Inside the ACC: SMU Is an Early Surprise, Pitt’s High-Scoring Freshman and More

Miller, a 6-foot junior who came over from ACC rival Wake Forest who’s both the leading scorer at 14.4 points per game and top playmaker with 63 assists, is the catalyst for the balance that keys SMU’s success. The Mustangs have had at least five players score in double figures in seven of their 12 games.

The Mustangs’ depth is best illustrated by forward Matt Cross, their sixth-leading scorer at 8.9 ppg and last week’s ACC Player of the Week. The 6-foot-7 super senior, at his fourth school after stops at Miami, Louisville and UMass, earned the honor with a 16-point, 16-rebound, 2-assist performance in the win against LSU. He followed that up with a 20-point, 8-rebound effort against BC, a sign that his role will continue to grow as SMU heads into the new year.

“We’re still developing as a team, but we’ve improved a lot in the last three to four weeks,” Enfield said. “I think you see that in our record, winning five in a row. But just the way we’re playing defensively, I think our guys have bought into each other, to our system. And offensively, as long as we share the ball, we can keep getting better.”

It won’t take long for them to find out how much better they need to be to become a serious postseason contender. After playing their final non-conference game against Longwood next Sunday, SMU will begin 2025 with back-to-back tests against Duke at home and North Carolina in Chapel Hill. 

Another Cummings is going places for Pitt

Jeff Capel might want to petition ACC Network to keep assigning Nelly Cummings as the analyst for its Pitt broadcasts, and not just because Cummings was an integral part of the Panthers’ NCAA Tournament team two seasons ago. The former point guard made his debut behind the mic during Pitt’s 96-56 blowout of Eastern Kentucky on Dec. 11, but his most notable achievement is the positive influence his presence at courtside had on younger brother Brandin Cummings.

The four-star freshman, who goes by the nickname Beebah, came off the bench early when teammate Jaland Lowe picked up two quick fouls and took full advantage of the opportunity by scoring his team’s first 12 points. He finished with a career-high 30, the most by a Pitt freshman off the bench, breaking Brandin Knight’s record of 24 against Georgetown in 2000. Cummings went 10-for-13 from the floor, and his six three-pointers were one off the Panthers freshman record set by Sean Miller in 1987.

“It’s just something that I’ve obviously dreamed of since I was a kid,” said Cummings, whose previous career-high was 12 points. “I always wanted to come to this school. Playing in this arena, it just made me feel really at home to know that I had my brother over there doing what he’s doing and my family there supporting me.”

Despite a 33-point embarrassment at the hands of Mississippi State in the ACC/SEC Challenge, the Panthers have put together a strong resume that includes marquee wins against LSU and Ohio State. At 10-2 overall, with a NET ranking just outside the top 10, they’re in a solid position to return to the NCAA Tournament after last season’s disappointing near miss.

Whether Nelly calls any more Panthers games or not, Brandin’s breakout performance is a positive sign for the potential for growth Pitt still possesses heading into its ACC schedule.

Around the rim

• North Carolina still has a lot of work to do to climb out of the early hole it dug for itself, but at least the process has begun. The Tar Heels, in what has become their custom this season, fell behind by 16 points against UCLA before upping the defensive intensity, finally making some shots and roaring back to take a late lead. It was a similar script to earlier games against Kansas, Michigan State and Florida, only this time, Hubert Davis’ team held on for a 76-74 win at Madison Square Garden that prevented it from falling back to .500. Even though the win gives UNC the resume boost it desperately needed, there were still troubling signs. Not the least of those were the big early deficit, the season-high 18 turnovers and 11 misses in 35 trips to the free throw line. On the flip side, the steady development of freshman Ian Jackson –— who scored a career-high 24 points — is a positive Davis and the Tar Heels can build on.
• One of two things can happen when a team faces adversity: it can either give up and go through the motions or adjust and become a better version of itself. It appears Louisville has chosen the latter. With their inside game decimated by an epidemic of injuries, Pat Kelsey’s Cardinals have been forced to become more of a perimeter team, and they’re beginning to adjust. They made a then-season-high 14 three-pointers while taking rival Kentucky down to the wire on Dec. 14, then did that one better by connecting on 15 in Saturday’s win at Florida State, including six off the bench by Reyne Smith. Louisville made 51.7 percent (15-for-29) from beyond the arc against the Seminoles, easily its best mark this season.
• Cooper Flagg is no longer the best 17-year-old basketball player in the country. No, the Duke freshman hasn’t taken a step backward or been surpassed by someone else, he just turned 18 Saturday. Flagg celebrated with a pedestrian (for him, at least) 13-point effort in an 82-56 drubbing of Georgia Tech in Atlanta that helped the Blue Devils further separate themselves from the pack in the ACC.
• Clemson lost back-to-back non-conference games to Memphis and rival South Carolina over a four-day stretch to fall to 9-3. Although both defeats came in overtime, it wasn’t the extra five minutes in those games that brought the Tigers down, it was the first few minutes. It took Brad Brownell’s team six minutes to score its first points against their fellow Tigers, and they shot just 31 percent while being held to 26 points in the first half against the Gamecocks, with leading scorer Chase Hunter going scoreless before finally warming up. Clemson solved its slow start problem Saturday, at least for the time being, by scoring 40 first half points and opening up a nine-point halftime lead in a 73-62 win against Wake Forest to improve to 2-0 in the ACC for the second time in three seasons.