According to just about every way you can measure such things, the Pack face their toughest test of the remaining regular season this Sunday in Atlanta. No really. The Yellow Jackets are way better than Wake and FSU.

The Wreck have earned this distinction primarily because they have the 20th best Points-Per-Possession defense in the country. That's mighty impressive. Tech hold opponents to almost .1 PPP less than does the Wolfpack D. Not to worry though Pack fans, GT makes up for this defensive over-achieving by being crazy-fancy-bad at shooting basketballs. They sport the lowest eFg% in the ACC with a woeful 46.7%.

I can clearly hear some of you saying, "None of this matters because this is an ACC road game, so if you don't mind":

Looking at the results for the year seems to back up that decision. Below is a chart (CHARTS!) of each ACC game we have played this year and the corresponding BPI score the Pack achieved in that game. (For those of you unfamiliar with BPI, just know that BPI is to college basketball teams as Quarterback Rating is for QB's. It's not perfect, but gives you a good idea of game performance in one number. It uses tempo-free stats, MOV, SOS, etc. to produce it's numeric scoring.)

No real surprises there. The Wolfpack's 88.2 home BPI average would make them the 5th best team in the country. Eat 6th Gonzaga! Their 69.8 away average, however, would make them 65th. That shoves us uncomfortably between Illinois St. to the south and Herbert B. Sendek to the north. Awkward.

So the real question is, how does Georgia Tech fare?

Good news first:
Our road average is better than their home average. Also, fwiw, their lowest home BPI score was a 33.6 against VT. That's a lot worse than we did at home against the Hokies and also a lot worse than our worst road performance (that 55.1 against UNC didn't feel like our worst road performance, but whatever).

And now the bad news:
The scary part comes when you look at their 3 best home showings. That's 3 games in the low 90's against three teams that beat us. That's very good, and very scary. Our best road performance was an 83, so it would seem like we lose if everybody brings their A game.

And now for news that makes me do that thing my dog does when it is trying to figure something out:
Their other home showings were all worse than any of the games we have played on the road. If you take all our road scores and all their home scores and rank them best to worst, the Wreck occupy spots 1-3 and spots 11-14. I have no idea what to do with all that.

I just realized I am seriously over-thinking all this. A quick scan of the charts gives you all the information you need to know that what you already knew was correct: The Wolfpack are the much better team, but that won't necessarily mean anything this Sunday.

Wolfpack -3 in case you were wondering. I wouldn't even bet on this game with Stephen's cabin-buying money. See you guys Sunday.