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2008 ACC Football Recruiting Rankings
by Chris Coleman, TechSideline.com

Every year at this time, recruiting services like to come out with their list of rankings for each school's recruiting class. The Hokies did very well this year in the national rankings, as did several other ACC teams. Nine ACC schools finished in the Top 45 nationally when you average the rankings of Rivals.com and Scout.com.

The consensus is that Miami and Florida State signed Top 10 classes, while Clemson is very close to being Top 10. The Tigers actually had the #2 class according to ESPN, but you won't see them ranked that high anywhere else. Virginia Tech also did very well, finishing with a Top 20 class according to Rivals and Scout.

The two services disagree about several ACC classes. Scout has Boston College at #22, just two spots behind the Hokies, while Rivals has them at #33 and nowhere close to Virginia Tech. Still, it's a solid class for the Eagles.

On the other hand, Rivals obviously thinks much higher of Maryland's recruiting class than Scout does. Rivals ranks Maryland #32, while Scout has them at #52. If Ralph Friedgen is still recruiting the same type of players that he has in the past, that #52 could end up being more accurate.

Only three ACC teams failed to finish in the top half of Division 1-A in recruiting. Virginia and Wake Forest tied with an average of 61.5, while Duke brings up the rear as usual with an average of 67.5.

In a few years, we'll be able to look back and determine how accurate these ratings are.

Virginia Tech has completed nine of their 16 regular season ACC basketball games this year. They are currently 5-4 in the conference, despite playing six freshmen regularly. We can take a look at their statistics in ACC games to compare this year's team to last year's team.

The Hokies have improved a bit in a few categories, but overall their numbers are much lower than last year. They rank an average of two spots lower in the categories listed in the table above.

Tech is averaging slightly more points per game in ACC play this year. However, the ACC is a better offensive conference this year, so Tech's ACC scoring rank slips from sixth to ninth, despite the improvement.

Defensively, Tech is giving up 2.5 more points per game in ACC play, but they have moved up in the standings from fifth to second. As noted above, ACC teams are scoring more points this season.

The Hokies have also made a slight improvement in field goal percentage defense, and they've also moved up in the standings in that category, from fourth to second.

The only category where the Hokies have made more than a slight improvement is rebounding. Tech replaced Coleman Collins with a rebounding machine in Jeff Allen. Cheick Diakite is a good rebounder, and Deron Washington and A.D. Vassallo are arguably the best rebounding wings in the ACC. Throw in the emergence of J.T. Thompson, and that's a pretty good rebounding team.

Such an improvement in rebounding has partially made up for getting worse in other phases of the game. Tech's three-point shooting and overall field goal percentage have dropped off the face of the earth after the loss of Zabian Dowdell, and his departure has hurt free throw shooting as well.

The difference in turnover margin isn't as drastic as you might think. The Hokies were +2 on average last year, and -1 so far this year. However, that is showing signs of going up. In their most recent four games, Tech broke even against BC, was +5 against FSU, +3 against UVA and +7 against NC State. That's looking more and more like last season.

Tech is actually forcing more turnovers this year than last year. ACC opponents turn the ball over an average of 15.8 times per game against the Hokies this year, compared to just 12.8 times per game last year. However, VT is turning it over about six times more per game after the loss of Dowdell and Jamon Gordon.

The most dramatic decrease is assist-to-turnover ratio. Tech was third last year with a ratio of 1.12, but this year they are dead last in the ACC with a ratio of 0.64. That's barely half as good as last season.