Down the stretch they come

It's the last week of college basketball's regular season, and while regular season titles don't mean as much as they used to there are still local bragging rights on the line, and seedings for the upcoming conference tournaments. And nowhere is that more true than in the ACC, where they're down, once again, to those old friends, Duke and North Carolina.

Wednesday night both are in action; first, the 22-6 Tar Heels, who have climbed into a tie for first place with the Blue Devils, visit 20-8 Florida State (7 pm Eastern, ESPN). And after that Duke, coming off a loss at Virginia Tech, hosts 19-9 Clemson (9 pm Eastern, ESPN). The Heels and Dukies then meet in Chapel Hill on Saturday night to close out their regular seasons.

North Carolina extended its winning streak to five games with an 87-76 victory over Maryland on Sunday. That, combined with Duke's 64-60 loss in Blacksburg on Saturday, has created a tie at the top of the ACC.

Back about a month ago the Heels beat Florida State 89-69 while favored by 6.5 points at oddsmaker.ag. Carolina shot 56% from the floor that day, and went 8-for-20 from 3-point range, helping the game cruise OVER its Oddsmaker total of 139.

But FSU, after beating Miami on Saturday 65-59, has won four of its last five games to enhance its NCAA Tournament resume.

Elsewhere around college hoops Wednesday the top spots in a messy Conference USA are up for grabs as seedings for next week's CUSA tournament in El Paso get settled. UAB, at 10-4, owns first place at the moment, while Southern Miss, UTEP, Tulsa and Memphis are all tied for second at 9-5. Wednesday night the 20-7 Blazers are in Hattiesburg to take on the 21-7 Golden Eagles (7 pm Eastern, CSS); the 21-8 Miners host 20-9 Marshall (9 pm Eastern); the 21-8 Tigers visit 15-13 East Carolina (7 pm Eastern); and the Golden Hurricane visit 12-16 Rice (8 pm Eastern).

In the Big East four of the teams battling for first-round byes in the upcoming conference tournament hook up when 18-10 West Virginia hosts 21-7 Connecticut (7 pm Eastern, ESPN2), and 22-7 Cincinnati visits 18-11 Marquette (8 pm Eastern, ESPN3).

In the Big 12 first-place Kansas, the new No. 2 team in the land, hosts 22-6 Texas A&M (9 pm Eastern, ESPN2).

And out in the Mountain West, 27-2 BYU, coming off a big win at San Diego State on Saturday and now ranked No. 3 in the nation, hosts 18-11 New Mexico (10 pm Eastern, TMN).

On an increasingly wide-open oddsmaker.ag NCAA championship betting board Duke and Kansas are listed as co-second favorites at +400, behind only Ohio State at +300. BYU is now getting +600, followed by, among many others, UConn at +2,000, North Carolina at +3,000, Texas A&M at +10,000, West Virginia at +12,500 (125-1), Florida State and Marquette at +20,000, Cincinnati at +30,000, UTEP at +40,000, Memphis at +60,000, Clemson at +75,000, UAB at +125,000, and New Mexico at +1,000,000 (10,000-1).