Wake Forest (Wake Forest?) Favored to Win ACC
By MMDavidK, SPORTS WRITER

The Atlantic Coast Conference race looks like it will be filled with excitement down to the wire. Although the new acquisitions of Miami and Virginia Tech will not be included, the conference still has plenty of talent and will be well-represented when the playoffs roll around.

The favorites to win this league, based on team ratings, are Big Rob with Florida State, Bruce80 with Maryland, and DCoakley with North Carolina State. However, several teams consider themselves to be dark horses for the title.

For instance, CandyMan is a very intriguing baller and possible candidate to be DaONE. CandyMan was the Madden World Syndicate (MWS) 2000 national champion. He has many Madden tournament victories under his belt, but the question is can he win with Wake Forest? Despite his poor team, his superior stick skills and ability make him a huge threat in the conference.

Although Big Rob doesn’t frequent the MM Room much, he is still considered a contender even by those who haven’t played him, because of FSU’s overall team speed. Off-season rumors about whether or not Bobby Bowden has control of team will be embellished if Big Rob doesn’t get off to a good non-conference start.

Prodigy feels that he has enough talent with Clemson to make a run for the conference title. He has a solid receiving corps with Derrick Hamilton, Kevin Youngblood, and Airese Currie, labeled by him as "Snap, Crackle, and Pop." Prodigy believes if he plays mistake-free football, the ACC will be his.

Coaches like Becanes, Maliki, and Guido might struggle with sub-par teams. Candyman noted, however, that longtime rival Maliki will "DEFINITELY turn some heads" with his coaching ability. Guido will have his work cut out for him with the lowly Blue Devils. Maybe he will have to step away from Dance Dance Revolution long enough to teach these players how to play. He seemed slightly pessimistic when he commented: "I’m an offense guy, I suck with ‘D’ and gonna suck a lot with Duke."

BigG definitely has the coaching ability to win the conference with Virginia, but can he overcome his poor team ratings? He feels that it would take a couple of upsets, yet he was confident he would be able to pull it out. BigG said that quarterback Matt Schaub "should be player of the year in the ACC." If that holds true, he will likely have a successful team.

The list of ballers in the ACC and their overall team ratings, with my prediction of their final conference standing in parentheses:

Wake Forest:====> Candyman ------79 (1st)
NC State:=======> DCoakley52 ---–91 (2nd)
Florida State:==> Big Rob -------94 (3rd)
Virginia:=======> BigG ----------88 (4th)
Maryland:=======> Bruce80--------93 (5th)
North Carolina:=> Maliki---------76 (6th)
Clemson:========> MM Prodigy-----84 (7th)
Georgia Tech:===> Becanes -------84 (8th)
Duke:===========> Guido----------70 (9th)