that wasn't above embracing luck as it entered a venue adorned with shamrocks.
When senior forward Coleman Hawkins walked into the news conference along with teammates Marcus Domask and Quincy Guerrier, he noticed their name placards were in an order different than where they sat in their previous media sessions. He quickly changed them.
"Superstitious?" the moderator asked.
Replied Hawkins: "Little bit."